Marla’s made fairy cakes with white icing,
all laid out on a wire rack,
ready for a pot of tea
and some company.
They smell lush, I tell her,
and she beams like I’ve given her
a sticker.
But when we sit down to eat
and Marla bites into the first cake,
her face clouds.
I try one too.
And no.
They are salty when they should be sweet,
though I swallow down my mouthful
instead of spitting it on to the plate.
I am useless, she says.
Feckin’ useless. Useless.
I can’t even bake a bun.
Seven-year-olds can bake buns.
She hits her own arm.
Her shoulder.
Her face.
I sit very still,
wondering when her hand will reach me.
Not daring to speak,
an eye on the back door.
I could be out in five seconds.
Stupid, she says.
Stupid,
stupid,
stupid.
And she is right.
I was stupid to
start feeling safe here.
She’s not with it.
She could strike out at any moment.
You missed out the sugar, that’s all, I say.
Yes, I missed the sugar.
I’m not a total gobshite.
I know what I did.
She grinds her teeth,
squints at me for a second.
Have I made this happen?
Have I made her feel this way?
She bangs the table,
hits her arm again.
Stupid, Marla.
Stupid buns.
How did I get so old?
Look at the state of me.
I exhale.
She is angry with herself,
with her brain,
the strain of her disease.
Marla isn’t mad with me at all.
On the countertop are the other ingredients
along with a dusting of flour.
She’s left the oven on.
I search for the sugar.
Could you teach me to make them?
She turns away. Don’t get on my nerves.
A cack-handed blind hedgehog could make them.
I find a tea towel,
turn it into a blindfold.
Let’s test that theory.
You’re not a right thing.
You’re really not a right thing.
I stretch out my arms towards her like a zombie.
I hear her giggle.
Come here and let me tie that thing tighter.
And so we bake.
Me in a blindfold,
Marla in charge.
And the buns come out OK.
In the end.