Aquafaba

Aquafaba. So innocuous sounding, almost elegant. But the word felt like a knife running up his spine. It was the way she said it to him, like there was an implicit ‘obviously’ afterwards. Like he didn’t deserve to be in the kitchen if he didn’t know what aquafaba was.

But he didn’t know, of course. (Obviously.)

Later he would go and stand in the garage to smoke a cigarette where she wouldn’t follow him and he’d Google it:

Aquafaba is an egg replacement usually made from chickpea water.

She’d said to him, faux-blithely, ‘Pretty sure there’s a few cans in the cupboard...’ then watch him looking blankly across the shelves, while he knew full well he’d never seen a can with aquafaba written on it. The thing is he knew that she knew that he didn’t know what aquafaba was. And she also knew he’d be too proud to admit it.

She watched him for a good minute, sitting on the kitchen stool, swinging her knees a little, evidence of her barely contained glee at this fresh new opportunity to torture him, watching his eyes scan unseeing across the tins of chick peas, until she finally hopped up off the stool and plucked up a can in each hand and go, ‘See, right in front of you, silly.’

Then she skipped upstairs for a shower.

This petty, childish teasing had taught him to hate her. It made him feel old. And that was exactly the opposite of what he’d married her for.

At first the age gap had made him feel young. And, yes: virile. She was his Porsche, his Maserati. She was lithe and sporty and made other men jealous. I mean that was the point, right? But what he realised now was: in the beginning their union was born amidst the slurry of second marriage lust, fired up by the intoxicating and effortless way she met the world and navigated the chicanes of life with half the stress and twice the moxie of himself at that age.

But then later, and far sooner than he had hoped, their marriage had became an embarrassing, transparently shameful compromise for both of them. Other men weren’t jealous anymore. They rubber-necked, waiting for the sparks to find the fuel tank.

He stamped out his cigarette on the garage floor, kicked the butt under the shelves. She hated him doing that. He knew that. But he knew something else she hated too.

He went back inside, pausing at the bottom of the stairs to check that he could still hear shower sounds. He yanked open the utensil drawer, pulled out the can opener and slammed the drawer shut again. He cracked the cans, poured the precious liquid down the sink and dumped the dry chick peas in a glass bowl. Might as well make it convincing, he thought.

He opened the fridge door and chose three of the freckliest, knobbliest hen abortions in the box. He cracked them into another bowl and dropped the shells into the disposal, where the machine pulverised the evidence into dust. He grabbed a hand whisk and started into the three bright slimy globes, his determination and his right wrist equal to the task.

About ten minutes later, she bounced down the stairs, toweling her hair dry and casting an appreciative sniff in the direction of the frying pan and the perfectly browning Spanish omelette.

‘Mmm that smells wonderful,’ she beamed. ‘See, aquafaba? It’s miracle stuff isn’t it?’

‘Unbelievable really.’

He served her up a wedge of omelette and watched her dive in. She chewed it carefully, letting her fork do a little dance in the air.

‘It tastes so good! I’m so glad you worked it out. It’s such a pain that I’m allergic to eggs.’

‘I know...’

‘You’re the best.’ She gave him a jab with her fork and carried on eating.