Main Ingredients:
stepdad
biologist
lime
mint
sports bra

Spice Pack:
1/4 whisper of acceptance
1/3 cup of neglect



She was sitting on the patio of that funky café, near the city market. What was it? “The sconewitch”?
Yes, that’s it.

A moment like this, liberating… The sunrays are refracting through the ice cubes in her glass of mojito. She closes her eyes. She smells the mint bushes against the old house wall and her grandmother picking a few leaves for a bean stew. The same warmth at the back of her neck, the same flashes of light in her eyelids. She squeezes the lime juice into the glass, eats the citrusy flesh and leaves the rind, a green crescent moon on the napkin.

Her grandma caresses the leaf’s tops like moving a brush stroke over the canvas, on her way into the house. She was such a great cook. It was only her stepdad who has something to complain about. “There was not enough salt!” or “There was too much salt!” He knew how to make you feel incompetent and helpless. She was only 13, just started wearing a bra. It wasn’t even a real bra, but the sports bra in which her breast, barely blossoming, looked even less visible. But he noticed them. He wanted to see them. She feels his hand on her shoulder and shivers.

- Excuse me!

She opens her eyes, terrified.

- Sorry if I startled you. Have you seen “The Lives of a Cell”? A book? I left it at this table. I was here just twenty minutes ago.

- No, - she whispered in relief - there is only my mojito.

- I really need it. For this conference, here in Ottawa. I am a biologist, you see.

She smiles.