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Stubborn Things, Part III - Plato Fuerte

Wherein Julieta beats herself for not being perfect, Bruno continues to make himself more miserable than he needs to be, and Agustin is just sort of… there lol

“I hope you’re hungry,” Julieta said, adding another sprinkle of salt to the pot. “It’s almost ready.”

Two recipes down, and Bruno remained undeniably sick. If anything, he seemed to be feeling worse by the minute. He was back to pretending he was fine, which would have been sweet had he been doing it to protect her feelings and not to dodge another round of testing. Julieta offered him several opportunities to lie down in the parlor if he promised to submit to supervision, but his stubborn devotion to conveying the illusion of health kept overruling his instinct for self-preservation.

“It smells fantastic,” Agustín said. “And I bet it will taste even better. I really think you have it this time, mi vida.”

Having finished all the prep work that didn’t involve sharp utensils, her husband was seated across the table from Bruno, pretending to read a copy of La Vorágine that he grabbed off a bookshelf at random. Julieta had tasked him with keeping watch over her brother and, if necessary, intercepting him if he tried to bolt again. Julieta wasn’t sure if he was doing his job well or if Bruno was simply too tired to move.

“I’m not worried about the taste,” she said, “or the smell.”

“I am!” Bruno croaked weakly, his voice muffled against the nest he made with his arms.

“My concern,” she continued, choosing to disregard his unsolicited input, “is that it works.”

“Of course, of course,” said Agustín, suddenly remembering to turn the page of the book he was supposed to be reading. “I’m just saying, I have a good feeling about this one. They say third time’s a charm, right?”

He threw an expectant look at his brother-in-law, who usually had a lot to say when it came to matters of luck, but this time Bruno had no comment. His head was resting on the table beside an empty cup that stood as a testament to Julieta’s latest failure. The guava and mango juices she had blended together with Isabela’s pelargonium and a dash of aguardiente made for a refreshing morning cocktail, but a woefully ineffective medicine. Bruno claimed to feel better just a few sips in, but then sneezed in short, strangled bursts not long after finishing the concoction. He tried to blame the cooking spices lingering in the air from breakfast and those new plants Isabela had growing just outside the kitchen window, but when Julieta kissed his forehead, it was warmer than the last time she last checked. He muttered an apology that only added to her mounting aggravation. It was her fault, not his, that she couldn’t figure this out.

Now here she was, pouring all of her prayers and frustrations and love for her brother into a pot of ajiaco. It would be cruel to keep him hostage much longer if he didn’t improve after this dish. He hadn’t lifted his head from the table since the juice; the only indication that he was still awake (and alive) was the occasional cough or sniffle, wise-ass remark, and knock knock knocking of his knuckles against the tabletop. Once an annoyance, the repetitive thumping was now a strange comfort, a reassurance that her brother was still here with her.

Julieta was ladeling steaming hot ajiaco between two bowls when she noticed a shift in his breathing. It was subtle, but just obvious enough to someone who knew him as well as she did. When she turned around she found Bruno sitting up but hunched over, gripping his nose between his thumb and forefinger. This time she felt compelled to speak up; she could tell that those last sneezes he bottled up left him with a headache, though he refused to admit it.

“Bruno.”

Her tone was just firm enough to pull him from his daze without startling him. Releasing his nose from the punishing pressure of his fingertips, he huffed sharply and shot Julieta a look of annoyance that struck her off balance like a thunderbolt from Pepa. She couldn’t remember the last time her brother looked at her with anything but adoration, though it was possible that his absence and the passage of time were clouding her memories. Her eyes darted to Agustín, seeking backup, and she found him engrossed in the book that he was only supposed to pretend to be reading. She wasn’t surprised or even disappointed; if anything, she was impressed it hadn’t happened sooner. To his credit, he closed the book dutifully upon his wife’s silent request, but not before folding the corner of the page to save his place.

“That really isn’t good for you,” he said, in a way that should have sounded condescending, but didn’t. “And what a terrible feeling, to waste a sneeze like that. It feels so much better to just let them out, ¿verdad?”

In a fleeting moment of desperation, Bruno almost seemed to consider his advice. Julieta wanted to be annoyed, but she couldn’t take it personally; despite his lack of physical grace, Agustín had a charming and sophisticated way of speaking. And besides, wasn’t she the one who wanted his help in the first place?

What she really wanted was her brother to quit being such a cabezota and stop suppressing a natural reflex like it was some sort of personal failing. She didn’t care if he was annoyed with her, because she was annoyed with him, too. Walking over to the table with the soup - slowly, so as not to spill a single drop of what could have been liquid gold - she watched him paw at his poor nose in an increasingly frenzied manner. The rubbing seemed to stoke the lingering embers of irritation back into a roaring fire. Grabbing a clean napkin off the table, he shook it open and brought it up to hover near his face, the cloth fluttering slightly with each trembling exhalation. Julieta decided to hold off on giving him his soup and instead stood quietly beside the table, ready to chastise him if he stifled again but hoping he would just listen to his family for once.

Agustín stood up to help her with the soup, but with an eagerness that suggested he was more excited to start eating than itching to lighten her load. He started to say something, but Julieta bumped him with her hip and gave him a stern look. He seemed to get the hint, but just in case, she shoved one of the bowls into his hands and produced a spoon from her apron pocket. Maybe some food would keep him quiet for a bit.

It didn’t matter anyway, if Bruno’s defeated sigh and deflating posture was any indication. Once again it seemed the urge to sneeze abandoned him, leaving him in a state of bewildered chagrin, but this time it wasn’t Julieta’s fault. She sat down across from him as a plank on the table tilted slightly, sending the salt cellar and bowls of crema, lime halves, and sliced avocado skittering to their end of the table. Bruno turned away from the food to blow his nose, then folded the napkin and clutched it in his fisted hand. He pressed the palm of his other hand against his forehead, eyes squeezing shut. Julieta frowned as he bit into his bottom lip hard enough to leave marks. Definitely a headache.

Tentatively, she pushed his bowl and spoon across the table. Bruno peered out from behind his hand to inspect the offering. His eyes flickered briefly to his sister’s face before settling back on the bowl in front of him.

“Ajiaco?” he asked, squinting.

She gave a quick nod, uncertain if what she was about to say was still true. “Your favorite.”

“Juli,” he said, taking a moment to appreciate her presentation. She felt the knot in her chest loosen when he finally smiled at her. “Gracias. It looks wonderful.”

Agustín indulged in a long whiff and sighed happily. “It smells wonderful.”

“I wish I could smell it,” Bruno said, looking longingly at his bowl. “I guess I’ll have to settle for sort of tasting it.”

“I added some red ginger,” Julieta said. “So it should help your headache, even if it doesn’t help with the… everything else.”

Bruno nudged absently at his nose as he studied his bowl. It was filled to the brim, though Julieta wasn’t sure if he had enough of an appetite left to finish it all. He took a deep, resolute breath that, miraculously, did not trigger a coughing fit. He held it in his cheeks and then exhaled slowly, some of the tension leaving his furrowed brow.

“It’s going to work,” he said. “Gus is definitely onto something, because this…” He tapped the edge of the bowl with his spoon for emphasis. “This is the one.”

Just as Julieta was wondering why his voice sounded sort of wonky, Bruno dropped the spoon with a clatter and brought his hands up to rub urgently at his nose. He managed an exasperated “De verdad?!” between hitching breaths before stifling violently into his crumpled napkin, each sneeze sounding itchier and more desperate than the last. Even with the fabric locked in place to muffle the sound, he still insisted on holding them back. The slightest squeak of air escaped after the last sneeze, a sign of his eroding self-control. He kept his nose buried in the napkin for a moment, then dropped his hand to knock against his chair three times, a delayed echo. His shivering exhale and subsequent coughs disrupted the graceful curl of steam rising from his ajiaco.

“Ay, Brunito,” Julieta sighed, unsure of how else to express her frustration and sympathy at the same time. “Salud.”

Bruno sniffled, expression hazy and nostrils flaring slightly, before giving his head a shake. The movement seemed to dispel whatever irritation remained. His hand crept across the table to the salt cellar to grab a pinch of salt, which he threw over his left shoulder. He hesitated before grabbing another and tossing it behind him in one swift motion, as if Julieta and Agustin wouldn’t see his do-over if he moved quickly enough. Then he muttered something to himself, something with the cadence of a prayer that Julieta didn’t recognize. He scooped up some broth, making sure to get a good sized chunk of potato in his first spoonful. His hand shook, causing some of the liquid to splash off the spoon and back into the bowl. All of his certainty from before seemed to evaporate as the moment of truth drew nearer.

“This is the one,” he repeated, as if saying it more would make it so. “This is the one.”

Taking another deep breath, he held it, then released it and took his first bite. He swallowed, wincing, and took another bite. Then another. As the contents of the bowl dwindled, Julieta felt herself growing more apprehensive. She was too nervous to eat any of the ajiaco Agustín kept trying to share with her. Bruno was still sniffling and coughing between spoonfuls, which wasn’t a good sign. As soon as he drained the last of the soup from his bowl Julieta studied his face, waiting for the first sign that he was still ill, that she failed yet again. He just gazed back at her, expression strangely unreadable.

“So,” she said, when he didn’t say anything first. “What’d you think? How do you feel?”

“It was…” The muscles in his jaw were tense as he paused to swallow. His next breaths sounded a little uneasy as he pushed himself to try again. “It wuh-hh! Sorry, J-Juli, I… h’hiihh!”

Oh.

Julieta felt her stomach sink as Bruno crumbled into his napkin with another string of stifled sneezes. He whimpered after the last one, pressing his fisted hand into his forehead and gently pounding at the table with the other. It didn’t even help his headache, she realized. Something about reliving the same failure over and over again despite her very best efforts shifted something inside of her. Before she could stop herself, Julieta was getting up from the table and marching towards the stove. Grabbing the handles of the pot, she hoisted it over to the sink and dumped her cooking unceremoniously down the drain. Steam rose in an angry cloud as the lid crashed against the ceramic. Somewhere behind her, Agustín squawked in surprised dismay.

“Mi vida!” he exclaimed. “Que haces?”

Julieta watched the liquid swirl in the basin before it vanished down the drain, leaving behind chunks of potato and shredded chicken. Her cheeks felt hot and her eyes were burning. “It didn’t work,” she said, speaking slowly in an effort to keep her voice steady. “I was so sure I had it this time.”

She pretended to busy herself with cleaning up, but when she felt a pair of arms wrap around her she dropped the act and turned into Agustín’s embrace. Suddenly she felt very silly, getting so upset over something so relatively minor that her husband felt he needed to rush to console her - that was Pepa’s move, not hers. Julieta closed her eyes and tried not to replay the image of her hard work swirling down the drain. She wondered what her mother would say about her wasting perfectly good food.

Except it wasn’t perfect; that was the problem. She mended four twisted ankles this month, reset a foot full of broken toes, and made countless scrapes and bruises vanish with her food, but when it came to helping her brother with something that she should have been able to handle, something that should have fallen within the scope of her gift, something she spent most of her life trying to figure out because it didn’t come naturally to her like everything else did, Julieta was completely and utterly useless.

“I don’t understand,” she said, her voice muffled against Agustín’s chest. “Why can’t I figure it out, after all this time?”

Agustín squeezed her tighter, then cleared his throat in a very specific way. He only did that when he was going to say something she needed to hear, but didn’t want to.

“I say this with love, corazón,” he said, drawing back to look at her. “Abuela isn’t the only one who needs to work on relaxing her standards.”

The only thing that stopped her from getting upset with him was suddenly remembering that nobody had eyes on Bruno.

Her poor hermano, who she had somehow forgotten in the midst of her self-pitying tantrum. Her blurry gaze landed on the chair where he had been sitting a moment earlier, empty now except for a rat nervously grooming itself. Julieta sighed, bringing her hand to her forehead and suppressing the urge to pound against it. She opened her mouth but Agustín beat her to it.

“Miércoles.”

#sneezefic

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