Recipes for Melissa

by Teresa Driscoll

  ‘And she lives nearby now?’

  ‘Not too far.’

  ‘This is just the stuff I need to hear. You see. You found a perfectly good way forward. After divorce, I mean. Most people tell me they do in the end. With the kids. That’s what I keep telling myself. That it will all come good in the end.’

  Max concentrated on the final slices of his baked potato, tipping some more of the salad dressing from the tiny porcelain jug onto the leaves and tomato pieces, watching the oily river catch the light against the white platter. No matter how many years passed, he always hated this bit. The point at which you had to decide whether to correct a perfectly reasonable assumption.

  In the early days it had seriously offended him. The implication that Eleanor would have chosen to leave him. These days he realised it was purely maths. Most men of his age who were single again were divorced. He had mentioned that he was single when he dated Deborah so of course Anna would assume a divorce.

  Sometimes he could get away with just changing the subject…

  ‘So – your ex, Max. She still lives in this country? I don’t meant to pry, it’s just my ex is talking about moving from Germany to Australia. To be honest, I don’t think he’s sufficiently organised to pull it off but it still frightens the life out of me. Germany was bad enough but at least it’s a short plane ride. Now I’m really not at all sure how the hell I should play it if Freddie wanted to go to Australia.’

  ‘She died.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘My wife.’

  ‘Oh my god. I’m so sorry, Max.’ The freeze frame then. The excruciating moment as they both stopped eating. Stopped moving.

  ‘It’s all right. It was a long time ago,’ he smiled, doing what he had learned to do so very well – to try to smooth over the embarrassment. To imply that being a long time ago meant he was fine about it all. He always did this. Tried to suck up all the awkwardness himself, as if it were somehow his fault.

  Well practised – yes; though strangely it never failed to surprise him how there was always this same tiny ping inside: this horrid little contraction of muscle which he had imagined would pass over time but had not and which he had, therefore, to overcome every single time so that the person who had committed the involuntary faux pas would not feel too embarrassed.

  The muscular ping was for some reason especially strong today and Max tried to make sense of this as he ate the remainder of his salad while Anna completed the familiar cycle of discomfort which he so hated.

  Max did not want anyone to feel sorry for him, least of all Anna. What he wanted was to be a man who had not lost the woman he had so loved, and given that was impossible, he wanted some end game to being this new man who over and over had to go on saying it out loud.

  That they were not, please, to be embarrassed. But his wife was dead, actually.

  Pavlova

  4 egg whites - ROOM TEMPERATURE (medium size eggs)

  8 oz caster sugar

  1 teaspoon cornflour

  1 tiny dash of white wine vinegar (barely a teaspoon)

  Three drops pure vanilla extract

  Oven at 140°C

  First nag – do not even think of trying this with eggs straight from the fridge. And your bowl must be super clean. No oil or bits of yolk. Yuk! Beat the egg whites with electric mixer until soft peaks. You should be able to turn the bowl upside down without the lot flopping out. Then whisk in the sugar a bit at a time but without stopping. Also add the cornflour, a tiny dash of vinegar and vanilla. You will now have a glossy meringue. Use a metal spoon to spread this into a circle on greaseproof paper, then use a spoon to make a little dent in the middle. Cook in the oven for 1 hour and 15 mins. Next – turn the oven off but leave the meringue inside with the door open until it is completely cold. Then turn it onto a lovely dish and fill with whipped double cream and your favourite fruits – I like strawberries and raspberries mixed together.

  OK. Deep breath. So the first thing to say about this recipe is – do not be afraid, which is rich coming from me as I shied away from pavlova for years and years out of sheer bloody terror. My mother made this outstanding pavlova – all crisp and crunchy on the outside and toffee gooey inside. Soon after I married, I had a bash myself and you should have seen the disaster. Dis. Gust. Ing. No idea whether I over whipped or under whipped or what. Anyway. Being such an appalling perfectionist, I threw in the towel until years later, you were moving up to a new class in primary school and Mrs Edwards (remember her? Year 5 – long, dark hair with red glasses?) asked me if I would bring or make a meringue for the Christmas party. Gawd. I should have bought one, of course. That would have been the sensible and sane thing to do. But – oh no! There followed a ridiculous few days in which I experimented with three different recipes from three different books and finally hit upon the fail-safe one above. Seriously – Melissa. This works. If you follow it to the letter, you will not go wrong. Always a show-stopper for entertaining and you can use it to make little nests if you like – cutting down the oven time, obviously. And OK you will have to walk a million miles to avoid slapping all that sugar straight to your thighs, but I am not going to waste any breath in this journal on all that bloody nonsense. Every woman has to figure out the food versus curves equation for herself and all I say is – whatever you are happy with, be happy with. Just don’t, for heaven’s sake, waste too much time worrying about what other people are happy with. Especially the frogs.

  And now something less sweet. I wish I didn’t have to bring this up at all but things have taken a completely unexpected turn. I had this rather odd session with my oncologist this morning. Took me by surprise and I find that I have no choice really but to mention it again.

  He is a very lovely guy – my oncologist – who has accepted my decision from here to veto the more gruesome treatments in favour of quality time and so has now involved what he calls the ‘comfort’ team. Palliative is the less pleasant term – but whatever; they are doing a jolly good job. I am, for the most part, more ‘comfortable’ these days than I have been in a while. I was very lucky in that I never lost all my hair and what I did lose is now growing back so I can stop wearing the extra hairpieces to cover things up. To even everything up I decided on a crop and though you were shocked at first (do you remember – I dyed it a very dramatic blonde!) you are now very used to it and Daddy reckons it’s ‘very Paris chic’, whatever that means. I realise that you have noticed I am not always myself and you have a lot of sleepovers at Grandma’s (thank heaven for Max’s lovely mum). We seem to have taken on some strange narrative about tummy trouble which worries me a bit as I suspect you will confuse it with girls’ chatter over periods. But I don’t think you are worrying unduly. You seem happy to me. Relaxed. Which is what I want.

  Anyway – back to Dr Palmer (Hugo on a good day) my oncologist who brought up this morning quite out of the blue the question of gene testing. I knew already that he had been involved in some of the early research into all this stuff. It may well be more common knowledge in your time zone – the BRCA1 gene mutation – but as I write it is all still pretty new and only those of us sadly in the territory hear anything about it. For myself I never felt that it had any bearing on my case. There are no other cases of breast cancer in the family that I know of so how could it?

  Mummy darling was lost, as you know, much too young with wretched cancer also but it was an entirely different kind. Ovarian. I had always personally wondered whether that was tragically to do with the fact that she had a number of miscarriages. The reason I was an only – born so late to them.

  But my oncologist shared something which quite winded me today. I am wondering, even as I write, whether I should just kick this into the long grass until I have more information but the problem is I really don’t know how much of this book will get filled. So I will share the narrative as it unfolds – hopefully ending with complete reassurance for you, which is now my absolute goal.

  Deep breath. You remember that earlier i
n the journal, I advised you to check yourself very regularly as a standard precaution and to go straight to the doctor if you find anything unusual? I said then what I honestly believe to be true – that this wretched thing is a statistical blip only in my case. I don’t want paranoia and I don’t believe in my bones that what I have is any risk to you.

  But Dr Palmer’s talk this morning took us in an unexpected direction, Melissa….

  * * *

  Eleanor heard Max’s key in the door and felt a strange mix of both irritation and relief. She hadn’t really wanted to continue with the entry and was happy to break off and tuck the book away, even though it would inevitably now hang over her. She had been having a better day, ironically – not feeling as tired as usual – and so had felt determined to get this godawful entry done. She checked her watch – puzzled. He wasn’t due home for hours.

  ‘Darling?’ His footsteps on the stairs.

  ‘Up here. I wasn’t expecting you. Everything OK?’ Pretending to jot notes on her pad – Melissa’s book safely tucked deep into the second drawer.

  Max let out a long sigh. ‘You look good today. Pinker cheeks. How did it go? With your appointment.’

  ‘Fine. Well – mostly fine. Actually there is something I need to discuss. But what are you doing home? I thought you had seminars this afternoon?’

  ‘Bumped them to Andrew. Half the group are out on some fieldwork anyway. Bank of England. So it’s not a problem.’

  ‘I keep telling you – you don’t need to do this, Max. All this coming home early. I am fine. I will ring if I am not and they’ve offered the district nurse whenever I need her. It’s way better when you are in work. Feels better.’ The truth was she hated to see the worry in his eyes; the sense of helplessness. Clinging to the rhythm of their old routine felt better for Melissa. And better for Max too.

  ‘Yes. Well. Like I say – only a handful of students around today so no big deal.’

  ‘I don’t want you getting into trouble, Max.’

  ‘I am far from in trouble. I am the department’s rising star, remember.’

  She smiled. It was a quote from a review of one of his latest papers which had again drawn some good media attention. A slot on national radio. Max had stuck the Sunday Paper comment piece above his desk downstairs with ‘rising star’ highlighted in day-glow yellow pen. Melissa had added gold stars to the cutting from her craft drawer.

  ‘So what is this bit that’s not completely fine, Eleanor?’

  She swung her legs round the side of the chair to face him better, pausing a moment.

  ‘Dr Palmer – Hugo – hit me with something of a surprise today. About this new gene testing that we talked about once before.’

  Max shifted from one foot to the other. They had had only one brief conversation about the gene research – in the early days when they had been bemoaning Eleanor’s terrible bad luck. To be hit so young.

  At that point there was no pattern in her family to suggest any relevance. Her mother had lived for five years after her diagnosis and treatment for her own cancer. There was no suggestion of a link.

  But Dr Palmer had now mentioned that he was involved in more ongoing research into the possibility that the genetic flaw was relevant in both cancers. There was a second gene – BRCA2 – which had apparently been discovered and he was wondering if Eleanor would consent to be involved in that new research work?

  ‘Why? What is he saying?’

  ‘Well. I think he was wondering if I would consent to having this gene test as part of his new research. You know. To see if that I had inherited some genetic mutation which was the reason for this.’

  ‘But there’s been no other breast cancer that we know of. I thought this testing was for clusters. For families with lots of cases of breast cancer—’

  ‘Yes. Well. Officially they think this new test will only be offered to families with a very obvious incidence. But it’s this new departure. The ovarian cancer—’

  ‘No. No. Eleanor. Do you not think we have enough going on? I don’t want you having some test that you don’t need to have. And what’s the bloody point, anyway. Just for something for him to write up in his research?’

  ‘You’re right. I said I didn’t think you would like the idea. I was just a little bit thrown by it all...’

  Neither of them mentioned Melissa.

  Over supper they were almost ridiculously upbeat to compensate. Max doing his funny walk for Melissa while preparing a particularly delicious risotto. It was only much, much later when she had gone to bed and Max and Eleanor were downstairs, both not listening to a play on Radio Four. When it had finished, Eleanor snapped off the radio and offered him a hot drink.

  ‘So this test, Eleanor. This new gene thing. Did Dr Palmer say it could have implications for Melissa? Is that what he was saying now?’

  Eleanor turned on the corner lamp which shed a warm glow across the two rear walls of the sitting room. By the time she had turned back into the room, Max’s face in contrast was white.

  ‘Please tell me he’s not now saying that Melissa could be at risk?’

  20

  MELISSA – 2011

  The water was absolutely beautiful – clear and warm. Melissa watched the froth wash over her toes and felt the pull of the sand beneath both feet as the wave retreated. She stood still until the next much stronger wave took her by surprise.

  ‘I’ll laugh if you go over,’ Sam had retreated from the water, still nervous over his injured leg, sandals in one hand.

  Melissa now joined him and they moved further back to the drier, firmer sand to sit down with Sam stretching his bad leg straight out in front of him.

  ‘God – I love this part of the day. Before it gets too hot. Should get up this early more often,’ Melissa was now leaning back on her straightened arms, head tilted to the sun with her eyes closed.

  ‘Yeah. Me too. The heat later really makes this bloody leg itch.’

  ‘Fancy breakfast at the cafe?’

  ‘Good idea…’

  It had been so much better since he knew about the journal. She had shown him some more carefully-chosen sections. The entry on the biscuits and the boeuf bourguignon recipe. Melissa was still cautious, but they were beginning to talk a little about some of the memories her mother’s writing had stirred. She was surprised by how much this helped.

  In fact, she had been making a few jottings since she remembered about the box of equipment in the garage. Melissa had been noting down all the little scenes unlocked by the recipes and her reading. The little comments her mother made when she was cooking. The sound of the jam bubbling. That image of the damp cloth in her mother’s hand as she so proudly cleaned her Kenwood Chef. The writer in Melissa had wanted to try to put down on paper her shock at all this; that food and cooking could trigger this, especially in someone like her who had in the past been so very disinterested in the kitchen. A part of her wanted to share these jottings but she wasn’t quite sure how.

  ‘Listen, Melissa. I’ve been having a think. About the journal. How about we cook all these recipes in sequence when we get back?’

  Melissa sat up straight, not entirely surprised they were thinking about the journal at the same time. ‘You serious? Me? Jam – and pavlova? I don’t think so…’

  ‘Oh come on, Melissa,’ he had turned towards her, trying to read her expression. ‘You’re not as bad a cook as you make out. And you must surely want to? Have thought about it?’

  Melissa was looking back at him closely. ‘You’re right,’ she brushed sand from her legs. ‘I do want to try them; of course I do. In fact I’ve been thinking a lot about all the stuff they’ve stirred up,’ she was remembering that time on the balcony. The very transient but strong sense of what it felt like to have her mother in the room.

  ‘But I want to get it right. I don’t want to rush it. And I’m worrying about how to tell my dad.’

  ‘I get that. And I didn’t mean go hammer and tongs. I just mean try a few of the
recipes. See how you feel. I expect it’s what your mother hoped.’

  Melissa was just about to share her idea about writing something. She didn’t want to trespass on her family’s privacy, of course – and she wouldn’t do anything until she had finished the journal, spoken to her father and cleared her head. But she was thinking that it would be really nice to create some kind of open platform to share what her mother had called ‘stories at the stove’. Maybe some kind of blog? Yes – a forum to both share and honour the way food and the kitchen could so surprise. Unlock things. She couldn’t, surely, be alone in the powerful feelings her mother’s recipes had triggered. Perhaps she could encourage other people to share their own stories too?

  Melissa was just working out how to bounce this idea past Sam when his phone rang. He pulled a face. There had been very few intrusions. Just one minor query from the office – a hiccup over listed building consent over another chapel conversion which only Sam could sort.

  Melissa watched his eyes widen as he listened.

  ‘Yeah. And I love you too, mate. But you sound as if you could do with some coffee. Where are you, Marcus?’

  Melissa frowned. Sam’s older brother.

  He listened for a little longer, interrupting where he could. ‘Look. It’s lovely to hear from you too, buddy, but I’m on a beach. In Cyprus. You need to get yourself some coffee and get some kip. Yes?’ He listened some more, frowning and then widening his eyes in turn. ‘OK. Yep, I hear you. But I’m going to have to ring off now, Marcus. All right? You need to go to bed, mate. Yes. Yes. And I love you too.’

  He ended the call but then began to dial immediately.

  ‘Sorry, Mel. But I’m going to have ring home. He says he’s at Dad’s. Drunk as a skunk.’

  ‘Are they all right. Your parents?’

  ‘Apparently.’

  Sam then walked and talked for several minutes, hobbling to and fro on the sand, his face falling and putting his right arm up over the top of his head. His posture of panic.