Elza's Kitchen

Elza’s Kitchen

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BY T H E S A M E AU T HOR

Valeria’s Last Stand

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Elza’s Kitchen

A Novel

MARC FITTEN

New York Berlin London Sydney

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Copyright © 2012 by Marc Fitten

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any

manner whatsoever without written permission from the publisher except in

the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles

or reviews. For information address Bloomsbury USA,

175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.

Published by Bloomsbury USA, New York

All papers used by Bloomsbury USA are natural, recyclable products made

from wood grown in well- managed forests. The manufacturing pro cesses

conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin.

library of congress cataloging- in- publication data

Fitten, Marc, 1974–

Elza’s kitchen : a novel / Marc Fitten. — 1st U.S. ed.

p. cm.

ISBN 978- 1- 60819- 769- 9 (pbk. : alk. paper)

I. Title.

PS3606.I8655E49 2012

813'.6 — dc23

2011039009

First U.S. Edition 2012

1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

Typeset by Westchester Book Group

Printed in the U.S.A. by Quad/Graphics, Fairfi eld, Pennsylvania

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For Zita

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Take all away from me, but leave me Ecstasy,

And I am richer then than all my Fellow Men—

Ill it becometh me to dwell so wealthily

When at my very Door are those possessing more,

In abject poverty—

—Emily Dickinson

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Book One

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3

Elza awoke alone. Alone and distraught over it. She felt dis-

traught because, quite frankly, though she was not a woman in

love, she was a woman who had grown accustomed to company at

night; and waking as she had — dressed in scratchy nightclothes

and supine in bed — with the bland view of her apartment’s ceiling

and crown moldings overhead instead of her lover’s bristly haunches

beside her, and with morning noises from city buses and trams

seeping in instead of his heavy breathing in her ear or the smell of

food wafting in from her kitchen, for a moment Elza wished to

God that she had not woken at all, but rather had slipped mercifully

into a heavier slumber — a coma perhaps — or at the very least, into

an amorous dream.

While this may have been a distasteful thought to have fi rst thing

in the morning, it was no less true. Company at midnight took the

edge of a busy day at the restaurant away. A bath after work. A glass

of wine. A foot massage she insisted on as foreplay. And then, fi -

nally, unapologetic abandonment. Elza required no convincing in

One


M A R C F I T T E N

4

this regard, no coaxing, only the foot massage. Her feet massaged

and a certain young man. A man she wasn’t in love with, but one who

was just attentive enough to distract her from her day at work — their

day at work, really, as they in fact worked together. This special

employee possessed the added value of helping her sleep more

soundly at night.

But today, this blue- skied Sunday morning, her day off , away

from the bustling kitchen of the restaurant, away from her other

employees — the dishwasher and the line cooks — well, even on her

day off , having missed her eve ning company, instead of feeling

cocksure, she felt irritable. Irritable and unsure . . . confused.

Unsatisfi ed. Untethered. Fitful. Restless. Bitter? Elza considered

this. Yes, perhaps even that.

She had reasons to feel bitter, for certain. It happened that Elza had

walked Delibab’s Centrum alone one recent eve ning while window-

shopping. A photographer had opened a new studio, and in this stu-

dio’s window hung well- lit and oversized portraits of the traditional

middle- class variety: families gathered around their patriarch,

done- up wives looking out sunlit windows, children in matching

ensembles sitting on rococo chairs, the odd pet. Family scenes being

of interest to Elza, particularly because she had none — parents

deceased of natural causes, divorced, childless — Elza stopped to

look. She examined the portraits for a good fi ve minutes before one

of them caught her eye. She gawked open- mouthed. Staring back

at her was a photograph of her ex- husband — a man she thought

she had loved years ago. He was seated, and a woman and two teen-

age girls were draped over him. She assumed this was his family.

He had daughters! She looked closer. She couldn’t decide if the girls

were pretty. Actually, best not to bother with them at all. She simply

shook her head, looked at her ex- husband, and laughed. The idea of

him sitting for a portrait seemed fi tting. It was the reason they had


E L Z A ’ S K I T C H E N

5

parted ways all those years ago. He wanted things she didn’t. Like

sitting for portraits, for starters. Newly wed, he had found a job in

the municipal works department in Budapest and a fl at in a newly

constructed block of buildings. He wanted them to begin a family

right away.

“You can cook for us,” he told her while she was studying at the

culinary institute. “For the kids and me.”

It was their death sentence. Elza divorced him soon afterward.

Eight months into the marriage.

In the photograph in front of her, her ex- husband wore a dark

suit. Elza noticed his paunch peeking from his jacket. He looked

content. Blissful even. Elza couldn’t help but wonder about him. It

was twenty years since she had seen him last. It should not have

mattered that his picture was here now, in her town. It was only a

strange coincidence, care of a transplanted photographer. But still,

was she bitter to see this long- lost person happy, to see that he had

survived her refusal of him, had thrived, in fact, had succeeded in

living his dream, and had even replicated himself ? Was she bitter

that he had grown into the sort of post- socialist, American- style

family man who took portraits of the newly minted bourgeois vari-

ety? All toothy wide smiles and plain-spoken earnestness.

She was.

Very.

And the eff ect of seeing him remained with her long after. An un-

easiness followed her around for days and fi nally settled in her

dreams. She awoke regularly — even on blue- skied Sunday morn-

ings like this one — suff ering from heartburn and a sour belly,

with one hand resting on her stomach. And this morning with the

other pressed against her forehead. Really pressed against it, as if

stuck there, as if to remind her of something important.


M A R C F I T T E N

6

Sometime during the middle of the night Elza had awoken with a

startled gasp and smacked her forehead with the realization that

despite her professional successes, despite her pop u lar restaurant,

her material comfort, and her own newly minted bourgeois status,

her life was passing her by and she wasn’t quite fulfi lled. . . .


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Elza's Kitchen