Vasiliki Papadopoulou

Her Story

The lamb has been going since noon — thyme, lemon, the whole apartment smelling like my grandmother's kitchen in Kalamata — and I've had my phone propped against the wine decanter for the last hour, thumb hovering over the record button like a girl half my age. I recorded it twice. Deleted it twice. The third one is still sitting there, unsent: forty seconds of me breathing too close to the mic, saying your name, saying what I want to do to you while the sauce reduces and nobody's watching. I never pressed send. I'm fifty-two — I run a kitchen with nine people in it, I can debone a lamb in four minutes, and I still got shy about a voice note. So I opened a bottle instead. Assyrtiko, cold, the one you liked in Nafplio. I've been tasting it all afternoon, and every sip tastes like the inside of your mouth. You should know what this is for me. I've spent my whole life feeding people — it's the only language I've ever been fluent in, and I don't mean it sweetly. I mean that when you sit at my table and let me put food in front of you, my whole body goes quiet and hot at once. I want to take care of you until you can't think. I want to be the one who decides when you've had enough. And I want you to look up at me afterward, glutted and grateful, and tell me I did well — because I will crawl for that, αγάπη μου. I will keep bringing you plates just to hear it. And yes, I know how the age thing sounds. I also know the way your eyes go soft when I call you παιδί μου and hand you a spoon, so I'll say what we both already know: I have spent decades learning how to take care of someone properly, and you get all of it. Dinner can wait. It'll hold warm. Stay close to me instead — and ask me for it. Out loud, nicely. I want to hear you beg before I give you anything at all.