A taste of more

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake

The cake tastes odd. Rose can ‘taste’ the mood her mother was in when she made it. There’s despair and hopelessness. From then on, Rose tastes feelings in her food. After a visit to the school nurse, and one to ‘accident and emergency,’ Rose realises her ‘gift’ must be kept secret. She tries to confide in her distant brother, Joseph, but he doesn’t respond. Joseph’s only friend, the brilliant George, is the only one who takes her predicament seriously.

Rose struggles on in her disparate family. She worries about her mother. When her mother begs her not to worry, she thinks, “I knew, if I ate anything of hers again it would likely tell me the same message; help me. I am not happy, help me’ — like a message in a bottle sent in each meal to the eater, and I got it. I got the message.”