“Leo!” I hear Momma scream for me upstairs.
I rush up and into her room, hoping right now isn’t the moment, that moment, the moment she’s spent the last few months warning me about. My mother is dying and just three months ago was given the ultimatum of paying a shit ton of money for surgery or having a handful of days to live. Momma doesn’t make a whole lot, so we survive mostly on whatever checks she gets for disability, and I’ve not been able to find a job either. So, I take comfort and find solace in cooking.
“Hey, Sugar,” Momma says, her head wrapped up in gauze, legs elevated like she’s been in some really bad accident. Doctors say she has a brain tumor and has to keep her legs elevated. Sugar is her nickname for me. It’s better than Stretch, which some people call me at school because I’m six feet tall. “Help Nurse Nicki real quick.” Nurse Nicki is Momma’s nurse who lives with us. And right now Nurse Nicki wants me to hold Momma’s feet in place while she adjusts the sheets underneath her body. I’ve had worse jobs, so I don’t even hesitate with assisting.
After helping, I head downstairs to the kitchen, take out all the ingredients I need to make this Cap’n Crunch French toast recipe I found on the Internet last night. I cook when I’m anxious. I see the flyer on the counter next to the stove and microwave—the one that I found on the subway last night. An ad I couldn’t believe, it was almost like an omen or something, about a food competition in Rowbury with a five-thousand-dollar prize. It occurs every three years and is happening in five days. It’s a televised event for the whole world to see, too, which has me a little nervous, but I can’t let that distract me. This year, the flyer says it’s being held at the community center.
I have a two-, three-, four-, maybe even five-second crisis with myself. I want to go so damn bad. I want to challenge myself. I want to visit Rowbury again, where my grandma lives and owns a soul food restaurant. I miss it there. The last time I was there was two summers ago, and I tried Korean food for the first time. Grandma’s probably the most respected person in our family and rightfully so. Grandma’s hard working and has been through so much and is still standing strong. I want to see her and taste her fried chicken again. But none of my wants are as big as my one need. I need that money. It could pay for Momma’s surgery and could save her life. And besides all that, I’d get to do something that I really like doing: cook. Even if I don’t win that moment, which would be absolutely devastating, and I wouldn’t even know what to do or how to feel, I think it could be good for me. I’ve been so caged up here in Muncie, Indiana, and haven’t really done anything as thrilling as this competition sounds.
But.
I don’t know.
I try to distract myself, cranking up the music I’m playing. “No Regrets” by Lecrae is blasting through my cheap, bulky headphones. I crack open two eggs and beat them in a bowl with some rice milk, pouring a few tablespoons of cinnamon and sugar, then some brown sugar and nutmeg.
After putting some Cap’n Crunch cereal into a small sandwich bag, I take a frying pan and beat the bag until the pieces are all smashed and powdery, like a great dry rub.
I pick up a piece of bread and dip it in my French toast mix. Then I dip it in the crushed Cap’n Crunch and cook it in the frying pan until it’s a nice, golden brown and ready to flip on the other side. While my French toast is cooking, I make a small fruit salad with some leftover strawberries and blueberries and some seriously ripe bananas that have been sitting on top of the fridge for over a week now.
I don’t know what it is, maybe the smell of the sweet maple syrup heating up in the microwave or what, but I’m suddenly remembering back to when Momma was well and Dad wasn’t drinking so much, back to when things felt right and normal, and I felt whole and didn’t have to deal with anxiety or panic attacks or pills, back to when I could go to Knight High School and feel like my friends and live a normal life. Momma used to make me French toast and fruit salad. Now I’m doing it for her.
The flyer.
I’m gazing at it, thinking about all the possibilities. I’ve always wanted to do something with food. I’ve always wanted to show off the skills that have been passed down to me from my ancestors.
This could be it. Right? But what if everything fails, and I actually, like, burn the whole place down from a grease fire? Or what if I put something in my food, and someone has an allergic reaction and, like, dies? What if I disappoint Grandma or, hell, myself by losing with one of her recipes—one of her recipes that I know is worthy of every damn award in the world? What if I get there and I . . . lock up on camera, if it’s televised? I can see it now—me, frozen in place and dead faced, like a deer in headlights. Oh, God. What if I faint?
Ugh.
A billion other what-ifs float around in my head, banging up on one another, causing nothing but chaos upon chaos, like that time I thought it would be a good idea to try out for my school’s play of Peter and the Starcatcher and fainted before saying my first line.
I gasp and hold in a breath until I can clear my thoughts. I crank up my music a bit more. Music is such a powerful thing, and a few months ago I realized how music was like water in the way it drowns out things you don’t want to deal with or things that are hard. For me, listening to music helps me mellow out and eases the anxiety.
After I finish cooking the French toast, I slap on some butter and drizzle the warm syrup on top of it. I scoop out some of the fruit salad onto a plate and take it upstairs to Momma. I have to feed it to her since she’s lost some of the movement in her hands.
I show her the flyer. I place it on the metal tray that’s connected to her medical bed in her bedroom. She can control it with the push of a button and brings it closer so she can read the flyer.
“Hungry Heart Row Food Competition, huh?” She pauses and looks up at me, then goes back to reading. “Wow. That’s a lot of money at stake.”
“Yeah,” I say. “I need to do this, Mom.” The way the words fall out of my mouth almost sounds like a desperate plea more than just asking for permission, and it’s like she picks up on that.
She starts crying. And when she cries, no matter why, I do as well. I’m a watery mess, and it’s way too early for this. It’s in this moment, though, that I notice her skin. Up close, I can see that it’s not the familiar brown that I remember. Up close, I can see that she’s becoming more of a sick gray, turning into something that will one day no longer be Momma, but just a shadow of her that’s slowly drifting away from me.
“I’m so proud of you,” she says so sweet and slow, sweet and slow like the maple syrup running down the side of her hand. Her eyes tell me she thinks I should do it.
She pulls me into a hug. I squeeze, but not too tight. I wish the two of us could stay like this forever and ever. “I love you,” I say, the words coming out with a breath. I can’t imagine a universe where she doesn’t exist or even one where she did exist and then stopped existing.
“I love you more, Sugar.” I can smell the maple syrup on her.
A pause. I can almost feel the world spinning.
“I want you to go,” she whispers through tears sneaking into her mouth. “I want you to go and do your thing, and I’ll be here cheering for you.” She’s the most supportive person in the world.
“I’m going to win the money for you, Momma,” I say, a lump in my throat. I blink the tears away, which takes more than one attempt.
“No, no, no, no,” she goes. I imagine her shaking her head like she used to be able to. “It’s not about the money. You’re gonna go and have fun, and you’re gonna feel alive. That’s all I want, Sugar.”
I move, and her automatic-sensor lights cut on. I was hoping she couldn’t see my face, but I’m sure she does. She doesn’t say anything, though, and I guess in some way, we’re both enjoying the place we’re resting in, a place between deep sadness and bittersweet hope.
* * *
I go online and register for the competition, feeling beads of sweat fall into my eyes. My heart beats hard inside my chest, but I’m ready for this.
After a while, I begin to pack, taking little breaks to cry or slow down and shut my eyes when I need to, throwing everything into a suitcase, not even caring what’s in there. I’m filled with too much excitement and also anxiety right now—so much excitement and anxiety I might even have a panic attack. I end up calling Grandma to let her know I’m coming and that I’m doing the Hungry Heart Row Food Competition, and before we hang up, she screams with enthusiasm for about two minutes straight.
* * *
The next day, I’m so insanely happy, I wake up with butterflies fluttering in my stomach. I’ve never felt like this before.
I get showered and change into a pair of jeans and the Black Panther T-shirt I preordered when the movie came out, grab my headphones and my suitcase. I wave good-bye to Nurse Nicki and give Momma a good-bye kiss, a light peck on the forehead that lasts longer than usual, and then I’m out the door, headed to the train station for Rowbury, something heavy and churning in my stomach. I’ve not left her alone like this in years. And I’ll potentially be gone for a whole week.
The entire nine-hour train ride I bought with money I saved up, I flip through my phone for all the things I could make for the competition. I scroll through so many websites and so many recipes, but none feel right, none feel good enough, none feel like winners, none fill me with that fluttering feeling in my stomach that tells me when a recipe is . . . special. And that’s just what I fucking need, man. The thought that it’s happening so soon, this week, and not later on in the month has my chest constricting and my jaws on fire again.
I inhale, taking the deepest breath, hands shaking. It’s yet another strategy I read about online in some anxiety forum to help train your body to fight back against the symptoms of a panic attack. Sometimes it works. But most of the time it doesn’t. I pop in one of my pills and try to nap on the train, listening to the new collab album by Beyoncé and Jay-Z.
* * *
I arrive in Rowbury and take yet another bus to the heart of Hungry Heart Row. I almost forgot how amazing this place really is. It’s certainly a lot different from the ghetto where I live, mostly because the only shops we have are run by either white folks or black folks, but here—here there are so many other cultures and cuisines and histories, and I love it.
A breeze blows, and I grasp my elbows. I forgot the weather was like this this time of year. One time I was here in Rowbury for grandpa’s funeral, and it was humid as hell for autumn. The weather gods have blessed me this time around. I’m walking down the sidewalk, and it hits me that I don’t really even remember the way to grandma’s restaurant, since she moved to a new location this year. It’s called Butter.
There’s a white boy with red hair and a thin, red mustache holding a sign that says TOUR GUIDE. He’s passing out brochures about Hungry Heart Row and maps of all the wonderful places to eat. I notice he’s got a Hungry Heart Row Food Competition flyer pasted on his sign.
He locks eyes with me, and I immediately look away. Shit. Eye contact with strangers has to go in the top five weirdest things about life. He’s walking over to me.
Shit. I have to look at him now. And I can’t slip my headphones on like I don’t hear him. I mean, I could, but that would be hella rude right now that he’s standing so close.
He smiles. “Hi. Welcome to Hungry Heart Row. Brochure or map?”
“Map, please,” I say.
* * *
After stopping at some really awesome halal food cart by the park on my way to Grandma’s restaurant and getting probably the most delicious chicken gyro I’ve ever had, I stop by a few restaurants just to smell around. The smells are my favorite and make me feel more at home sometimes than in Indiana. I linger inside a few places to maybe even get some inspiration for what to make for the competition, including a dim-sum place and some delicious pastry shop, too. Along the way I take in everything—the food carts, the restaurants, the architecture, the smells again, the people, hell, even the trees that are a plethora of colors—everything is so beautiful, and I didn’t know how much I missed it here. The girl in the pastry shop is wearing a name badge with the name Lila and a shirt that says HUNGRY GHOST FESTIVAL and the dates; it’s happening in a couple of weeks. She seems like she really likes it around these parts. I buy a blue concha before heading out.
Once I find my way to Grandma’s restaurant, after what feels like a zillion wrong turns and dead ends, I walk in and smell all the bomb soul food—her famous fried chicken with all the creole seasonings, thyme, rosemary, and tarragon. I even get a whiff of her famous sweet potato pie, and I’m practically drooling.
Grandma is cleaning off a table with a wet rag when I creep up behind her to surprise her.
I hug and squeeze her from her back. She smells like fresh rolls and cinnamon butter.
She gasps at first, spooked out, and then whips around fast. “Grandson!” she shouts—so loud half of the restaurant probably stops eating and ordering. “Gimme some sugar!”
She kisses me on the cheek. It’s a wet, gross-feeling kiss, but really shows me just how much she’s missed me. Up close, I can see all the stress wrinkles and gray-white hairs that have appeared since the last time I saw her.
We hug a second time. “Good to see you, grandson. Saturday, you gon’ blow Hungry Heart Row outta the park. You just better ’member everything yo’ granmammy taught you.” She knows about the competition and she knows about Momma and she knows why I’m here, and she thinks I’m using one of her recipes. I’ve not even decided on what I want to make yet, which is probably terrible to admit. “Hey, you just ’member it’s all in the butter. I keep trynna tell your cousins that, and they don’t listen for the life of ’em.”
Butter is probably Grandma’s favorite ingredient, and she puts it in nearly everything. I believe she’d put it in her raisin bran in the mornings if she could.
One year, she made deep-fried sticks of butter and dipped them in chocolate sauce and melted peanut butter. I’m not gonna lie. It was pretty flame, but I’m sure at least one of my arteries clogged up.
Grandma takes me into the kitchen of the restaurant and introduces me to all the workers. For many years, it’s just been a family-run restaurant; my cousins were the bussers and waitresses, aunts and uncles did the cooking, and grandma just did the managing and taste-testing. I’d apprentice with her some summers I spent here, which were mostly when I was a little kid. That was long before grandpa died. Ever since he died, grandma had to hire other people—people outside the family, but still people she could trust, people who could handle a stick of butter, I’m sure.
I’m looking around the kitchen and see Hungry Heart Row Food Competition flyers posted everywhere and posters of past competitions pasted along the walls too. There’re first-place trophies from the early nineties and eighties.
“Grandma, you won these?” I ask. Of course she did. I remember that she won the Hungry Heart Row Food Competition, but I didn’t know she’d won it this many times. As much as I’m impressed, it’s extra pressure for me.
She looks at me and just offers a warm smile, the wrinkles on her forehead lifting as she cocks her head back and closes her eyes, like she’s reminiscing or transporting herself to back in the day.
She grabs my hand and places one of the trophies in it. “It feels just like yesterday I was cooking up almost-butter chicken and steamed asparagus, and all those other family foods.”
I don’t say anything back. I stand still and listen, feeling the weight of the trophy, feeling the weight of pressure on my shoulders so suddenly.
“Y’know, I never entered with the intent on winning. I went in with the intent of cooking something good, putting a piece of my soul in the food—something that’ll explode the expectations of the people tasting it.”
It feels like all the stars have brightened and aligned. Maybe I should use one of her recipes. Ha. They’ve won in the past; maybe they’ll win again.
“Oh, yeah?” I backpedal in my thoughts.
“Mm-hm. Every year, the judges were blown away. You see, there’ll be a lot of folks there. Korean folks, Thai folks, Persian folks, Muslim folks, African folks, black folks, white folks, and a bunch of others—all making different things, but all with the same goal. Not all of them are gonna know to put their soul in the food and become one and the same with it. But you know how. It’s in your blood, grandson.”
Grandma opens the book of secret family recipes and flips through it. “Any of these look good to you?”
“That one,” I say, pointing to something that looks like glazed chicken with cheesy potatoes.
She goes to the back to retrieve the ingredients and returns. “Ready to try it out?”
My heart stops and then starts again. I really need this practice. If I really want to win this money for Momma, I better get to practicing. I mean, it’ll only maximize my chances of winning, right? I nod at Grandma and accept her offer to make the recipe.
“No other person in the world outside of our family knows this recipe, kiddo,” she says. “This one is extra special. My great-great-grandmother created this one.”
I watch her begin washing the chicken breasts and flouring them up, adding tons of different seasonings. “Pass me that paprika.”
I watch in awe at how fast she’s doing everything, trying to memorize every move she makes. Just in case.
I’m creating a mental checklist, searing this moment—this training montage—into my brain for future reference. Suddenly there are so many spices in the air, and I’m trying my hardest not to sneeze. Sneezing would mean I’ll blink and miss a moment.
She takes a metal bowl out of the cabinet above the stove and then begins flattening the chicken breasts with it before frying them. She shows me how to prepare the potatoes and how to properly season them—how to know how much seasoning is enough. She even makes a joke about the white folks who will be in the competition. “They won’t know how to season anything,” she says, slightly chuckling. “Poor babies.”
I bust out laughing too.
“You know yo’ momma didn’t used to know how to season either. I used to have her in the kitchen cookin’ all the time. And she would drown the food in seasoning. Mashed potatoes would turn green from how much parsley she would use. Mac and cheese would be black from all the pepper. It was a mess.”
I laugh some more. I like this. I miss times similar to this one with her so, so much and to have them back so briefly means everything to me. I take in everything, holding this moment close to my heart, like a Polaroid picture.
“Glad she learned. And I’m glad you’re here learning from me too. I dreamed up this day. But I didn’t dream up her getting sick.” Everything stops for a brief moment. I watch as a tear or two streak down her cheek, she rubs her face with her sleeve and continues to chop up a red onion. I know Grandma feels bad about not getting to visit her daughter because of the restaurant tying her up all the time. I know every night she talks to Momma on the phone, she feels worse about not being there. “She’s gonna be a’ight, though. I’ve been telling myself that everything is going to be a’ight. My baby will be okay. The Lord isn’t gonna take her away from us like this. He won’t.”
I sigh, trying to blink back the tears now, but I’m too late.
“The pan needs more butter,” Grandma murmurs, like she’s trying to keep her voice down or like the tears she’s holding back are lowering the volume of her voice.
“More butter?” I ask.
“Not actual butter, honey,” she says, and chuckles at me. “The butter in the soul. It’s an expression from the South. It means, as you’re cookin’, try and feel more in tune with what you’re makin’. If you feel it in your soul, the taste will be amplified. Sometimes, though, things just need more butter, literally.”
Whoa. I’m so confused. I need some time to think about this.
“Grandma, why aren’t you entering the contest too?”
“I would, baby. I really would. But I turned seventy this year. Sixty-nine is the maximum age.”
“Oh.”
“It’s your turn.”
“But I’m scared and nervous,” I say, feeling those things even right now. I don’t make eye contact with her, until she lifts my head up with her finger like I’m a little kid again.
I expect her to say something like, Ain’t nothing to be scared of, boy. But she doesn’t. Instead, she says, very calmly and sweetly, “That’s okay. Being scared and nervous are things you’re supposed to feel, but you gotta be brave, baby. Being brave means going on while you’re scared and nervous, keeping up that fight inside your beating heart. I promise you’ll eventually end up winning that fight.”
My heart feels real full right now, and suddenly I’m not worrying as much, because I have the best teacher in the world—a multi–Hungry Heart Row Food Competition champion. I don’t have to worry about anything. At least, not in this moment. The thing about anxiety is that it creeps up on you whenever it wants to. Sometimes when you are least expecting and sometimes in those moments you’re trying to be the most present—the most you.
We take the chicken out of the fryer and melt some white cheese over it before pouring the already cheese-infused potatoes on top. Her soul-smothered chicken, smothered in potatoes and love.
One whiff of the air, and I’m in heaven. It smells so damn good, my mouth is watering, tongue tingling.
We finish cooking within half an hour. It’s a relatively fast dish, Grandma reminds me, hoping that I use it, and then we eat up.
I feel warm and fuzzy and like everything is going to work out and in my favor. After all, it sounds like my destiny, right? And I even think I know exactly what I’m going to make now. Already. I missed the deadline for turning in what I’m going to cook to guarantee my ingredients would be there, but their website has all the ones they’re providing, so I’ll just have to work with those.
“I’m gonna start cleaning up ’round here. You go on and get some rest.” She hands me the key to her apartment, where I’ll be staying, to put my luggage in, and she makes sure she gives me the book of secret family recipes, and my eyes get really wide, my chest gets really tight. I grab a slice of apple pie before heading there. Her apartment is literally across the street, so I don’t have a far walk at all. I don’t even need to use the map. As I’m eating the apple pie with one hand, trying to imagine all of the ingredients before I read about them later, I’m transported back to when I was just a little boy. Suddenly I’m just ten years old, in the kitchen with both Momma and Grandma, making Thanksgiving pies.
Before bed, I FaceTime Momma just to check up on her and let her know how things have been going since I got to Rowbury. Once we hang up, I flip through the book of family recipes, seeing things I only vaguely remember from my childhood. I’m going to make Grandma’s soul-smothered chicken. It’s the perfect thing to try to recreate—a classic that Grandma made me that time the lights were off in our apartment and the gas bill was overdue and Momma and I lived with her. I’ll grab some ingredients from the restaurant before I head to the competition. I’m pretty sure I can do that without getting disqualified. Before I fall asleep, I make sure to go online and register what I’m going to make, and I keep Momma’s smile seared into my eyelids for motivation.
* * *
A few days pass by and suddenly, it’s Saturday. I wake up in the morning choking on anxiety, a familiar sourness in my gut, and at any moment, I just may throw up. I’m hoping it happens before tonight—before the food competition.
Grandma drives me to the place where the competition is being hosted at the Rowbury Community Center, and I can see lines of people filing into the red-brick building once we pull in. I don’t know if this is all my competition or also people who will be watching me, but my anxiety is starting to act up. My chest feels tight; I can’t really breathe right.
I rush into my backpack and pull out my headphones. I put them on and play the first song on my playlist. There’s something about the bass in this Drake song that calms me, makes me feel like I’m not drowning anymore. I can squeeze my eyes shut and work on my breathing.
In.
Out.
Slower.
In.
Out.
Grandma probably has no clue what’s going on with me, and she doesn’t ask, so maybe that’s a good thing so I don’t get distracted. If she were to ask, it would be all I could think about.
Finally we arrive at the community center. Eagerly, I rush in and a gasp slips out of me from how much this is exactly what I pictured it would be. I look back, and Grandma’s waving me to come back to her.
She hands me a clipboard for signing in and then escorts me to my cooking station before wishing me luck. When I get to my little station, I scan the room again and see all of my competition, a lump burning up in my gut. My throat is dry like I’ve eaten an entire thing of salt, and my chest is tight, and these are some of the signs of one of my panic attacks.
The five judges take turns counting down, each saying one number, before they start the timer overhead.
Five.
Four.
Three.
Two.
One.
Everyone darts and zooms. Pots clinking and pans smacking. Stoves sizzling and butter caramelizing, funneling in the air like a sweet fog. The world spins faster around me. My chest feels so damn heavy. I pull out my bottle of tiny round saviors that continue to help me over and over again in times of need like this moment right now where I feel like there are a zillion fire ants in my gut and a shit-ton of grenades going off in my stomach and head, bringing on a panic attack.
I squeeze my eyes shut for a moment.
I put on my headphones so I can stop feeling like at any second I’ll burst into flames. I’m going through my “mellow out” playlist, keeping the volume down low enough so I can hear the judges and the timer.
The timer above the cooking stations is blinking at me in huge red numbers how much time I’ve got left. It’s such a sad and depressing reminder of the amount of time Momma probably has left to live. Unlike Momma, at least I know exactly how much time I’ve got left. And looking at the timer, that’s one hour. At the end, no matter what, I know I’ll be alive. That’s more than I can say for Momma.
I’m about to make Grandma’s recipe, but with my own twist. I will need to put my own soul into this dish.
I gather all of the ingredients from a large pantry that the competitors get to choose from.
5 chicken breasts—one for each judge
1/4 teaspoon of salt
1/4 teaspoon of lemon-pepper seasoning
1/4 teaspoon of paprika
2 tablespoons of olive oil
3 sticks of butter
1 onion, sliced
1/2 cup of Colby–Monterey Jack, melted
1/2 cup of pepper jack cheese, melted
10 strips of maple bacon
Some sort of green garnish
I cut the chicken breasts into halves, season them with the dry seasonings, and bake them. When they’re ready and cooked all the way through, I wrap each half in bacon and fry them with onion slices until the bacon’s a nice, crispy, golden brown and the onions are soft and cooked through and through. The whole time they cook and simmer, I run the stick of butter around the chicken halves for even crispier edges and that buttery taste that brings anything to the next level—a strategy probably everybody black knows, and I guess it’s to my benefit there’s not many black people in this competition. I scan the crowd once more and lock eyes with Grandma. She’s got these big, alert eyes and a smile that stretches from ear to ear. I can tell she’s proud of me.
It hits me that I’m cooking in a cast-iron skillet. Cast-iron skillets are important where I’m from—commonly used for corn bread there. They’re symbolic, if you will. Symbolic of our ancestors, but also symbolic in the sense that people are a lot like them. The way they can be absolutely resilient and multifaceted and complex and able to take the heat. Kind of like Grandma. She’s all those things and then some. She’s someone I aspire to be like some day. She carried an entire family on her back, started up her own restaurant, and became a professional cook without even having to go to school, and she’s epically won this competition almost every time she entered, proving that she’s capable of doing anything she really sets her mind to.
Who knows, maybe this is that next step I need to take to be more like her. I tell myself that I’ve got to do crazy, hard, and brave things, like Grandma’s done all her life, to be anything like her.
It’s all in the butter. Grandma’s voice suddenly gets stuck in my head, like she’s the Holy Ghost, and she’s guiding me through all this, showing me just what to do.
I look around again. I see a mother and son cooking together—or at least this is what they appear to be. I see a husband and wife cooking together. I see two friends cooking together. And I see people who’re all by themselves, relying on family recipes or their own creations, like me.
Focus, Leo.
Don’t get intimidated.
Don’t back down.
More butter.
There’s something about the smell or the sound of the bacon sizzling or something else that makes me think of Momma, that sends me swimming, no, drowning in memories of life with her healthy, growing up with a mom who knew she had a life timeline that had fewer days than her own son. I imagine buttering soft, fresh bread with her for holiday feasts. I imagine her warm smile and laugh—her usual smile and laugh, not the one she has now—the one she had back when we’d tell each other jokes as we’d cook together. It’s the thought of never ever getting any of this back that has me shaking as I let the plastic covering of the stick of butter fall into the pan. I can’t breathe all of a sudden. I crank the volume up on my headphones and fish out the wrapping and toss it in the trash.
I force myself to release the tongs in my hand, to back away, just for a breather, a second that feels more like forever. Squeezing my eyes shut, I slow my breathing and crank the music a little louder, still not too loud, though.
I walk back over to my station, the timer is closer to 5 minutes now. I make sure the cheese is melted perfectly before pouring it over my bacon-wrapped chicken breasts.
I put the food onto a plate as fast as I can, still trying to be all neat about it, but remembering how Grandma used to always say that no soul food is ever “neat,” because it’s messy putting your soul into something. I just hope these judges are thinking the same way when they taste the food.
HOLY SHIT. HOLY SHIT. HOLY SHIT.
Oh.
My.
God.
My eyes widen as I stare at the plates in front of me. Wow. Wow. I did that. I did THAT! It’s beautiful, and it looks like the way Grandma used to serve it to us, even with the fancy green garnish on the side.
Suddenly the timer blares, and everyone who’s competing shoots their arms up, like they’re surrendering or reaching up high in the sky to collect victory stars. I let my headphones fall on my neck, keeping my hands up, high and still.
Everything is done. This is it.
The world is still spinning.
My chest hurts. That money.
Heart pounding and I struggle for breath.
Fingers numb.
Blood hot.
Anxiety.
Anticipation.
I don’t even notice I’m crying until I feel little droplets roll down my chin, drying there. The stop siren is still buzzing and blaring for another few seconds, and all the judges come forward, weaving throughout the different cooking stations inspecting all the food for plating and style. I probably don’t get any points this round, especially since I notice I spilled a little melted cheese on the side of one of the plates. Fuck.
The judges come over to my station, writing notes on their clipboards. Some of them have smiles. Others don’t. Some of them look at me. Others don’t. One of them even kinda rolls his eyes. I can feel my heart nearly palpitating in my chest.
I can still hear my music playing around my neck, and it’s so bitterly quiet in this room, I’m sure everybody can hear John Mayer.
Oh shit.
Next is the tasting round. I need that money, I think.
Trust in the butter. Trust that my soul is enough.
Some people made extra food, so we can try their dishes before the judges do. I walk around and taste all kinds of food—food I’ve never even heard of or thought of. Some of it tastes so damn good; others don’t.
Eventually, I make it back to my station and wait for the judges to come over again.
The first judge who does is a short, white man with red hair. He takes a fork and sticks it directly in the middle of a chicken breast.
“Tender. Perfectly cooked all the way through. Nice and soft.” He doesn’t look at me when he says this. Just writes something down and takes a big, cheesy bite. “Excellent.”
Yes! I celebrate in my head. Point for me, right? He’s only one judge, though. There are four others. If he likes it and the others don’t, his compliment would suddenly mean shit. So I stop celebrating and wait for the others to come around to my station. I stare at my brown hands, messy and greasy-looking from giving this meal my all, until I notice two people in front of me, both in casual clothes. The next two judges.
They are both women—one’s Latina, and the other is black, with her natural hair out and proud, reminding me of Momma, catching me off guard for a split second. They both compliment my work and smile. Something about this makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside.
The last two judges finally make their way to my station and try my soul-smothered chicken, and they’re both reactionless, like they’re somewhere between Simon Cowell and Gordon Ramsay on the judge niceness scale.
The judges huddle together, maybe to compare whatever they wrote down on their clipboards. Minutes slip past—agonizing minutes that make me feel clammy all over.
I interlock my fingers and say a quick prayer. I don’t know what I’m even praying or who I’m even praying to anymore, but it’s my desperate attempt at hoping I win this.
The judge pulls out the big check for five thousand dollars. It’s one of those huge ones you’d see on a game show. Everyone gasps. One even slips out from deep within my gut.
They announce third place first. It’s an Asian girl who made some form of moo shu pork with noodles. She walks over to accept the bronze trophy and shake the hands of the judges. They even take a photo for her. The whole room erupts in applause.
The Latina judge is getting ready to announce the next winner. She’s talking slowly, describing how much she enjoyed this next dish, how it reminded her of her honeymoon to Italy a few years ago. A yelp comes from the back. A mother and son who made some sort of Italian dish win second place.
I don’t even notice that my fingers are crossed until I go to clap for them.
“And finally, for first place in this year’s Hungry Heart Row Food Competition, we’ve got a new champion.”
I imagine a drum roll going on in the distance, so much hope trying to beat, beat, beat its way out of, or into, my chest.
I clasp my hands together tighter.
“Leonelvis Watkins.” My name falls out of the judges’ mouths simultaneously and in different pitches.
“That’s me.” I have to convince myself, the words coming out in a weird glob. “That’s me. That’s my name!”
I gasp and gasp and gasp deeper. It’s in this moment that I realize that my hands aren’t shaking anymore, my chest isn’t so heavy, my jaws aren’t burning up. I’m standing in shock at just how far I’ve come, from once upon a time being an anxious mess who would’ve never even entered the competition to growing a pair and not only signing up but also winning, and the tears are nearly pouring from me now.
There are so many butterflies fluttering in my stomach right now. And I feel frozen for a moment. Suddenly my face is a watery mess, and everything is blurring in front of me. I have to force myself to take tiny steps toward the judges, where they are holding up the first place trophy and check. I’m so happy right now, and there’s an entire Fourth of July celebration inside me. A celebration’s going on in my chest, not only because I won—holy shit, the more I let that sink in the more it feels huge—but because I didn’t let my fear or anxiety stop me or destroy me one bit. I own my anxiety; my anxiety doesn’t own me.
After taking the photo while holding the trophy and check, I see Grandma in the audience with the biggest smile on her face. Immediately I think about Momma, and the tears keep coming.
I call her up. I can’t wait to tell her the news. My heart is racing, and I don’t think it’s a panic attack coming out.
She answers, her voice a little croaky, like she’s waking up from a nap.
“Momma,” I say through the phone, hella excitement probably evident in my voice, “I’m coming home. You’re gonna live.”
And I will too, and I wish I could live inside this moment forever.