NEWS POST

Under reconstruction. Please don't mind the mess. In the meantime, have what I desperately hope is the last piece of filler this blog shall see for a long while. It's the best bit of a "dark comedy"I wrote when I first came to live with my aunt and uncle. In all honesty, it was mostly fifty pages of pure catharsis, but this chapter is one of my favorites and stands alone as its own short story. Plus, it's written by me in ninth grade, so is likely amusing in ways I did not intend at the time. Enjoy!

Dinner

I sit down at the dining room table and watch Fam and Unc as they arrange themselves in their chairs. It was dinner time again. My aunt had actually cooked, and I was dreading what I had to put myself through as a result. You see, I am a picky eater at best, and you CAN’T be picky when you’re dealing with her cooking. If you are, you’ll starve. Which might explain why I have lost ten pounds in the last two months.

As she sets the plate down in front of me I try frantically to fight back a look of horror. Fam has an insecurity about her cooking. You see, her mom and her sister were wonderful cooks (being her sister’s daughter, I should know. Man, I’m ruined.), and she just hasn’t ever managed to get the knack of it. The mess that is supposed to be goulash looms at me, and I find myself thinking about the famous Spartan black broth. Great, I think. Even militant, bloodthirsty Greeks living before the Christian Era had it better than me.

Fam looks at me expectantly to see if I'm happy to see her latest creation, and I really do feel guilty for what's going through my mind. She's made an effort in the kitchen since I got here, but her desire to please has often just made it all worse. See, every time I don't like the dish, she takes it as a personal insult on her pride. It's sad. I try my best to hide what I really think of her cooking, but...

So here I am now, guilty, yet wanting to burst into hysterical laughter. I'm also disgusted at my own juvenality. It takes all my effort to suppress these three emotions; It takes all my self-control to pick up a fork and stab the overcooked pasta shells before me without retching.

Just as I’m about to take a bite, Fam says “I ran out of tomato paste, so I used ketchup.”

The fork goes down. I look at her with incredulity. “Ketchup? The slop that is in no way similar to tomato paste?” I really doubt that ketchup is still made with tomatoes. I mean, come on, it comes in green!

She looks at me, mildly annoyed. “You won’t be able to tell.”

I hoped she was right. Well, time to focus on the task at hand. Holding my breath, I put the fork in my mouth and try to get the pasta off of it. I do eventually win, but there is no joy in it. The stuff is a medley of these three flavors and textures: Squishy starch, runny ketchup, and stringy cheese. And I swear it’s trying to chew me back.

“So,” I ask once I have finally swallowed the bite, “What spices did you use?”

Fam blinks and doesn’t answer. I begin to consider the possibility of taking over cooking dinner for the household. It may well be worth failing all my classes because I don't have time to do homework.

Maybe if I talk I won’t think about what type of profanity I am poisoning my bodily systems with. Thinking of a topic, I startle them both by speaking. Evidently they are used to inhaling food in silence. And I do mean inhale.

“My English teacher told me about an interesting thing I can try out for, for high school.”

Fam opens her mouth in mid chew to speak, and I discover that somehow masticated goulash doesn’t seem any less appealing than the non-masticated kind. “Interesting?”

I nod. “Yeah, it’s like this advanced English class or something.”

Unc’s turn to find a response. “Advanced?”

“Yeah. Since I have a 100% in English, she thinks I should try for it.” I try not to allow any obtuseness of voice into that comment. They must not yet learn that I am usually being sarcastic when I speak to them. That would have disastrous consequences.

“Oh really? Your grades are that good?” ((Talking monkey. Really.))

“Yeah, so I think I’m gonna try for it cuz it’s supposed to be really challenging. School has never been tough for me, so I kinda wanna to have something I can put effort into,” I say vaguely.

Unc nods. As the smart, successful lawyer of the family, he knows all about needing a challenge. “What do you have to do to get in?”

“I don’t know.”

“What will the class be like? What types of things will you do?”

“Actually, I don’t know that, either.”

“So why are you trying out for it?”

“Mostly because I can.”

He looks at me with a total flat look in his eyes that signifies complete lack of understanding. Yeah, you and the rest of the world, Unc. Looking down, I realize that the heap of toxic waste on my plate is still at the same sickening level. Sighing, I pick up the fork again. If I had eaten food like this as long as Fam and Unc had, I too would know how to inhale food like they do.

Looking at them, I wonder how they manage to stay OVER the recommended weight level by thirty or so pounds. Fam has an excuse, since she’s still slimming down from being pregnant, but Unc must supplement his diet from fast food restaurants. I laugh quietly to myself as I remember a conversation I recently overheard between the two of them.
“How can you say such mean things to me, sweetie?”

“Look, honey, you asked me, and I told you my opinion.”

“You called me fat!”

“No, I said you were big when you were pregnant.”

“Hmph.”

“And honestly, you didn’t help it all that much by wearing purple sweats, cuz then you looked like a big grape on legs.”

“Marcus!” His name was said in the most outraged voice I have ever heard.

That is when I wisely left the room. To this day, it still makes me laugh. Because I saw that outfit, and that’s exactly the thought that had run through my head.