It was a crisp, sunny autumn afternoon. I crossed the city to meet my old friend Sally for lunch. I didn’t like Sally. Possibly, the feeling was mutual.
Sally chose the restaurant, which was new. It was called Duskywing, after a butterfly, which sounded charming. More extravagantly priced than its peers, Duskywing was the kind of establishment my mother would have called “fancy” by which she meant pretentious. Maybe too fancy for me. As we approached, I could see the old façade had been remodeled. It looked like it had been raked with coal dust.
The hostess greeted us. A pale woman encased in an asymmetrical sheath of black linen, she exuded an aura of sadness. She led us to a small table on the terrace, a sunny corridor planted shoulder-high with English boxwood that gave off a faint aroma of cat piss.
Our table was set with grey borosilicate glasses and showy pretend-plates, the kind that are removed the moment your food arrives. The pretend-plates were heavy and made of a dull clay aggregate that mimicked slate.
Our server appeared, a stoic man likewise encased in asymmetrical black linen. I half expected him to introduce himself as Barnabas.
“My name is James and I’ll be taking care of you today.”
James poured chilled water into our borosilicate glasses and handed us each a menu, dove-grey one-pagers with a rag edge printed in a font that suggested longhand Victorian script. The menu was updated daily, he said, each day with a different theme.
Today’s theme was Smoke.
Sally, who liked to say she didn’t drink, ordered a dirty martini with French vodka “for the occasion.” I decided to stick with water. James set down a single black oval napkin and did an about-turn.
Sally and I took our time perusing the menu. As promised, lunch offerings featured smokey things. Smoked caviar with blini and crème fraiche. Smoked tea-glazed duck with preserved cherries. Smoked Maine lobster pancake with a roasted carrot reduction. Smoked melanzane alla parmigiana. This last dish was described as a constellation of smoked eggplant purée, a mound of shaved Piave, and a ribbon of pasta in the shape of a tilted sphere, a nod to Richard Serra, recently deceased.
I stared blankly at the menu. At last, I spotted the sole item intended for diners like me, apostates forced to come along for the ride: crispy smoked chicken on house brioche with sunchoke slaw and spicy aioli—a barely camouflaged fried chicken sandwich.
James reappeared with the smallest martini glass I have ever seen and took our order. I, of course, chose the chicken sandwich. Sally, a long-time admirer of Serra, passed a few anguished moments before settling on the lobster pancake.
We unfurled our napkins, unleashing our forks and knives, and sat quietly sipping our beverages until James reappeared with our food. He set down our plates in a tight choreography with another server who whisked away our pretend-plates.
We were both starving. Sally pushed aside the ramekin of purplish carrot syrup and dove into her pancake. I looked down at my sandwich—and froze.
Staring back at me was a face.
Not just any face. It was the face of someone I knew, someone I hadn’t thought about in years. Someone I’d hoped never to see again. My nemesis on a bun.
I felt my forehead. It felt cool. I closed my eyes and counted to ten. I opened them and looked down at my plate. Animated by animus, the face returned my gaze.
It was uncanny. I rotated my plate to assess the sandwich from different angles, but the bun served the same face no matter how I looked at it. Was it an illusion, an impression left by the thumb of an overzealous sous-chef? The sneering face had to be nothing more than a trick of sunlight, the play of shadows flickering off fancy glassware and shoulder-high boxwood. A silly coincidence.
I didn’t believe in coincidences.
I lifted the malevolent effigy from my plate and took a bite. The brioche, burnished with egg wash, was warm and pillowy. The smokey chicken was tender yet crisp on the outside. The sunchoke slaw was crunchy. The aioli left a fulsome smokey aftertaste.
It was a really good sandwich.
I dove in for another bite, chewing slowly so I could relish the taste of my food. I went for a third bite, ferociously this time, grabbing the bun tightly. Some slaw slipped out and a sluice of aioli dripped down as far as my wrist. I chewed and swallowed.
I paused to look up. Duskywing was filled to capacity. The kitchen was blazing. The air was buzzing with lunchtime conversation. Sally was busy with her pancake. James was busy elsewhere.
I looked down at my plate. The half-ruined face was still there. It glowered up at me, shooting darts of opprobrium. My sandwich appeared to be mocking me.
Glowering back, I took another bite, reducing the face by a third, and then to a quarter of its original size. I bit and chewed and swallowed. I ate until there was nothing but crumbs of brioche and a daub of aioli besmirching my plate. I regarded the smear with suspicion. An aggressive, potent smudge. Not quite a sneer, it was nevertheless suggestive of one. I pressed my finger into the aioli and pulled it across the plate, wiping it clean before sucking the last vestiges from my finger. I felt like a killer slathered in blood. Goya’s Saturn devouring his children. I looked down at my plate. Nothing was left, no sauce, no face. My nemesis was gone.
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Joy Amina Garnett’s stories have appeared in ellipse, Nashville Review, Evergreen Review, Rusted Radishes, Ping-Pong, The Artists’ & Writers’ Cookbook, and elsewhere. Her forthcoming memoir, recently completed at Yaddo, was Longlisted for the 2024 First Pages Prize in Creative Nonfiction. Joy lives, writes, cooks, and takes very long walks in Los Angeles.
© 2024, Joy Amina Garnett
Halfway Down the Stairs 