Stressed Spelled Backwards

by Ivanova, Svetlana

  "I can't stand it! It's more than a person can bear!" Celia grumbled. "The mere mention of Gourmet Week makes me sick. That woman charges ten dollars for a lousy bowl of pumpkin soup. She charges twenty for two chicken wings and five just to walk in the door and listen to stupid music! She's a criminal! She should be put on the electric chair!"

  We ate all our meals in the deli, serving ourselves since Celia was still raving mad. By weekend, our landlady could take it no more. I was pouring some coffee for Karmen and Elise when I overheard her disguising her voice in a French accent on the kitchen phone.

  "I just had supper at that miserable Monica's, and there was a cockroach in my food as big as a Volkswagen. You're the health inspector. Do something about it," then in a normal voice at me, "Go and sit down and mind your own business, Miss. Kononovich. And don't be so generous with my coffee. You think it grows on trees?"

  During that week, I had to suspend the job search because of my black eye. Outwardly I complained bitterly, but I was rejoicing on the inside. While Karmen scoured the city for another job and Elise went on fashion shows, I toured around my apartment, went to museums and art galleries and saw the movies.

  "It doesn't seem fair, does it?" Celia snickered. "Your friends are busting their bums, and you're on a vacation."

  "It's my eye," I explained. "Who would hire me with a face like that?"

  She snorted. "You can hardly see it anymore. You're just making excuses."

  "Look," I said defensively, "As soon as I'm back to normal, I'll be right out there with them."

  The bruise continued to fade. I actually toyed with the idea of enhancing it a little with mascara and eye shadow. But then Karmen got hired on as a receptionist at a publishing company. The next morning, I was once again looking for a job.

  Almost immediately, my mind started playing the usual tricks on me. A little dust here, a rumpled sheet there, anything to keep me away from that employment goal. Then I started cooking again. During the black eye, I hadn't felt the slightest urge to turn on the stove. I started with dinner, but soon an elaborate luncheon became a habit, too.

  I began preparing lunch boxes for Karmen and Elise. I told them it was because I felt bad about not contributing to the expenses. But the real reason was that, by preparing them the previous afternoon, I could use up even more job-hunting time.

  Then I diversified into the laundry. It was a godsend. Laundry takes hours!

  What was the matter with me? There was a time back in my parent's house when my clothes got piled up like a mountain. Why was the sight of dirty socks or a rumpled sheet suddenly so intolerable?

  Cooking, cleaning, washing, ironing - these used to be nothing more than scolding words in my mom's list of Things to Nag About Today. Now not only did I do them - they were my whole life!

  Was I goofing off? No way! There wasn't a job on earth that would have me working this hard! I couldn't believe maintaining one little apartment could be so complicated. Could you imagine a whole house? Talk about the chronic disappointment. You wash clothes, somebody wears them, you make beds, and somebody sleeps in them, the more you cook, the more dishes you have to scrub. All your accomplishments reset to zero. How could every housewife in the world live like this?

  I had sworn that I would never be a housewife!

  But now that was technically what I was.

  And it doesn't help when your roommates are such slobs.

  One day I got the bright idea to rearrange some of the furniture. But the problem was that the section under where the couch used to be was cleaner than the rest of the carpet. So I had to shampoo the rug, which made everything else in the apartment look lousy, so I had to vacuum the upholstery, wax the floor, and wash the walls. I barely had time to make dinner.

  Karmen and Elise hardly noticed the change in me. Between overtime and Clarice Kingsley, they weren't around much and rarely showed up for dinner. No matter what I said about their girlfriend, those two idiots just wouldn't listen to me.

  I didn't have a hope of domesticating them, but it wasn't much of a bother becoming their personal housekeeper.

  When I went groceries shopping, I walked past the baking section. A nostalgic feeling stirred in me. Before I knew it, I was stacking flour and chocolate fudge cake mix, which I hadn't been able to resist buying them.

  I remembered working in my parents' bakery. I remembered the smell of fresh baked bread and cakes and all sorts of pastry, and it made me miss home. When I was little, my mother always used to make vanilla and strawberry shortcakes based on a traditional Russian dessert topped with sweet mascarpone and finished with a naughty warm chocolate sauce. Before she even put it to chill, she would allow me to lick the spoon and scrape the bowl. I always used to say that, if I had my way, that glorious stuff would be gone before she could get it chilled.

  I was homesick, but I still didn't want to go home. So I decided to make that memorable dessert myself.

  After carefully layered up the cheese mixture with the nectarines and strawberries, I put the stuff to cool off for an hour. When the pots were ready to serve, I ran around the ramekins with a sharp knife then unmolded onto plates. I topped them remaining almonds and drizzle with warm chocolate sauce. I sat down and started with the first bite. It was ten times better than I remembered it.

  I ate three of the shortcakes and only two more left. I gave one to the Jogging Grandma. She ate it in two bites.

  "I never knew you were a great baker, Azra dear!" she said. "That is so fantastic! It reminds me a lot of my childhood. This...this brought back sweet memories."

  To my surprise, she started sobbing. I didn't know my dessert tasted so good, it moved her to tears. I spent half an hour consoling the elderly and listening to her childhood stories and love life. But an idea burst into my mind. What if I could sell these cakes? A plan began to take shape. I would have to find a place that I could sell these goodies.

  I went down to the deli with the last vanilla cake. I was too proud of my baking skill and wanted someone to notice the result. Celia frowned at me when I put the cake in front of her.

  "What's this?" she said.

  "I name it 'Azra's Secret'," I said, beaming. "It's a special dessert recipe from home."

  "Fatness might not an imminent danger for you, but not for me," she said.

  "Oh come on, Celia," I said. "You always complain about how customers keep turning away to Monica's, but have you ever noticed how boring your menu is? There's no cool desserts whatsoever!"

  She glared at me. "What are you, a dessert police?"

  "What I mean is I have something refreshing for your menu," I said. "If you let me sell these in your deli, I will have money to pay my rent on time. It's a win-win solution."

  She was silent, probably weighing the option. Then she looked at the cake, which was all cute and delicate on the plate, it looked like it could sit on a queen's table. After a moment, Celia shrugged and gave in. She scooped a tiny piece and put into her mouth.

  I held my breath, but then I could see a spark in her eyes. The landlady ended up wolfing off the whole thing in a blink. I poured her some tea.

  "If I die of diabetes, it's all your fault," she said. I knew that was how good my dessert was.

  "Told you," I said with a smirk.

  "Well, be sure that you keep the consistency," she said. "I want the cakes on my counter freshly bake every day and I take ten percent of the sale."

  "Ten percent?"

  "Do you want it or not?"

  "Okay, okay," I said. "Deal."

  And that was how I became self-employed.

  Chapter Eleven

  I was prepared for the life in the big city, but nothing can prepare a girl for anything like real life itself. In fantasy books, the warrior princess knows how much food she will take with her. What sort of monsters she will slay. Should she trust the witch or burn her? It seemed every moment of the journey she had to make a life-and-death decision, but at least, her life sounded more exciting than
my current one.

  On Friday, I went down to the deli to see if I could borrow some eggs from Celia for my first business launch.

  "'Neither a borrower nor a lender be', Miss. Kononovich. Fifty cents per egg."

  "What? You charge higher than the supermarket," I said.

  "They're organic," she replied with a shrug. "You don't plan to give my beloved customers cancer lumps in the future, do you?"

  I rolled my eyes and went back to the apartment. I turned on the music and danced as I mixed the flour and eggs. Once done, I got out the vanilla ice cream. We didn't have any strawberries, so I threw in chopped nuts and candy sprinkles, and topped the whipped cream off with a cherry. I was in love with my dessert. A minute later, the bell rang. I went to open the door and found Clarice, standing there with a wide smile plastered on her face.

  The first word that came out of my mouth was, "Nope."

  I slammed the door shut. It was clear that I wasn't going to let that devil charm her way into my personal space again.

  "Hey, Azra, please, let me in!" cried Clarice, rapping on the door. I groaned when she wouldn't stop abusing my hearing.

  "What do you want?" I said when I opened the door again. She sort of pouted in that cute way and I had to remind myself to be tough.

  "I just wanted to drop by to see if your eye is okay," she said and whizzed into my kitchen uninvited. "I brought you some eye drops."

  "Well, it was last week, and I still can see all right, so don't worry," I said and turned to resume my work.

  "What are you doing?" she said, staring at my dessert.

  "I'm building a nuke in my kitchen, can't you tell?" I said, but she missed my sarcasm.

  "Oh, I didn't know you could bake too! You're so cool," Clarice said. "Can I have a taste of that?"

  "No, that's for sale." I pulled the dessert away from her protectively. "I'm trying to earn money selling them."

  "Well I would love to buy one then," she said. "It looks so adorable."

  I was about to refuse, but then how would I know if the dessert held the same glorious flavor like the last time? Celia would be pissed if I brought to her deli with low-quality products. I might as well get a feedback now.

  "Okay," I said. "You have a bit and tell me what you think."

  I scooped a spoonful of fresh cake and before I could hand it to her, Clarice leaned in with her mouth open, and I ended up spoon-fed her. The sight of her luscious lips wiped away the dessert caused a weird feeling in my body. My face heated up.

  "Oh wow, Azra, it tastes fantastic!" she said, smacking lips in delight. "Not even a five-star hotel can serve such a delicious thing! You're a dessert princess!"

  I blushed some more.

  "You think so?—Thanks," I said.

  "You know I admire you," she said and leaned herself against the counter, looking at me with those deep green eyes. "You're very self-efficient, and you look like you never get bored or stressed. You just do your own things."

  "I enjoy my own company if you haven't noticed yet," I said. "Aren't you happy with your life or something? Is that why you keep popping up in mine?"

  She laughed and laughed, and told me what a funny girl I was.

  "It wasn't a joke," I muttered.

  "Well," she said sheepishly. "I'm free today if there anything I can do to help set up your business."

  Maybe I could use a hand getting the dessert down to the deli after all. I tried to avoid being alone with her too long. It started to do weird things to my system.

  We walked past the Jogging Grandma, who had just returned from her daily run.

  "Is that your girlfriend?" she whispered to me because apparently everyone in the building knew about three lesbians from Russia living in Apartment 2B having a girlfriend, except they didn't know which one. Trust me, I didn't know which one either.

  "No, she's everyone else's girlfriend," I whispered back. "She only drops by every now and then to let me do her work."

  We found Celia bending over on the counter. Why was she leaning like that?

  "Celia, are you okay?" I asked. Her face looked a bit bluish.

  "I'll be okay when you give me my fifty cents. Otherwise, give back my eggs."

  "I can't. They all turned to this," I said and put the dessert in the glass cover. "But what's with the sitting down?" Normally, she would go around verbally harass her customers.

  "You want to know what it is? I'll tell you what it is. Mind your own business, that's what."

  But I could tell she was in pain, because she was grim and pale, and she didn't find pleasure abusing anyone today.

  "I think she might need a medical checkup," Clarice said. "She looks like she's in no condition to be working."

  "Miss. Kononovich, I didn't know your girlfriend was a model-slash-medical doctor," Celia said. "Now leave me alone."

  "Well, she's not my..." I started but then Karmen and Elise walked into the deli together. They looked at Clarice and me and then at Celia.

  "Hey, Clarice! What are you doing here?" Karmen asked, excited to see the Elven Princess.

  "I'm visiting Azra," she said. There was an awkward pause.

  "Why are you guys home so early?" I asked to change the subject.

  "I just finished the photo-shoot," Elise said. "The producer let me take the car from the set for a day. Such a sweet guy."

  We looked outside and saw a sparkling white Rolls-Royce. Karmen grimaced.

  "He must be blind or you made him blind," she said then turned to our landlady at the corner. "Is Celia okay?"

  The landlady was muttering to herself. Her walk seemed a bit stiff and slower than usual.

  "She won't tell me." I shrugged.

  We decided to sit around our booth and observed the woman.

  "What is this, a circus show? Don't you have anything to do other than staring at me?"

  "Ms. Celia," reasoned Elise. "Have you had your sugar level checked?"

  "Looks like everybody graduated from a medical school today!"

  But after a long argument, we managed to hustle our landlady out of the deli and into the car, which was conveniently there for a ride to the hospital. We got her into the luxurious seat.

  "I wouldn't buy a car like this for no money," she said, obviously overcame with gratitude at our concern.

  Celia had refused to go and leave the deli unattended, so this was a compromise. Elise and Karmen would stay and mind the place for an hour or so because neither of them liked the idea of the other going along with their girlfriend, which meant I and Clarice would drive the grumpy Celia to the Emergency.

  We parked the borrowed car on the side of the street and hustled Celia again into the hospital.

  When the doctor got out of the Emergency room, Clarice and I asked how she was.

  "Her head is fine, judging by the way she complains about everything," the doctor, whom we learned was Mrs. Brown, said. "But she messed up her back, working too hard—stressed and bad diet. We have to put her in traction."

  "But how?" I wailed. "She was perfect just yesterday."

  "It took a while to stiffen up," said the doctor. "But now that it has, she's in for at least a month."

  "A month?" My heart gave a lurch. "And it's—it's my fault!"

  "What?" Clarice looked at me blankly. "What did you do?"

  I slumped against the counter. "I introduced her to my Azra's Secret. It's bad for her health, and that's probably why she got sick."

  Clarice looked confused.

  "It's my signature dessert," I said. "You tasted it."

  "Oh come on, Azra," Clarice tried to comfort me. "You can't say it's because of that."

  There was nothing else we could do, so we left the hospital, but the spot we parked Elise's car was empty.

  "Where's our car?" I said.

  "We parked it here, didn't we?" Clarice said.

  "Someone stole the car!" I gasped in panic. "What are we going to tell Elise?"

  "Look! Is that our car?" Clarice pointed
to a distance. Then I saw the tow truck. It had the logo of the NYPD on it, and it was taking our car away!

  "Hey!" I was up and running after it.

  "Azra!" Clarice called from behind. After a few seconds later, she was ahead of me. Clarice could put a professional Olympic runner to shame. People on the sidewalks looked at us. It must be quite a sight —two young women running and screaming after a truck.

  Four blocks of road race had me fuming, but Clarice caught up with the truck as it slowed down at the traffic light. She went in front of it and held her palm up as if she could stop it like a Supergirl or something. The driver hit the brake. I reached them at last, but I couldn't speak, so I banged on the window and hyperventilated. Why it always happened to me of all people? The Rolls-Royce was hanging there.

  "Sir! Mister! (gasp) Mister! (gasp) Hold it! You can't tow away that car! (gasp) That's (gasp) legal parking space!"

  "I'm sorry, ma'am, but your vehicle seems to have excessive parking tickets as of late," the police said.

  "What?" I said. "I just drove it today!"

  "Excuse me, officer," Clarice came to say in a sweet voice. "It's not our car actually. We borrowed from a friend who borrowed it from another friend."

  Her simple explanation worked a lot better than I thought. After a lot of nodding and smiling, the police agreed to let us go.

  "I promise it won't happen again," Clarice said with a gleaming smile. Then the beauteous model and I got into our car and drove out of there.

  Once we walked into the deli again, Elise and Karmen came to us. It was probably the longest time they could stay with each other without me.

  "Where's Celia?" Elise asked.

  "She's not coming back," I said unhappily.

  "Is she dead?" Karmen gasped in terror.

  "No silly! She's fine, but she has to stay in the hospital for a while," I said. "I think it's because she had too much of my Azra's Secrets the other day. It's my fault."

  "Girl, it's not your fault! Don't blame yourself like that," Karmen said.

  My mourning was interrupted by the ringtone of my phone. It was Celia.

  "Miss. Kononovich, this is your fault!" she yelled into my ear. "You and your friend need to come and break me out of here! They've got me tied up like I'm a loony, and the doctors won't listen to reason. They might as well speak Russian!"