ST2.7 | "A Li’l Something Extra"

PROMPT: It’s a time for gatherings and cookouts, so this month, we want your stories about food. That restaurant that's been open for 20 years despite never having any customers. A baker's deranged attempt to perfect their blood pudding. A delivery order gone horrifically wrong. Extra rare or well done, if it’s about food, we want it.

A LI’L SOMETHING EXTRA

by Ashley-Ruth M. Bernier

The ol’ time saying declared that the way to a man’s heart was through his stomach, and everyone knew Tyrell Cockburn loved to eat. Given his impressive girth and the feats of engineering he achieved whenever he stacked his plate at a buffet, the joke on-island was that the “way” to his stomach was four lanes wide with a couple of overpasses—although it was the kind of joke that lived in text messages and whispers, muffled and quiet so it would never get back to his grandmother. St. Thomas hadn’t been ruled by a monarchy since Denmark sold it to the U.S. in 1917, but everyone understood Adina Cockburn was the closest thing on the rock to royalty. Ridiculous last name aside, the Cockburns had managed to maintain a number of high-value properties in Charlotte Amalie’s Historic District, and their sprawling estate at the top of Skyline Drive remained a visible reminder that the family money was hadal-level deep. This was why, after Celine had gone on her fourth date with Tyrell, her mother decided it was time for a visit to Auntie Paloma.

“Actual auntie, or jus’ Auntie-out-of-politeness?” Celine asked as her mother’s ancient Toyota struggled its way up a serpentine hill on the island’s northside.

“Li’l bit of both. Auntie Paloma used to be married to your great-uncle Albert,” her mother explained. She didn’t turn her face from the road, but Celine could see her mother roll her eyes. “Not that his ass deserved her. We can all agree on that, so there haven’t been any hard feelings over the years.”

Celine considered this. Great-uncle Albert died decades before she was born, and no one talked about him much—or, at least, talked about him positively. As for Auntie Paloma, her name always came up under very specific circumstances. Those circumstances usually involved a daughter who was a little inexperienced in the kitchen, a possible fiancé in the picture, and a mother itching for some grandchildren.

“Listen, Auntie Paloma’s been helping young ladies catch and keep husbands for almos’ half a century at this point, okay, dahlin’?” her mother said as they pulled up to a pretty little home at the top of the hill. It wasn’t the Cockburn mansion by any stretch, but it felt like paradise to Celine—an expansive porch wrapped around a well-kept yellow house, mature mango, genip, and gooseberry trees in the front yard, and views of the Brasses and Hans Lollik Island in the distance. “Jus’ go in her kitchen an’ try to learn something from her. You could be a feast for Tyrell’s eyes all day long, but eventually, the man’s gon’ need to consume some actual food.”

Although she didn’t say as much, Celine knew her mother was right. Every date with Tyrell had included detours to restaurants and food trucks. He’d flashed that dazzling smile, pearls set in the deep amber of his complexion, and shrugged his massive shoulders each time. “A man’s got to eat,” he’d said, and proceeded to annihilate a saltfish paté or a plate of oxtail and potato stuffing. Indeed, he did. Celine could make a decent baked mac-and-cheese, but to create the kind of spread for Tyrell to see his forever with her, she needed a miracle. And here she stood, that miracle, five feet tall and 100 pounds; with eight decades of culinary wisdom hiding behind patient brown eyes.

Celine was welcomed with a hug from Auntie Paloma, along with a cup of lemongrass tea and wedge of guava tart. After they’d waved goodbye to her mother and settled at the mahogany kitchen table, Auntie Paloma asked a question.

A little smile spread over the old lady’s face. “What is it that you want, honey?”

Celine wasn’t sure what to say. “Um . . . to learn how to cook? Tyrell loves a good bowl of kallaloo, so—”

“No, dahlin’.” Auntie Paloma pulled her chair closer and took Celine’s cinnamon-colored hands into her own. “I’m asking what you want . . . from him. For him. For you both.”

“Oh.” Celine hadn’t stopped to think about this before. All she knew was what she felt whenever she was with him—a lightness, a breathlessness, a tingle she could only describe as pure joy. She let that feeling answer Auntie Paloma now. “I guess I want . . . his heart. I want his whole heart. A family. A life together. I want us to have all of it, Auntie Paloma.”

The old woman nodded. “I see,” she said gravely. “Then we have a lot of work to do.” Her eyes flicked to a black and white photograph on the wall, and Celine recognized a much younger Auntie Paloma in the shot, hugging a tall and incredibly handsome man. They were standing outside of the Lutheran church in the heart of town, smiling at the camera like they’d just conquered the world. She squeezed Celine’s hand and rose from the mahogany table. “First thing to learn is that deh trick to capturing a man’s stomach—to capturing a man’s heart—is to add a li’l something extra.”

And so began Celine’s months of tutelage under Auntie Paloma’s experienced hand. Stews, sides, mains, desserts—when it came to Virgin Islands cuisine, Auntie Paloma knew how to do it all, and Celine was a quick learner. Soon, Celine could whip up a fried yellowtail with cornmeal funji, a plate of whelks and rice, hearty stew chicken or a fluffy batch of johnnycakes as easily as she could microwave popcorn.

Over the next few sessions, Auntie Paloma constantly reminded Celine to “Remember deh trick,” and Celine had studiously watched the old lady’s examples: an extra bay leaf added to oxtail gravy, some almond essence stirred into Vienna cake batter. A pinch of cinnamon in the guava tart crust, and the tiniest sliver of scotch bonnet peppers blended into the potato stuffing seasoning. “Anyone can cook well,” she’d remind Celine. “You got to give him something he can’t get anyplace else.”

“A li’l something extra,” Celine repeated one day, after tasting her pot of kallaloo and adding another dash of pepper to the rich green stew. She gestured to the picture on the wall. “Is that how you and Uncle Albert . . . what made him fall in love with you in the first place?”

Auntie Paloma had been ladling kallaloo into a ceramic bowl, but her body stiffened when Celine asked her question. A few seconds passed, long enough for Celine to wonder if she’d somehow broken the old woman, but when Auntie Paloma turned to face her, her smile was warm, her eyes clear and calm. “Yes, honey,” she answered, handing Celine the bowl and a large spoon. “Your great-uncle, handsome as he was, had more than a few admirers aroun’ deh island. But Albert did appreciate something different. A li’l something extra is exactly how I got him in the end.” She slipped an arm around Celine’s waist as Celine took her bowl of green stew. “And listen, my dear, I think you’re ready to catch your own prince. Right through his stomach, honey. That’s the way to his heart.”

Later that month, Celine set a table for Tyrell on the modest porch of her parents’ house and laid a feast fit for royalty out in front of him—fried snapper, a pot of kallaloo, potato stuffing, crunchy plantains, peas-and-rice, johnnycake; a pitcher of fresh-from-the-vine passionfruit juice, and three different tarts for dessert. And her love, of course, but Tyrell was focused on the meal. She’d found it, she realized as he filled his belly with thirds and fourths; that li’l something extra had found her the way to the first stop in her forever. His heart had to be the next destination. She wasn’t wrong. Four months later, Celine officially became a Cockburn.

***

It was a very different Celine who sat across the table from her mother eighteen months later. She and Tyrell had moved into a well-built house with the same expansive harbor views as his grandmother’s, but these days, it felt like a prison. Celine and her mother sat at an imported teakwood table in front of glass doors that opened up to the pool deck and endless southern views.

It was a beautiful structure that felt nothing like a home.

“You know,” Celine’s mother began as Celine wiped tears from her puffy eyes with a paper towel, “your great-uncle Albert was something of a scoundrel himself. Maybe a visit to Auntie Paloma would help?”

Celine protested at first. The old woman had been so hopeful for her, and Celine didn’t want to return as a failure. Still, her mother had been persuasive, and before long, Celine was pulling her sleek new Mercedes into Auntie Paloma’s driveway. No mangoes or plums in November, but the frangipanis and oleander plants next to the steps welcomed Celine with a fragrance that hung heavily in the moist northside air. Auntie Paloma’s welcoming smile dropped the moment she took full notice of Celine, and within minutes, they were seated at the kitchen table, again with bush tea and guava tart.

As Celine told the whole sordid story, Auntie Paloma listened, weathered face impassive, brown eyes sorrowful. A few beats of silence after Celine’s words ran dry, and then— “No children yet, I assume?”

“How could there be, when he barely even touches me?” Celine shook her head miserably. “I tol’ you, Auntie, he has a different woman for every day of the damn week. He’s high half the time, drunk the rest . . . and cruel no matter which. I can’t bring a child into that.”

“I see.” The gravity in her voice was deeper, heavier than it had been when she’d used the same words in their first meeting. “Celine, what is it that you want?”

Tears flooded Celine’s eyes. “I think I want his heart . . .”

Auntie Paloma sighed. “You want deh heart of a man who treats you like trash?”

“No,” Celine whispered. “I wasn’t finished. I meant . . . I think I want his heart to stop beating entirely.”

The old woman sat silently for a moment, and Celine wondered if she’d gone too far. If she’d let her rage fuel words that weren’t supposed to be let out into the world. If the old woman would shrink away, appalled and disgusted.

Auntie Paloma ultimately rose from her chair and walked over to the picture on the wall. “Albert had his moments, too,” she said quietly. “He had several . . . paramours of his own, and when he’d drag himself home from the bars mos’ nights, well, he also behaved like a pig and a brute. I felt the same way you did.”

“I’m not sure you understand, Auntie. I meant—”

“I understand perfectly. You want his heart to stop. And deh way to a man’s heart, dahlin’, is through his stomach.” Auntie Paloma walked across the room and opened a cabinet below the sink, one full of rows of dark bottles filled with liquids, powders, and leaves.

She picked one out and placed it gently in Celine’s hand.

“Like this way. When you dice oleander leaves, it doesn’t look like deh toxic plant we all know it is. Cut up like this, it could look jus’ like any green seasoning. Mix it up in some soup, something hearty like kallaloo or spicy like goatwater, and nobody—not even the police or coroner—knows it’s there. Your great-uncle enjoyed his rum and women, but he also loved my soups.” She nodded down at Celine pointedly. “A li’l something extra is how I got him, in the end.”

Celine considered the container in her hand. A quiet, breezy home with a cozy kitchen and mature plants outside had felt like paradise the first time she’d come here. With time and solitude, her new house could become this, too. Eventually. “Something he can’t get anywhere else,” she murmured.

Auntie Paloma smiled. “Exactly.” She walked to the stove. “Let’s cook, dear. You said he likes kallaloo?”

Ashley-Ruth M. Bernier’s (@armbernier) stories have appeared in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, Black Cat Weekly, Stone’s Throw, Smoking Pen Press, Mystery Most Devious, and The Best American Mystery and Suspense 2023. Originally from St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands, Ashley-Ruth writes mysteries highlighting the vibrant culture of her home island. She currently lives in North Carolina with her husband and four children, where she teaches first grade and finds few things more valuable than uninterrupted writing time and the perfect cup of tea.