My mind inched forward and crawled through the blood-soaked paper towel, the cutting board, Marta’s hair tied loosely over her shoulder. I imagined I’d have to pull a long black strand from my mouth, feel it tugging through the bits of food I’d already chewed. I swung nauseatingly between worry and disappointment in myself for being worried.
“Please,” I tried again. “I’d really like to help.”
From the look on her face, a face that was deeply settled into procedure, I didn’t think she would let me. But then she handed me an onion, a plastic cutting board, and a knife, and asked me to chop it for the pasta sauce.
“Thank you,” I told her and set up my station next to her.
It was a beautiful onion: perfectly round and white with a golden tuft of hair at the top. I peeled back the papery shell and admired the smooth inside, as shiny and lustrous as mother-of-pearl. I took the knife and pierced the onion at the root, as I’d learned from Julia Child’s cookbook, but the knife was dull and it slipped, narrowly missing my thumb. I looked at Marta to see if she’d noticed, but she was standing at the stove stirring the pasta.
I let out an audible sigh. “I almost cut myself. This knife isn’t very sharp.” I waited for her reaction, but she didn’t respond.
I looked for one of the knives I’d brought from home and found it tucked behind the silverware. The moment I cut into flesh, the onion’s acidic spray was released into the air. The farther the blade sliced, the stronger the burn, and I could feel my eyes begin to pour. I cried, chopping and chopping, tears dripping from my chin, my eyes swollen. I turned the onion sideways and continued until half of it was rendered into small, seeping dices.
Marta heard me sniffle and handed me a towel. Her eyes sparkled with dryness.
“How are you bearing this?” I asked, blotting my face with the dishrag.
She shrugged and responded flatly, “Many years of cutting onions.”
I left for the bathroom to rinse my face.
Many years, I thought. I looked in the mirror and watched beads of water splay across my sunburnt cheeks, the roots of my hair frizzed from the humidity, unsure which way to turn. I had envisioned Marta and me together whimsically in the kitchen, chopping herbs and taste-testing each other’s sauces with a wooden spoon. I felt silly for believing that Marta and I would become instant friends, for having assumed that we would feel fundamentally connected, like an apprentice to her mentor. Maybe she thought I was feeble for almost cutting myself and crying over an onion. Why did I want her to feel sorry for me? I had felt a tug, just then, for her to stop what she was doing and acknowledge that I was in pain, that my eyes throbbed with tears, that I had been inches away from drawing blood. No, maybe it was that stupid comment I’d made about the cutting board. Why had I said that? I didn’t actually care which cutting board she used. Or maybe she had heard me pleasuring myself behind the bathroom door? Did I moan out loud? A hot flash drew into my hands and feet and the tips of my cheeks.
I slinked back to the kitchen, ready to start again, when I saw that she had finished chopping the onion and had already stirred it into the pan.
“You’re done?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said. She took out her fan and waved it across her face; the baby hairs that framed her hairline blew majestically back. “Lunch will be ready soon.”
Defeated, I left for the bedroom and shut the blinds. Marta never came to get me. Or maybe she did, but I wasn’t awake. I lay on the bed to rest my swollen eyes and dreamt through the passing hours. The silence woke me. On the kitchen table she had left me a plate of pasta with beef covered with plastic wrap.
That night, you returned home with the flitting energy of an emptying helium balloon and began recounting your day as soon as you walked through the door. The bus ride had been busy, with people filling the aisle and the stairs from the front to back. You worried that you wouldn’t be able to get off at the right time. But another young professor recognized your faculty tote bag and helped you push forward through the crowds. You described the students as organized and mannered and much more diligent than the wealthy students you’d taught at St. Gregory’s. (Was it a matter of affluence, you wondered. Or stricter schooling? Or maybe you were projecting.) Your classroom was vast with large windows and glossy, round-lipped plants in every corner. The Provost had dropped in unexpectedly and introduced you in front of the class.
“He told them it was a privilege to have me join them,” you said, your hands flailing. “A privilege!”
We went to the living room sofa and you stacked your feet on the coffee table.
“Anyway. Tell me about your day.”
“It was good,” I replied.
“Good?”
“Yes. It was good.”
“Anything interesting happen?”
“Not really. I did some unpacking.”
“How are things with Marta?”
“Good.”
You turned to me.
“Good, huh?”
“Well, what do you want me to say? I didn’t have as exciting a day as you. There’s still a lot to do at the apartment.”
You yawned.
“Did she cook dinner? I’m starving.”
“It’s in the refrigerator.”
You heated pasta in the microwave and brought it back to the couch. I could smell the reheated meat, ripe like an old dish sponge, steaming from the bowl.
“This is delicious,” you exclaimed and spooned faster than you could chew.
“I make that dish all the time at home.”
You didn’t answer. We sat for a few minutes as I listened to you clink the spoon against the bowl, filling your mouth with Marta’s pasta.
“Can I tell you something?” I said.
“Of course.”
“I get the sense that Marta doesn’t like me very much.”
You stopped chewing.
“Where’d you get that sense?”
“I tried to help her cook and she practically batted me away.”
“It’s her first day. You just need more time together.”
“Do we? I mean, I know I’ve said this before but…do we even need her?”
You rolled your eyes and put down your empty bowl.
“You’re the only woman I know who would complain about having a maid,” you said. You then brought your dish to the kitchen, unbuttoning your dress shirt as you walked. When you returned I could see your chest hair darkened with perspiration. “I’m going to take a shower. Maybe try and think of all the ways it will be useful to have Marta around.”