Freshly Baked Bread

Ella LaBarre

Ibaked fresh bread this morning and I thought I would tell you. Maybe you would ask me if it was a sourdough or whole wheat loaf or if the edges crisped up with that nice, golden brown tint. Perhaps I’d bite into it and gush about the warmth and flavor of the bread and you would beg over the phone for me to bring you some to try the next day. Then, that day after trying it you would go on and on about how heavenly this bread was and you’d talk about it with the most crooked smile on your face and it would be just perfect. So, that night I would go home and create a little recipe for you to follow with the ingredients list in cursive handwriting and the directions written with my favorite gel pen and little doodles all over the margins just because I would very much like to see you smile again. The next morning I would give you the recipe and you would thank me profusely with that same smile but still laugh at my drawings because I’ve never been much of an artist. Then, that night you’d tell me you followed the recipe but it wasn’t as good as the bread that I baked. And I’d say that maybe one day, in my kitchen, we could bake another loaf of bread together. But you didn’t say any of those things. In fact, you said nothing at all. I know it was just a meager loaf of bread and it probably tastes more bland than heavenly but still,I thought you would say something. I mean, you didn’t even beg to try the loaf of the bread I baked. I offered some instead, making sure to add that it was a sourdough loaf because thirty-two days ago on a Tuesday—no, a Wednesday afternoon you mentioned you liked the sourdough bread they sold at this one grocery store that was a bit too far for your convenience and you were nagging about how they should open up a closer location and–You politely declined. And I know it’s just bread but at this very moment, I would like to shove this loaf of bread down your throat so that you can just tell me just how absolutely splendid of a baker I am. But I don’t. So, there will be no recipe and my kitchen will only have me alone sprawled across the cold granite countertops blubbering about five cups of flour, a pinch of salt, and a tablespoon and a half of yeast. This morning I am baking another loaf of bread. You are 29.7 miles away buying your own overpriced sourdough loaf at the grocery story. I know you do not care what type of bread I am baking or what temperature I preheated the oven to while kneading the dough. But, I think maybe you would care if I touched the hot pan while the bread was cooling. Or maybe I could forget the oven mitts when I take the bread out. I could watch my fingertips puffing up and turning white as they begin to peel. But even as I stare at my throbbing hand I am not thinking about the pain. I am not running to call an ambulance to patch up my skin. I am not even screaming. All I am thinking about is what you will say. Don’t you see, I never baked this bread because I was hungry. I baked it so that you would ask about how it tasted, so you would ask about the recipe, so that I would have something to say to you and you would have something to say back. I will be a woman stuck in this kitchen forever and I will keep baking loaves and loaves and loaves of bread until you say something. I will climb inside this oven and cook myself alive. But even as my skin is charring and the scent of burning flesh is filling the cold, empty kitchen I will still be waiting for you to ask about the fresh bread I baked this morning.