Bartosz nodded, but still looked peevish.
“And what areyougoing to do?” he asked, and I couldn’t quite tell if he was actually annoyed with the distribution of labor or was just trying to get a rise out of me that would cause me to put him in his place, which he very obviously enjoyed.
“Well, thank you for asking; I will be building a little stand out of rocks to hold the wheelbarrow over a fire, then hauling water to fill said large wheelbarrow, then preparing the meat, seaweed, and anything else I can for the stew, then tending to the stew for several hours, and then serving it to you. Happy?” I shot back with a smile. I knew that it would be a lot of work, but I could already feel the satisfaction of doing something worthwhile with your hands, along with the satisfaction of feeding people whom you care about. Bartosznodded, chastened, and all of them went away to do their tasks, some more happily than others.
It had taken a while and quite a bit of Jenga-like maneuvering to make a functional stand that wouldn’t topple and would keep the heavy, water-filled wheelbarrow upright and sufficiently above the fire. I ended up using a whole lot of mud, which was, luckily, full of clay, and a couple of logs. The wheelbarrow wasn’t as high above the fire as I would have liked it to be, but the day was awasting.
The cold weather overnight had kept the large cuts of sheep cool, and about thirty minutes after I had finished the cooking stand, the water was simmering, and the meat, in chunks or bigger pieces like the ribs, were quietly cooking away.
The stew looked a little sad, with just meat in the water. I was half-tempted to pour a little seawater into it for the salt, but was worried that it would just make it taste fishy, or I would somehow be contaminating our food despite all of the boiling. Sighing, I cut the seaweed that Jin Woo had delivered into pieces.
The guys were being good sports about the food, but I would do horrible things to get my hands on a croissant, or a slice of key lime pie, or even a turkey sandwich. Regardless of my wants, the seaweed and sheep soup-stew thing eventually became fragrant, and I yelled at myself mentally for not being grateful for the meat. How quickly had I become dissatisfied with something that I had once practically prayed for?
Jin Woo came back to the fire, his pockets bulging.
“Would you mind scooping this soup into the buckets?” I asked him, “My back is killing me, and I want to go up and wash my hands and stretch for a bit before we eat. I might take a nap; the stew should be done in around an hour. ”
Jin Woo slipped an arm around me, drawing me in and placing a hot kiss on my forehead.
“Of course,Naekkeo, thank you for cooking, it smells delicious,”
Turning my face to him like I was a sunflower, I basked in his warmth. Things were looking up! We had food, I had a weird relationship that made me happy, and there was peace between the five of us. The air had even begun to taste less of ash and smoke and more of pine. Maybe this would be over soon. Maybe I could invite everyone to stay with my godmother for a while. Maybe it wouldn’t be the same as being on the island, but I wanted to eat a juicy burger and hear Ettore complaining about how messy it was as he chowed down enthusiastically. I wanted to see them in the real world, even if only for a little bit, even if the end result was disappointing. I could handle a little heartbreak.
When I came back, at least two hours later, the boys were chowing down on the soup, scooping stew up in their cupped hands and pulling flesh off of ribs with their teeth. They were outside, with Jin Woo being the only one who was eating out of a bucket; even Ettore only had a stick as silverware, which was mostly ignored as he used his hands instead, dropping chunks of meat into his mouth. Bartosz was the one who noticed me and froze guiltily, which Ettore noticed and turned to look at me with only a little guilt.
“Salvatrice,we saved some for you. Sorry, we were hungry,” He said, gesturing to the other bucket that was indeed filled to the brim with soup, a large amount of meat bobbing in the broth.
I sighed gently, but I couldn’t help the smile on my face. I had taken a long time; I had rested on the stone near the watering trough, closed my eyes, and soaked in the sun, letting it warm my bones.
“You should’ve woken me. Sorry for making you wait. Thanks for saving me some.”
I settled down between Ettore and Bartosz and picked up my bucket, but before I reached in for my first scoop of food, I paused.
The bucket was truly mostly meat, with some seaweed thrown in, but, along with the pale brown of the meat, there were small brown bits and some pale white pieces that didn’t look like fat or bone and bobbed, innocently, among the rest of the stew. I reached into the soup, pulling out, between two of my fingers, two mushrooms, one pale and one brown.
Flinging them away, my breath quickened, hot flashes of terror coursing through me.
“STOP! STOP EATING!” I yelled.
The boys froze and stared at me in shock as I leapt up and pulled the bucket out of Jin Woo’s hand and kicked over the wheelbarrow pot, spilling the contents, still enough for another meal for all of us, into the dirt.
“Hey!” Bartosz exclaimed, but I wasn't listening, not to him, not to anything. Instead, I was squatting over the stew, looking through the contents carefully, throwing aside meat and seaweed until I found it, until I found them. More than a dozen deadly webcap and death cap mushrooms, looking limp and unassuming among the rest of the meal.
“Fuck!” it slipped out, as I tried to shift myself into business mode, into survival mode.
Oskar stood up and came closer to me,
“Ginne,” he said softly, “what’s wrong?”
Something about his words, him calling me that name, allowed me to speak even though my mind spun as I tried to make a plan, any plan.
“Those mushrooms are poisonous,” I said, not just to Oskar, but to all of the men now looking at me with great concern, “like the most poisonous mushrooms in Norway. How do you all feel?”
Ettore replied first,“ I feel fine.”
“Me too,” chimed in Oskar and Bartosz.
Jin Woo nodded in agreement to the others, but looked pale.
