Sweetheart

Photographer - Tobi Brun

Sweetheart

“Slit lengthwise, trim off the fat and silverskin, slice into one-inch cubes,” Valeria read off a creased recipe card as she worked her knife into the heart and pushed the scraps into a pile at the corner of the cutting board.

The smell wasn’t as strong as she thought it’d be, but the air was heavy with iron.

“Season with salt and pepper. Massage until salt dissolves into the flesh.” She followed her instructions, evenly coating the meat. “Transfer into a bowl. Add olive oil, minced garlic, thyme, parsley, and onion powder.”

She admired her mise en place as she tossed in each ingredient; the uniformity and organization of small glass bowls with her herbs reminded her of when she first started learning her craft at her grandmother’s hip. Now, unlike her cooking, she found it easy to make what she needed by following her intuition. Potion, poultice, poison—Valeria’s specialty was solution. The oil carried the blood between her fingers, under her nails, and into the gaps of her engagement ring, leaving stains in the creases of her skin. Fingers sticky and curled to the ceiling, Valeria slid the recipe card away from the sink before washing her hands and flicking her wet fingers over a hot copper pan. The oiled surface
sputtered, her sign to lower the flame and tip the bowl’s contents into the pan. She scraped the vermillion marinade off the glass with a rubber spatula and drizzled it in. The warm smell of browning meat covered the metallic scent and lifted wafts of crisp herbs and smoke. She added a few tablespoons of salted butter to the pan and stirred, eyes lingering on the pool of oxidized blood spreading across the cutting board.

While the heart cooked, Valeria punched holes into the film of a container of mashed potatoes, set them into the microwave, and emptied a salad kit into a large bowl. If she’d abandoned anything over the years, it was the need for pageantry. She’d found her shortcuts where she needed them: herbal tea bags had most of what she needed for tinctures, an ice tray of menstrual blood in the freezer removed the need to cut her hand over candlelight, and—as she discovered yesterday—enough Rohypnol in his whisky kept him asleep through anything.

The sound of Marc sitting at the dining room table called her attention back into the kitchen in time to stop the microwave before it beeped.

“Dinner almost ready?” he called from the other side of the wall.

“Just a minute!” Valeria responded, emptying the pan onto his plate alongside his potatoes and salad. She threw only a smattering of greens onto hers and rushed their dinner around the corner.

The table looked nearly the same as when she set it earlier—nice flatware, a glass of Maker’s Mark, a glass of Reisling—the only change was the presence of her too-soon-to-be leaning heavily onto the wooden arm of his dining chair and tapping his fork with his finger.

“Not like you to make me wait,” he chided as she placed their plates on either side of the six-seater table.

“I think I can make it up to you,” she said, turning to the record player he kept against the wall. She thumbed through his collection, then held up Frankie Valli’s “Solo” album—his favorite.

“Good choice,” he said, mid-drink.

She pulled the record from its sleeve, placed it onto the platter, and lowered the needle. The vinyl, after a moment of crackling, played “My Funny Valentine.”

By the time she took her seat, he was already chewing his first bite. She paused, napkin hovering over her lap, and watched closely for his reaction.

“Mm,” he grunted.

He sounded happy. Valeria stared at the line of buttons down his white shirt.

“Is this my mother’s pig heart recipe?”

“Mhm,” she answered, smoothing her napkin and reaching for her wine.

“The woman was dumb as hell, but she could cook.”

“That’s nice.”

“She would’ve liked you.”

She let Frankie’s voice wash over her fiance’s while she eyed his plate. He loaded a buttery dollop of potatoes onto a chunk of heart and scraped it off the fork with his teeth. It was the first of his habits he learned to ignore. She counted his bites, her only relief from his
ramblings.

“We’re gonna start selling girls now.”

It was the first business decision he had made without consulting her. “You told me.”

“I think it’s really gonna take the organization to the next level.”

“You told me.”

“It’s gonna be huge,” he said, exposing his half-chewed heart. Ever since she approached him at his favorite bar six years ago, he had big dreams of criminal enterprise. “You always have ladies here for your business. Know anybody who’d be worth anything?”

She stabbed her fork through the spine of a lettuce leaf.

“I’m joking, relax. We have some coming in a few weeks.”

Her eyes narrowed. “You told me.”

The flat of his hand struck the table. “All of a sudden you know everything?”

He may have changed his name from Marc to Marcello and called an arms-dealing ring his ‘organization’, but Valeria saw him without presumption: a small-time gangster who’d still be mid-shelf if it wasn’t for her.

“You told me all of this last night,” she circled her wine glass with her finger. “When we were celebrating.”

His dark eyes searched her face.

“That’s why I made this special dinner for you.” She sweetened her tone—it was artificial but effective.

He leaned back into his chair. “I did hit the drinks a little hard last night. I can’t remember a thing.”

“We both had too much.”

“Hm.” He lifted his glass to his lips, staring at her through his silence.

Her knee bounced under the table. “I worked so hard on your dinner, hon. Don’t let it get cold.”

He scanned her plate of salad. “Where’s yours?”

“You know I don’t like organ meat.”

“The chef should taste the food,” he stabbed a bite onto the prongs and pointed it at her. Her heels pressed into the laminate floor.

“Taste it.”

She rose to her feet. Her skirt brushed against the tablecloth as she walked to his chair and crouched at his arm. She took the bite in her mouth, staring at the scar across the bridge of his nose as the flavors settled into her tongue. It was tender to chew; easy to flatten and hide
between her cheek and top gums.

Even after swallowing, Marc didn’t hide his skepticism.

“See?” she said, opening her mouth and revealing her tongue.

His glare was cloudy, but he nodded in satisfaction. She tried not to look at his plate.

“Come here,” he said, wrapping his hand behind her head and pulling her lips to his. Her stomach lurched.

“Marcello!” she laughed and pushed on his chest. His wound still hadn’t surfaced. “After dinner!”

“Promise?” he asked.

She took her seat and placed her napkin back on her lap. “Cross my heart.”

He began shoveling food into his mouth. Here was the voracious, greedy eater she had counted on.

“I know you’re not much of a cook, babe, but you did great with this.” It was as close to forming a compliment as he could get outside of “nice ass.”

“It’s very tender, not chewy at all. Kinda sweet. You picked a good pig.”

“The biggest one I could find.”

The wound from last night was opening with every bite, something he didn’t seem to notice. Blood seeped through his white shirt the way red wine spreads on a tablecloth. It was slow and pretty—probably the prettiest he ever looked. A brass crescendo emanated from the speakers followed by a quiet, pulsating beat.

“Ahhhh, here we go!” A smile crossed his face as he threw back the last of his whisky.

“Here’s my song!”

His movements were delayed and languid, his breath more labored. Valeria wondered if this was her work or the alcohol’s.

“You’re just too good to be true. Can’t take my eyes off of you,” he sang with an annoying amount of charm. “You'd be like Heaven to touch, I wanna hold you so much.”

Despite the food in his teeth and paling face, moments like this reminded her of a time when she tolerated him. Maybe even liked him—it still counts, even if it’s short-lived.

“At long last love has arrived, and I thank God I'm alive.” He raised his remaining bite of heart to her. “You're just too good to be true. Can't take my eyes off you.”

She sucked the last of the juices out of the piece she cheeked, taking her time to swallow its rich, peppery flavor. He was right, his mom was a great cook. Her pulse swelled with the sounds of horns and trombones as he inhaled deeply, ready to belt out the chorus. Memories of him singing this part in the shower, in the car with the windows down, and the night they met at the bar flashed through her mind.

“I love you, bab—”

A fit of coughing—a deep, guttural one that sent sprays of blood over the table, across their plates, and onto her face and chest—cut him off. He gasped, trying to choke out the words and save his performance, stopping once he noticed the splatter. As his expression transitioned from confusion to panic, she watched the crimson droplets mix into her wine.

He motioned for her help with hands that became more frantic when she remained seated. His eyes, once clear, coursed with red. A sanguine string of saliva dripped from the corner of his lips.

“Val,” he wheezed. “Help me.”

Valeria tilted her head. Marc pressed his hand to his chest, letting out a shallow groan when he felt the raw, gaping cavity. Ripping the button-up shirt open, he revealed her handiwork from last night. She had sliced him lengthwise, and the edges of flesh curled open, giving way to
broken, unfurling ribs. Shock had set in. It was the first time he couldn’t find his words. She wanted to ask him how it felt when the blade cut him open, when her hand slid under and into his beating flesh, when the drip of black wax sealed and hid the laceration. She wanted
to know if he felt lighter, walking around without a heart all day. She wanted to fill the room with all the bitter, little truths she’d kept under her tongue, rancid and rotting.

Something that sounded like a cross between a sob and a wheeze spilled from his mouth. She let the song play through. His lips emitted faint, raspy words.

“What’s that, hon?”

“You—fucking—“ he choked on the air, heavy once again with iron, “—witch.”

She smiled and stood to walk to his side of the table before grabbing the sides of his jaw to pry it open.

“You... fucking...” She mocked him slowly.

He fought her weakly.

Her tongue swiped the bit of heart from inside her cheek and moved it into her mouth, spitting it down into his, “...Cannibal.”

His eyes were wide, wet, and bursting. One of her hands cupped his mouth shut while the other closed his nostrils, forcing him to swallow.

“Oh, pretty baby, don't bring me down, I pray. Oh, pretty baby, now that I found you, stay,” she sang over his muffled screams, tightening her grip.

“And let me love you, baby, let me love you...”

Jordan Nishkian is an Armenian-Portuguese writer based in California. Her prose and poetry explore themes of duality and have been featured in national and international publications. She has been awarded the Rollick Magazine Fiction Prize and has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best American Short Stories. Jordan is the Editor-in-Chief of Mythos literary magazine and the author of Kindred, a novella.