Chapter 10: Her Sister's Sauce

On Sunday afternoon my sister walked into the diner carrying a black pot.

She wore sunglasses, a camel coat and an expression I had never seen on her face.

She looked scared.

"Don't say anything," Bianca said, and set the pot on my counter.

The pot smelled like burned tomatoes.

"What is that?"

"Sunday gravy." She took her sunglasses off.

"The fiancé's mother is coming to lunch next Sunday."

"He told me I'd cook for her, because that's what a Gallardi wife does."

"Mom's gravy?"

"Mom's in the basement, and she won't come out." Her voice cracked.

"Livia, I've made it four times. I can't even make it taste like food."

I stared at her.

For twenty-five years she had been handed everything.

Now she stood in a campus diner with her chin shaking over a pot.

"I won't cook it for you," I said.

"I'll pay you."

"I won't do it for money, either."

"Then what do you want?"

"I want you to chop."

The owner looked over the counter at her camel coat.

I saw him decide she was worth tolerating.

"Back kitchen," he said. "Don't burn anything."

So my sister stood at the prep table in her cashmere with a paring knife.

I put a bag of onions in front of her.

She cried within a minute.

"It's the onions," she sniffed.

"It's the onions."

"This is humiliating."

"You're holding the knife wrong."

I moved her fingers, and she let me.

Her hands were smooth.

She looked down at mine, rough from a year of bleach and hot water, lying over hers.

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