“I’m Back Baby”

Yes that is a Bender quote.  I took a bit of a hiatus there, but now I’m back.  I return to my sanctuary.  During my time away, my hands have healed, but my heart has been dealt another blow.  Suffice it to say that someone I loved very much (and still do, against my better judgment) loved someone else more.  Maybe I’ll write that story someday, but today is not that day.  This is, after all, the tale of the butcher shop girl, and not the tale of her epic failures in the realm of romance.  Besides, the story of the stupid girl who fell for the wrong boy?  That one’s old as the ages.

I’m taking it out on the physical labor; banging around more than necessary while hauling lugs of raw meat back and forth, scrubbing blood and fat from racks and pans, wielding the high-powered pressure washer to rinse cutting boards, filling the rag buckets with fresh water and bleach.

During my hiatus I did manage to get in another pig day with Foster at the pub, as well as a lamb day.  Lambs are pretty much the same as pigs, only smaller.  And these particular lambs were much smaller.  The pub was promised 65 pounds.  The lambs that arrived were 45.  They arrived whole—headless and skinless—split at the breast.  They left tongues and kidneys inside the carcasses.  Foster grabbed a tongue and stuck it near the owner’s ear, so when Beano turned his head it was right in his face.  Instead of being grossed out, he stuck out his own tongue and pretended to lick it.  I’d never touched a lamb tongue before, so I picked one up to see what it felt like.  Foster said, “Be careful now, don’t be takin’ that thing home with ya.”  It took me a minute to get the euphemism, then I rolled my eyes and tossed the tongue in The Amigos’ bin. 

So, with chops smaller than my palm, I wasn’t allowed to do much knifework on the expensive meat.  (One slip up of the knife going half an inch too far and I’ve cost them $30.)  I did however get to use a cleaver for the first time; to split the “naughty bits” as Foster called them.  This was accomplished using short blows with my right hand and holding the meat steady with my left—pretty much exactly what you are not supposed to do with a cleaver.  Cleaver strikes are supposed to be long and heavy (and by nature, imprecise), come from above the head, and your empty hand should be behind your back—nowhere near the meat.  I nicked my thumb a bit doing this, and I’m lucky that’s all I did.

I also sort of learned how to French the ribs with twine:  tie one end of the twine to a table leg, wrap the twine around a rib one and a half times, hold tight and pull the ribs towards you and the string away from you.  It takes muscle, and the twine digs into your fingers, and since the ribs are narrow at the base and wider at the top you have to adjust the pressure, otherwise the twine just stops and will go no further.  But pulling that twine back and seeing a perfectly clean rib is incredibly satisfying.

Exciting news:  Foster is opening his very own restaurant!  In about a month, I will be going there for Pig Day and Lamb Day from now on. 

            The shop is quiet.  Uncomfortably quiet.  Once again it is just me and Tommy, just like my very first day.  There’s a pillow and a sleeping bag back in the office.  I wonder idly who’s been sleeping here.

            “You know how the twenty-third is our biggest day of the year?” Tommy asks.

            “Of December?”

            “Yeah.  Of the year.  Max decided not to show up.  He doesn’t work here anymore.  Don’t say anything about it to Burt unless he brings it up.”

            The silence between us deepens.

            “Do you wanna peel some ribs?”

            I do not.  I say, “Yes.”

            Peeling feels good, though, ripping the membrane off; today I relish the feeling of tearing something apart from something else.

            While I’m in back I overhear a customer ask Tommy if he’s all alone; he says yes.  So I’m nobody, huh?  Just to be a jackass, I choose that moment to take a few racks out to the case.  The brown girl in the back room . . . obviously I must just be “the help.”  I think I might feel kind of like an Amigo in this moment.

            “Do you wanna do chicken breasts?”

            No I do not.  But I do anyways.  The color and texture of the chicken appears very . . . human-ish to me today.

            Burt comes in and we start chopping vegetables for chicken stock and gumbo.  I slice harder than necessary, slamming the knife against the cutting board with a satisfying “snap.”  I’m fond of the feeling of chopping today; of taking something whole and breaking it down into tiny parts with a clean, sharp object. 

            I am sorry I missed the holidays here.  I could’ve learned how to do standing rib roasts.  Burt agrees, “There was more than one time I thought to myself, ‘If the girl were here she’d have already taken care of this.’”  It’s a nice feeling, knowing my boss thinks I’m such a hard worker.

            Tommy comes back and sees me tediously pulling tiny bits of curly parsley leaves off the stems.  He asks me what I’m doing.  I tell him Burt doesn’t like to use stems in the gumbo.  Tommy turns and walks away, muttering curses under his breath. 

            Late in the afternoon Burt asks if I’ve eaten.  Not since 4 o’clock yesterday.  He asks if I want to eat.  Not really.  He orders me to take a break and grab something from the cooler to eat.  I sit down for maybe five minutes, check my phone, then sneak out front and start scrubbing dishes out there.  Eating would be nice, if I could get this wretched ache to quit gnawing at my guts.  The thought of ingesting anything solid right now is nauseating.  Right now I am running on an hour of sleep and a single can of Cherry Coca-Cola. 

            “Do you want anything from the store?” Burt asks.

            “No thank you.”

            “Something to make you happy?”

            “This makes me happy,” I say, without pausing in my work.

            He doesn’t move.  I look up; he raises his eyebrows.  I fake a convincing smile and he shrugs and walks away.  He comes back from the store with a Kit Kat for me.

            At the end of the day Tommy wraps up a few filets for me to take home; I think they’ll go nice on a bed of greens simply dressed with vinegar and oil.  When I get home I throw the meat in the fridge and crack a beer instead.  I have returned to my sanctuary, but it doesn’t feel quite the same.