Tender Cut — Maggie Matsukas
short story ☆
short story ☆
The kitchen was Eiren’s sanctuary: a sacred space where creativity and culinary skills breathed life into gourmet dishes celebrating life itself. She was an established vegan chef, moving through a world of olive oils, aromatic herbs, spices, legumes, and fresh produce sprawled over the counter before their final transformation.
Yet the immaculate domain was soon violated by the gruesome, thick red of raw meat. By the blood, marrow, and sinews she had to trim before slicing and searing it. Liver, tenderloin, T-bone, shanks, fillet mignon paraded on her table every day, despite the nausea they induced. Despite the repulsion Eiren felt at the sight of those bloody red chunks of meat, their grease and fat contaminating her hands, their sharp smell. The idea of desecrating her space with such filth made her skin crawl.
Yet she endured, swallowing her disgust and drowning the stench of death and iron in red wine and intense seasonings that transformed into a sweet, caramelised glaze. The taste of meat was softened with lemongrass, garlic, and thyme. She strived to prepare the most delicious dishes for her husband.
Hector was her partner, her soulmate and cohort. She couldn't bear watching him waste away to a mysterious disease that was reducing him to the shadow of his former self. It was an ache they both shared, visceral and overwhelming. His wrists thinned by the day, his eyes hollowed in the pale skin, his shoulders narrowed. A man reduced to skin and bones.
I need protein, Eiren. Real meat. He pleaded. Only you can help me. Eiren, my life is in your hands, like my heart.
The love was there, alive and pulsing, but on some days the sense of devotion felt like a noose tightening around her neck.
The weight of sacrifice swelled in her chest, heavy and inescapable.
In the weeks that followed, the recovery was turbulent. Hector regained some strength, but his hunger increased, disproportionate and unrelenting. Eiren was left with no other choice but to quit her job, reshaping her entire existence around him- around his restless hunger. Soon her devotion warped Hector’s perception too. He no longer perceived her as a wife, nor an equal, but as a provider. A beacon of life. A priestess figure, akin to an idol, he would worship as a devotee to have his needs met, his hunger sated.
Eiren, help me, I beg you. My life is in your hands. I need more meat…fresher.
She felt compressed and confined, exhausted, but her marital vows were impossible to forgo. One evening she sat alone in the kitchen, staring at her chef’s knives and the cutting board, convinced only a desperate attempt could bring Hector back, and restore their relationship. Mend it. I lean on you as you lean on me. She turned the oven on and started to crush the garlic cloves, chopping the green onions and parsley leaves, in a rhythmic, almost entranced dance. She added the olive oil and white wine and began to simmer the mixture, infusing the atmosphere with the warm, earthy aromas she was closely tied to. Later, she muffled herself with a dishcloth, white-knuckled grip on the knife, and watched her once immaculate kitchen collapse into a slaughterhouse.
Blood splattered across the floor, staining the table and tiles as its pungent, iron-heavy stench wafted through the air, and a tender cut roasted in the oven along with vegetables. Eiren had fainted multiple times in the process of making her husband something special, in the hopes of feeding him real meat. Something exquisite and unique that did not only contain proteins and calories but love, devotion, and sacrifice. It was her magnum opus, the perfect dish. She was still on the floor, seated in the dark pool of her own blood, when she slipped into an awkward, almost hysterical laughter.
That evening she served her husband in their bedroom and h. He immediately noticed the bandage soaked in blood.
Eiren, my love, what happened? You’re bleeding.
Don’t worry, darling. Eat. I made a special dish for you today.
She had long lost her appetite and had been going for days without eating, but that evening she watched her husband feasting hungrily, everishly even, like an animal. It was a grotesque scene. A man, her own husband, tearing the meat with his bare hands, sucking on this flesh- –on life itself.
He did bounce back slowly, regaining some of his strength, his energy. It’s the secret ingredient, she thought to herself.
But Hector’s recovery was fragile, marked by sudden relapses that made it clear that simple meat, however fresh, however tender, or craftily cooked, was not going to suffice for long. The diagnosis, on the other hand, was still nowhere in sight, and Eiren had to stay strong for both, fending off the encroaching despair.
You’re my life force, my sun and marrow, Eiren. I love you more than anything. More than life. With all my heart. Don’t leave me like this. Don’t let me fade.
But Eiren was fading too. Growing weaker by the day, skipping meals, wasting away. The pressure inside was building up, suffocating her. Sometimes she’d let her mind wonder what it all would be like if he wasn’t there anymore, if she’d let him go. But guilt and shame would engulf her. Swallowing her with overpowering force. Such a brutal and selfish thought.
But what is love if not an endless act of sacrifice? Eiren knew she had to devise a plan to help Hector reverse the sickness before it was too late. Before either would’ve succumbed completely, betrayed by their bodies.
Her determination and loyalty proved to be stronger than despair as she found a new source of supply through a string of acquaintances, paid profusely, with ties to the local hospital. Soon enough, unmarked coolers with sealed bags inside were delivered at her doorstep. Their label was a single marker, the symbol of biohazardous material.
Her sanctuary was profaned, her morals dissolved in the dry atmosphere of the kitchen that pressed against her body whenever she stood before the cutting board. Her hands continued to move with surgical precision through lungs, hearts, or translucent, unformed remains slick with blood and tissue- –cutting them into cubes, or thin slices like ribbons. She did not allow herself to think of their origin, focusing entirely on the ritual: the water rinsing, the butter sizzling, the meat browning on all sides. Everything drowned in Cabernet Sauvignon and served on a bed of marinated herbs.
Hector’s body responded, but the recovery progressed with fits and starts. Slowly, his vigor surged, as his voice deepened and his muscles regained some of their lost density. But it was always a matter of time -–weeks before he’d collapse in his former state, to his unnamed illness. The relapse was violent and sudden and found him limp, eyes sunken in a grey complexion, bruises forming on the body and bones turning brittle like soaked chalk.
Eiren, help me. You’re my saviour, my all. Without you I’m lost. And you promised, remember? You vowed.
Eiren knew, deep in her heart, she was already too far gone. Love turned her into a monster, beyond redemption, beyond salvation. Guilt was the ultimate price to pay, burning in her chest, consuming her. Hunger, on the contrary, kept her captive. Anchored to reality.
Since her husband fell ill, she’d lost her appetite, but since he had begun demanding meat, her whole body started to shut down by rejecting food–once familiar flavours and tastes were rejected through convulsions and vomiting.
Love never saved her, but she could still harness its power to end this sordid cycle, this tragic slaughter-show. It was in her hands, the ultimate act of devotion.
That evening she set the table with their fine wedding china and handmade tablecloth, prepared the dressings and condiments, and uncorked two bottles of Château Margaux. Hector joined her in the kitchen, visibly weaker, and their hands interlaced. They both stood silent, aware of what would follow, of what the secret ingredient was. The key to Hector’s recovery. She lit a candle and placed it in the center of the table, next to her chef’s knife, watching the steel gleam in the flickering, warm candlelight as the first notes of their favourite Leonard Cohen’s song started to drift. A delicate wave of tenderness swelled, filling the room, as the distance between them closed. She placed her hand on his chest, breaking the silence with a trembling voice.
One last time, darling. Dance me to the end of love.
Maggie (she/they) dwells between words and worlds and in her free time likes to weave dark tales that exist in the twilight between the mundane and the whimsical. They draw inspiration from mythology, classic gothic stories, history and the ordinary. Through their prose and poetry they strive to capture the beauty and the horror, the divine and the malice. She lives in Greece with her cats.
