She waited. My mother used to put something in them. Spice. I don't know what it was. Made them taste like he stopped.
I know it's not your job to cook what people want. What did it smell like? She asked. He thought about it. Like smoke and something sharp.
She turned to the spice shelf spare, but not empty. She had reorganized it 2 weeks ago. Cumin, she said, taking down the small tin and probably chili. Did she cook them long? All day, he said.
I can do that on Thursday when we have time for it. She set the tin on the counter. Anything else? He looked like a man who had prepared for a harder conversation. No, he said.
That's all. He left. She put the cumin back and thought about the particular economy of small gestures, how much they cost, how much they returned. Her mother had understood that a recipe book was not really a book of recipes. It was a record of every time a woman had used food to say something she didn't have the language for otherwise.
She thought about this more than she should have, probably. The storm broke on the eighth day. Not with fanfare, the wind simply went quiet sometime before dawn. And when Rosalie came downstairs, the kitchen windows showed a sky that was still dark but clear, stars visible for the first time in over a week. She stood at the window and looked at them for a moment with her arms crossed over her robe.
Feeling something ease in her chest that she hadn't realized had been clenched, she made the coffee. Gideon came down 10 minutes later. He looked at the clear window and then at her. Roads might be passable by tomorrow, he said. We need the flour first.
Everything else can wait a week, but the flour can't. He nodded. Mateo and I'll take the supply wagon to Harker as soon as the road's workable. I'll give you the list. I know you will.