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It starts when Ava finds dumpling wrappers in the frozen aisle as they’re getting groceries. They were meant to simply restock their staples - dried beans, eggs, this week’s serving of fresh vegetables - but Ava’s eyes are wide and curious as she turns the package over in her hands.
In a sudden flash (of insight, of yearning, of want), Beatrice can see them at the table of their small home - apartment , she corrects herself sternly - flour on Ava’s cheek, concentration on her brow as she tries for the eighth time to pleat a dumpling closed the way Beatrice had taught her (the way she herself had been taught one weekend a senior at school had invited Beatrice to her home over a holiday; Cindy’s grandmother had offered to make dumplings and neither Cindy nor her grandmother had said anything ill or pitying when she had admitted to never making one before; Cindy had been the only other Asian at school and graduated two months later) -
“Bea?”
She steadies herself, takes a breath. “Put it back.” Beatrice preempts Ava’s pout with what she hopes comes off as a smile; that Ava doesn’t immediately start whining means it’s at least a partial success. “They’re better made from scratch.” She sighs at Ava’s squeal and leads them back through the store to procure a bag of flour.
(It takes 15 tries before Ava can properly pleat a dumpling closed. They set up a makeshift steamer in their only pan with an empty tin can and a plate, steaming one-third of the batch, pan frying the other third, and freezing the rest. Beatrice teaches Ava how to use chopsticks; Ava drops three dumplings before she gets the hang of it, laughing the entire time. The dumplings in the freezer are one of the many things they’re forced to leave behind.)
*
Of course Ava gets sick after they get caught in the rain while training. She’s bundled in blankets and tissue boxes on the couch, cursing the halo for not keeping her from getting “the stupid fucking common cold” as Beatrice closely watches the rice on the stove.
It’s not a memory, exactly. She’s not sure how she would have seen her father making congee when she herself had been sick in bed. But somehow, she remembers the wide kitchen, cold more than it was warm, her father a solitary figure at the stove, stirring occasionally as he chopped up vegetables at the counter, fried garlic in a smaller pan (she knows it was likely just a fever dream and that he’d had the help make it, but still she wishes, remembers to wish).
Congee isn’t much to look at, she realizes a second before she hands Ava her bowl. It occurs to Beatrice that she should have warned her, should have kept her from getting her hopes up, perhaps should have made something else entirely -
“Smells incredible,” Ava says, greedily taking the bowl, hissing slightly at the heat. She perches the bowl atop her blanket covered knees, dunking her spoon in and barely blowing off the steam before taking her first bite. Her eyes widen and she lets out a series of sounds too garbled for Beatrice to remotely count as language.
Beatrice shakes her head and settles on the other side of the couch. She doesn’t have to wait long until Ava swallows and exclaims, “I had no idea rice could be this good!”
“Rice is magic that way.” It’s an echo of words she’s heard only once before (her father, the cook, an uncle, she’s not sure). She dips her own spoon into her bowl, watches it fill. Lifts it to her lips and she’s a child again, her father’s hand on her head and something like safety, something like care settling around her shoulders, a dream, a wish.
There’s a warmth at her knee. She looks down to see Ava’s hand there, looks up to see Ava’s eyes closer than she expects, gaze searching, intent (Beatrice feels her breath catch; she can be honest enough with herself to admit that the warmth blooming in her chest is not from the congee).
“- teach me how to make this too?”
Beatrice blinks. “Why?” she blurts out before she can filter her words.
Ava shrugs, scoops up another spoonful. “I want to make it for you too one day.” She swallows hastily before following up, “Not that I’m hoping you get sick or anything, I mean I doubt you even get sick, you’re like the healthiest of healthy, germs are probably scared of you -”
Beatrice lets a laugh puff through her nose. “I’ll teach you.” Everything I know , Beatrice thinks, promises, everything I have.
(Ava eats three bowls and falls asleep on the couch after taking some medicine. They leave Switzerland before Beatrice gets the chance to teach her the recipe.)
*
In hindsight, Beatrice should have known something like this would happen. What did you expect? a dark voice murmurs in the back of her mind, sharp and condescending, the companion she’s had ever since she was a child. Beatrice shoves it away into the deepest part of her mind, keeps it as far away as she can from Ava.
Ava, who is looking at her with wide eyes and her mouth slightly agape, mimicking the pair of fish she’s holding up next to her face. A pair of whole trout that had certainly not been on the grocery list Beatrice had given her, though yes, to her credit, Ava did get all the other items on the list. “- but Bea I swear they were calling my name and the fishmonger even let me haggle and yeah maybe I didn’t get as good a price as you would have but still -”
Beatrice sighs; it’s not like they can take them back anyway. They lean against the counter as Ava looks through ‘best ways to cook whole trout’ videos on her phone, Beatrice watching surreptitiously while she’s supposedly conducting a search for recipes on her own phone. Ava keeps scrolling from one video to the next until one catches Beatrice’s eye. Or rather, her ear: The sound of sizzling oil sparks the barest hint of a memory - a warm kitchen in a cramped home, a table full of laughter, faces with eyes that match her own, someone helping her gather a serving of food from the rotating turntable -
“This is the one,” Ava proclaims. It’s both the tone and proximity that startles Beatrice, that makes her realize just how closely Ava was watching her ( has been watching her; it’s something Beatrice has been too scared to admit she’s noticed, because to acknowledge means to confront and to confront means to change and to change means to lose and if there is one thing that she cannot, will not, must not lose, it’s this: the way Ava is looking at her now, the way she looks at her always, the way she looks when she only looks at her).
They pan fry the fish until there’s a golden crust on both sides, add a simple sauce, and serve it on the table with bowls of rice. “This fish is amazing,” Ava proclaims after the first bite, albeit with increasingly more effusive language as she eats. Beatrice ignores the heat on her own cheeks when moans start entering the mix; she scolds Ava about the former, refuses to acknowledge the latter, but agrees that the fish does, indeed, taste ‘out of this world.’
(They talk about fishing, about freshwater and saltwater fish, about the ocean and snorkeling and diving; they make plans to swim, to sail, to boat, to fish. One out of four is a failing grade , the dark voice whispers during nights Beatrice cannot sleep, the portal too bright in her dreams. She knows.)
*
Beatrice hasn’t been to this grocery store before, hasn’t been to a grocery store since - since she can’t remember, but Ava is back and Ava is hungry and insistent on getting out of the apartment. Beatrice says yes because there’s no other answer she would dare give (not now, not ever).
Ava didn’t say anything about Beatrice’s meager stores at her apartment and a part of her is glad she didn’t ask, unsure if she would have been able to explain how she never cooks now, how she eats out almost exclusively, a half-hearted attempt to follow Ava’s wish for her to live, to wash away the bitterness that so frequently weighed down her tongue these past 14 months (sure, she could have lived more piously but what’s the use of salvation when there’s nothing left to salvage? And so her dismissal of cooking extended to prayer, and on some days and many nights, extended to hope).
They meander through the aisles, enthusiasm and curiosity speeding and slowing Ava’s steps at unpredictable intervals. Beatrice keeps pace easily, following with the cart, merely hums when Ava picks something up of interest and tosses it in. She notices that Ava doesn’t wander too far as they walk, turns often to make sure Beatrice is still in sight; she knows she’s likely doing the same.
They reach the frozen section and Beatrice smiles at a pack of dumpling wrappers. The selection at this store is miles ahead of the grocery they’d frequented in Switzerland: there are no less than five types of wrappers as well as shelves full of bags of premade dumplings and, to Beatrice’s surprise, steamed buns.
She catches Ava watching her, feels her chest tighten at the memory of that look, how long it’s been since she’s been on the receiving end of it. She’s too caught up in it to stop Ava from snatching two bags of steamed buns and tossing them into the cart.
Beatrice can’t help but huff. “It’ll taste better -”
“- if we make it from scratch, I know.” Ava’s expression stills the rest of Beatrice’s protest - it’s less a smile and more a plea. “Teach me later?” She reaches out and her fingers, still cold from the freezer, callused and scarred from the other side, brush against Beatrice’s wrist. A promise of later, an offering of time, a vow of self. Beatrice takes it, threads their fingers together, holds on as tight as she can.
(It takes just two minutes to heat the steamed buns up in the microwave Beatrice had never used til then. They eat on the couch and Beatrice files the moment away with all the other memories they’ve made together, will make together.
(They write out a list of all the recipes of food they want to make - everything from pizza to cream puffs to pot pie to beef noodle soup. “It’s going to take us a while to get through all of these,” Ava says around a mouthful of her fifth steamed bun.
“We have time,” Beatrice answers, quiet and determined. “We’ll have time.”)