It was Uschi’s turn for the school run, so Leah had an hour to herself.
There’d been a cancellation, so her first case, a tricky fractured molar, wasn’t until ten. If she left the house at nine fifteen, she calculated, she should avoid the worst of the school drop-off traffic.
She’d treat herself to a second coffee. A proper one. Sit in the quiet kitchen, catch up on the agenda for the evening’s council meeting.
She enjoyed the rituals that surrounded her old stove-top espresso pot. Unscrewing the base; checking the gasket and filter; filling the reservoir with water to just below the valve; inserting the funnel; tamping down the fine-ground coffee; enjoying its nutty aroma in anticipation of a steaming, bitter cup of blackness. Setting it on the stove and waiting for that delicious throaty bubbling, the final hiss of steam.
They’d been given one of those capsule machines. A wedding present from Uschi’s older sister. It sat there on the bench, its metallic red plastic a parody of the enamelled Art Deco monsters which hulked and hissed in many a Melbourne coffee shop.
It had wifi and Bluetooth.
It produced ‘coffee’ that was convenient, consistent, vile. Uschi claimed not to mind it, but Leah thought this was just familial loyalty. She was a long way from her folk in Germany; family ties cut deeper with distance.
Leah was prepared to indulge her wife in this. Drinking a bland, coffee-flavoured, warm beverage in lieu of a decent long black was a tiny sacrifice to marital harmony, surely?
This battered Bialetti pot, on the other hand …
Its scarred, octagonal, aluminium squatness made her smile as she took it from the cupboard. She was transported back to student days: squalid, cheery share-houses in Footscray and Sunshine. That cool, rain-washed, magical year in Kiel when she and Uschi had met. Chewy rye bread and cheap jars of rollmops herring from Lidl.
It was a paradox, but brewing up a coffee strong enough to stain her enamel, give her neurons a jolt and loosen her bowels had become a relaxing and nostalgic private ritual.
Five minutes later she gazed at her phone in despair while the coffee pot hissed unregarded.
She’d known it was coming up, of course. She also knew that the outcome was a near-certainty. Even if the council knocked it back, the developers would win at VCAT.
Shit fuck fuck shit.
How was she going to break it to them, down at the Plot?
They were beautiful.
Vince fondled one, savouring the warm, smooth skin. Weighed it in the palm of his hand. So heavy! The little, puckered point at the end of that exquisite, rounded plumpness was sheer perfection. His thumb flicked it gently.
He imagined biting in: the sweet, warm juice dripping from his chin. What a delight, almost erotic. Why, it reminded him of …
He felt a stirring in his groin and looked around guiltily.
His neighbour at the Plot, that grim young miss, already thought him an ancient pervert. Clearly. Standing in his allotment with a bulge in his daks wouldn’t raise him in her estimation.
Fortunately, he was alone.
Anyway, it was no way to treat an Amish Glory tomato. Just chomping down on it like a savage animal.
No. Instead, he would hone his best cook’s knive to a keen edge, slice the seductive fruit lovingly and politely; serve it on toasted ciabatta with wafer-thin rounds of mozzarella; drizzle cold-pressed extra-virgin olive oil; dust with the tiniest pinch of sea salt. A sprinkle of freshly torn basil leaves …
His eye caught a sudden movement. What was this?
Gaudy black-and-yellow bugs! Feasting on the torn flesh of one of his beautiful tomatoes. It wasn’t even red yet. Not the faintest blush.
But it was ruined. Utterly ruined. No good for slicing; no good for passata. Not even green tomato chutney.
Vince fell to his knees, began to search among the lower, unripe fruit. Moaning, he located another huge, wounded orb, and another, another.
He rushed to the tap by the clubhouse and ran a bucket of water from the tank. But plain water wouldn’t do it: they would swim to the edge and climb out, he knew from past experience.
What to do?
Wait – wasn’t there a bottle of dishwashing liquid in the kitchen?
He brought it out; gave the bucket a generous, guilty squirt; put it back.
For an hour he hunted on hands and knees amidst fruit and foliage, scrabbled through mulch. The familiar, beloved tang of brushed tomato leaves was registered by his olfactory nerves but brought his mind no pleasure. The sun was high in the sky and he sweated.
In the end, hundreds of bloated insect bodies lay belly up in the water. A few still swam a desperate backstroke as the detergent ate through their waxen armour and waterlogged them, dragged them under.
Ha.
But it was impossible to pick all the invaders by hand. Some would remain and multiply. Netting the plants now would just trap them inside. The only remedy was a bloody good dose of that citronella spray he had in his laundry cupboard.
Trouble was, they now had a strict spray-free policy at the Plot.
He, fool that he was, had voted in favour at last month’s meeting.
Next week in The Plot:
Chapter 2: Borrowed Time
Jorja talks herself out of a bed for the night; the council planning committee convenes.
Disclaimer: The people, organisations and events described in this story are entirely the product of the author’s imagination; they bear no intentional resemblance to real-life people, organisations and events. The locations are based on real places.
Interesting.
"...a tricky fractured molar"? Is she a dentist?