"Capetown Breezes" by Penny Pennell

Mama never cried when she chopped onions. She peeled the rustic encasing from the fleshy orb and with her butcher’s knife slid through the root and crown while cold water ran from the tap. In the chill of the water, her long, knobby fingers turned white. The water shut off, pink rushed to her fingertips while she dried them on a towel.

Then the cutting board brought closer to the edge of the counter. The onion pierced. Thin rings sliced, fanned from the center with her thumb. A tendril of blond slipped from her chignon. She left the rings of watery flesh—the tears of an onion, not Mama.

That morning we picked apples from our tree. Mama selected two and peeled. She left a long, thin curl, telling me of an old wives’ tale: keep the curl intact so that when it dropped to the counter it would reveal the first letter of your true love’s name. Mine was L. Always L. Sure, it could have been a J. Four swift cuts to the cheeks and the apples stood with right angles, revealing slender cores. Mama never liked to waste. And when she diced—neat, tidy cubes.

Butter wafted, sizzled and popped, the onions hitting the pan. Gentle stir and back to the cutting board.

Don’t let it burn, I would tell her.

She didn’t.

In the next room, Father worked the piano, a distended growl from low C, unbridled and clashing. He hammered to perfect pitch. His reward would be Mama’s Bobotie and my renewed dedication to lessons, to practice, to keeping 6/8 time.

The beef, the turmeric, the curry, the raisins followed suit. Milk wrung from slices of bread—my favorite task—followed. We sautéed. We talked. We laughed at B flat.

For those anxious forty minutes until the next step, I would run and play. Sand on bare feet. Gulls above. Shells below. Rest. Impatient for the next beat. The lull before the egg and milk mixed. Chores. The vague note of laundry soap. The parched soil under violets. Bills to pay.

I don’t remember why the windows were kept open when Father tuned the piano. It couldn’t have added to the craft. But in my memory the salt air perfected the music like it perfected the sauce. But here—now—a hemisphere away from home, the salt is gone, the air dry with the lingering scent of brittle leaves, of harvest.

Watching Mama craft Bobotie, held the wonder of perusing sheet music too advanced for me to play. When she offered me a card covered in her wobbly script, the magic I’d sustained was gone.

I never mastered her technique of chopping onions without tears.

Penny Pennell received a master’s degree in English with an emphasis in creative writing from the University of Illinois at Springfield. Her fiction has appeared in Eureka Literary Magazine (ELM), Underground Voices, Foliate Oak, The Journal of Microliterature, River Poets Journal, and The Illinois Times.