Page 24 of Veil of Death and Shadow

In the evenings, she’d fish through her collection of old keepsakes, and we’d look at the few photographs she had of myfather—her nephew—and the one of my mother—their wedding portrait—while she’d tell me whatever stories she remembered about them both. Most of the stories were about him; she’d only met my mother two or three times over the years, but I clung to every word, like she was spinning straw into gold.

I could hear the same story a million times, and I’d still listen enraptured, her soft, melodic voice, its own gift—one I didn’t even think to cherish as its own coveted memory, until it was gone.

Now, I hold onto the memory of her telling those stories more tightly than I did the stories themselves. I’d never met my parents, but Amto Amani was my entire world for the first decade of my life.

The rest of the night would be spent watching comedy films and laughing until we cried while we acted out our favorite parts. She had the kind of laugh that would make the entire room feel full with it, like not even the walls themselves were strong or sturdy enough to contain her joy. We’d cram in as many movies as we could until we couldn’t justify staying up a second later.

It had been more than fifteen years since I’d heard that laugh, and the loss of it still carved an ache deep in my bones—one I could never fully shake.

When I lost her, I lost everything that existed in that life—the photographs, the specific scent of our home, the recipes.

I couldn’t get the latter back, but when we took over Frank’s restaurant a year ago, I’d done my best to recover as many as I could by memory and by taste. It was a work in progress, but one I enjoyed pursuing.

The restaurant was quiet after the early morning rush.

It was my favorite part of the day.

As much as I’d grown to love our regular customers, and the labor that went into making this place run, there was somethingabout the solitude that soothed me in a way that a busy diner never could.

The light above flickered as I stirred the cooling milk on the stove.

Another electrical surge. Hopefully, it would hold off until I got the rest of this finished.

I turned the light off and opened all he blinds, preferring to work in the natural light that shone through anyway.

Most of the food was already prepped for the lunch rush we’d get in another few hours, which Sora would take over for. We both handled the dinner service most nights, and we also had a few people we could tap in for a shift or two each week, when one of us couldn’t cover it.

Like me, Sora had taken quickly to the work, both of us experimenting with new recipes, searching for links to pasts that eluded us.

Sora didn’t know her family. We’d met in foster care during middle school, but she and Rina had been hopping from home to home for as long as they could remember.

When she found a Japanese cookbook a few months ago in Frank’s surprisingly robust stash, she’d made it her mission to cook her way through every recipe, making substitutes with ingredients we couldn’t easily find, just as I did with my attempts at recovering Amto Amani’s dishes.

Food had become an unexpected link to the parts of ourselves that had been taken from us too soon. It was inefficient, up against all that we’d lost, but it was something.

And it was strange that it was this diner that helped us along that journey, the very one that functioned as a refuge when we’d arrived in the city. Almost like it was growing with us.

I didn’t grow up wanting to own a restaurant, had never even enjoyed cooking until a year ago, but the daily routine of it had become like a meditation practice, one that I clung to dearly.

And when I had a chance to linger in my memories, trying to replicate Amto Amani’s spice ratios—never measured, always eye-balled—and flare, I felt closer to her than I had in years.

“It’s smaller than I’d pictured.”

A gravelly voice pulled me out of the mindless routine of chopping parsley and mint. When I looked up, I saw Claudine, seated at her usual booth—mine and Sora’s old favorite—with another older woman I’d never seen before.

She was a shorter white woman, her back hunched slightly, and she had spiky hair that stood out in every direction. Her face was wrinkled, but in an expressive way that made it clear that she’d had a lifetime of laughing.

“Shit. Sorry.” I smiled at them both, “Was so lost in my thoughts I didn’t even hear you guys come in.” It was Tuesday, but a bit earlier than Claudine’s usual time. I searched through the cluttered shelf of mugs until I found two matching ones without chips. “Would you like some tea as well?”

The new woman glanced from me to her friend, her drawn-on brows arched in interest. “No, nothing for me.”

“You’re sure?” When she nodded, I brought Claudine’s usual to her table.

She smiled up at me, green-eyes wide as she leaned over the cup of tea and breathed in the minty steam floating towards the ceiling.

Claudine never actually drank the tea.

She didn’t exactly pay for it either, but that wasn’t a big deal. Most things were bartered for when money was difficult to come by, and I supposed she saw her (often unsolicited) advice as payment enough.

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