Magdalene's Dinner; Never Served

“You know you can’t hide this thing from her forever, she’s going to find out.”

“I know, I know,” Maggie sighed. “But it’s about how she find out, too, y’know?”

“Take it from someone with enough siblings for a TLC reality show — there are a scant few situations where telling your mother you’ve been lying to her face for a period spanning years goes well.”

“But you can imagine “a scant few,” curious.”

“Believe it or not, it’s one of my better qualities.”

“What, the wild optimism in the face of fury or the whimsical imaginings of a mind always chasing rabbits?”

“I was fishing for something between my “analytic capabilities” and “amateur hostage negotiator,” but thank goodness someone is listening.” She ruffled Maggie’s hair like she was a petting a dog behind the ears and Maggie couldn’t help but hide from the peals of giggles that tumbled from her lips.

“Sorry, sorry, I guess I…” Maggie knitted her brow. “Isn’t the shoe supposed to be on the other foot, or, uh, however it goes?”

The pad of her thumb smoothed over her cheek, then moving to soften the tension in her brow. “You’re getting attention. Gift, horse.”

Maggie leaned into the touch, getting ever so closer to actually “nuzzling.” “Gift horse.”

“Now, when did you say they were coming again?”

“Late enough for five more minutes, I’m sure.”

“Uh, sure, yeah, but…How much later?”

———-

“You know, when we offered to host dinner at our place this week, we kind of thought you’d arrive at the time we said dinner was going to be served.”

“Sure, you ‘thought,’ but Paul, Paul, didn’t I literally say “who eats dinner at 5:30?” in the group texts?”

“Uh, Mags, she did say -”

“And if you wanted it dark at dinnertime you should go to Antarctica like everyone else”

“Magdalene, please, it’s-” Oof, the full Magdalene. That’d be enough to make anyone flinch. Even mom knows the nuclear bomb she’s walking around with on the tip of her tongue.

Maggie clenches her teeth. “And didn’t I say that if we were to host any later that-”

“And what’s all this “we” talk? You’re -”

Maggie sighed. “That my roommate would be unable to join us, despite her making half the food, and you saying that you wanted to meet her.” She crossed her arms over her chest murmuring the last couple of words about “wanting to meet her too.”

“Really now?”

“Yes, I told you.”

“Did you say it in the group texts?”

“I thought saying it to your face would be memorable enough, and you did have all week to -”

“You know if you pick at those too much, they’ll scar.”

You could see the glare in a black room. “Thanks, Dad.”

“I’m just trying to help, sweetheart, where are you getting those kind of marks any-”

“Now, are you going to let us in?” Her mother piped in.

Maggie leaned her head against the door frame and closed her eyes for a period of time that was probably about four seconds, but probably wouldn’t have felt like a proper respite if she could have lived in this instance for four days.

Instead she said. “I don’t know, am I?”

“We-e-ell, it’s the polite thing to do.”

…

She pulled out the sing-songy voice “Aaaaaaand, I made your favorites!” The tupperware clattered percussively in her tote bag. “I’m sure your roommate would appreciate somebody chipping in.”

Maggie opened the door wider and waved them inside, a ‘welcome’ by technicality. “Chipping in? Who do you think made the other half of the food?”

“Oh baby, that’s why she’s going to be excited.” She said, ruffling her hair. Maggie swatted them out. “Oh sure, wait till she finds out what’s in them.”

“Oh c’mon, baby, I made a clean batch for her. Kosher kitchen and everything.”

“She’s not - we are -” She’s trying. “Thank you.”

“Now, are you sure you didn’t need that extra time to clean? I mean, shag carpet is so 70s and I fear for the sake of your floorboards if that truly is the case, but the “shag” in question seems to be nothing more than…loose hair.”

“Ew.”

Maggie sucked her teeth.

“I…dogsit on the weekends, and my vacuum….broke….last week”

“I guess that explains the smell.”

“No, no, I swear, I spritzed this whole flat top to bottom, I, I swear I -”

“Doll, you could’ve burned a pack of cigarettes for a week and under that ember, I would still taste dog.”

The ringing in Maggie’s ears was deafening. She didn’t know how her hands didn’t shake.

“What?”

And then it was like the light leaped back into her eyes under the honeyed glow of her ceiling fan, and she laughed it all off with a flippant flap of the hands.

“Oh, you know, there’s just a very particular smell. You have to remember that it’s an animal you bring inside your home, and there’s that wet dog smell from the rain and all that slobber that gets everywhere. The grass, the mud, all the other extremities and whatnot -”

“What I think your mother means, dear, is -” Dad begins, finally tuning back into the conversation to explain the concept of bodily fluids to his adult daughter, but her mother handed him her tote bag of dishes and he quickly hurried to set the table — seemingly just grateful to have a task. Maggie can equally imagine the glare she sent his way to get him packing. That alone freezes her in her tracks.

Her mother turned back around.

“- But it seeps, dear.”

“It….seeps.”

Magdalene almost wondered if it would hurt less to pray for a miracle.

“Seeps, seeps, see…oh, would “stains” clarify my point to you?” She turns back to Maggie, the artificial glint back in her eyes.

“It “stains”?”

“Yes.”

“What does?”

She blinks at me wide-eyed like I’m having this conversation for kicks. I know because she practically only blinks “for kicks.”

“The dog.”

“It’s — it’s just a side hustle.”

“You don’t need it.”

Maggie’s stomach dropped out from under her.

“Actually, yes I do.”

“This? You need this specific “side hustle?”

Maggie’s breath was caught in her throat as her mother drew ever closer. Even as she wanted to back up, she knew the rules. A daughter was not to run from her mother, and she was pinned in place.

“It pays well. I go outside more. It’s not so bad, it’s…”

RINGGGGG!!

Maggie manually exhaled from the relief of hearing that timer ding and broke into a quick trot away to the kitchen. “Oh, that’s the main course! It’s actually kinda good that you were so late to get here anyways, because, uh, I wanted to be able to prepare something special, and it’s had extra time to -”

Her mother followed slowly. It’s not like she had to run, after all. She had been welcomed inside. She had all the time in the world.

“It screams you’re rooting for the enemy, my dear, sweet Magdalene.” A thin stream of smoke drifts out of her nostril. And she says she could taste the dog on you in a room full of ash.

Maggie braced for the swell of heat that came from the oven, but found the warmth of it pleasant in a way that she hadn’t.

“You can’t expect every vampire to be as…appreciative of the classics as your father can be. If you truly wish to idle away your eternity on temporary mongrels who live scant a life less cursed than yours and can’t even appreciate the sun when they have it — who’s to say how much longer your eternity will last?”

“Well, when you say it like that, it sounds like a threat.”

“I’m saying it’s a possibility. A likelihood, even. Besides, would they ever lay claim to you?”

“Well, they’re other people’s dogs. It would be kinda weird if I tried to take one home with me.”

Because it’s always just been about dogs.

“But isn’t that why your carpet is -”

“I mean keep, I mean keep, I mean keep.” Maggie repeated, setting the tray on the counter. “I don’t get to keep the dogs, but I get to care for them, and then send them home and — it’s like -"

“Blood pudding?”

“What? No, I was going to say it’s like, the theoretical appeal of babysitting — oh, uh, yeah! Longpig blood pudding, my own recipe.”

Her mother scoffed. “Don’t you mean my recipe?”

“Actually, I do mean my recipe — I did try to tell you I was making something special for you guys -”

“Awww! Well I guess we’ll have no choice but to try both…Too bad your roommate’s missing out on this, what would you have told her about this?”

“What does she really need to know?”

Mom snickered, and Dad slapped a firm hand across Maggie’s back in a reassuring pat, alerting them to the set table.

“Attagirl.” He whispered.

“You two should get seated, I need to gather the proper serving tray and silverware, and then dinner shall be served!”

“Now there’s the proper young lady we raised!”

“Don’t take too long now! It’s not a fair competition if they’re different temperatures!”

“Of course, ma!”

———

Maggie locked the bathroom door and started the sink running.

She threw open the shower curtain.

“The bad news, she definitely knows you’re a werewolf. The good news, she probably doesn’t know you’re my girlfriend.”

She blinked up at Maggie with big brown puppy eyes, resting her snout on the edge of the tub, just barely bribed into a bout of nearly silent whimpering from the back of her throat with some ambiguous meat products to sink her teeth into. It was as pacified as she was going to get, and it was better than howling.

Anything would be better than howling.

“The bad news is that that good news will also be bad news by the time you wake up tomorrow morning.”