“A Grandmother’s Guide to Burning Sugar”

by Yakima Cuffy (St.Kitts/Nevis)

You watch their green and brown and yellow weave together – the bodies of woodslaves floating like chandelier from the pitched roof. It is your best attempt at not staring at her. But still, from the corner of your eye, you glimpse a bit of her throbbing flesh, white like flour dumpling boiled in a litre of sweat. The air is dry, crisp. Your own clothes are glued to your skin and the plastic-covered settee simultaneously.

There is not a murmur between the two of you – only the clicking tongues of the mabouya.

You recall a time she was not so quiet – not so frail and grisly. A time when her dark skin glowed with the splendor of youth. Her eyes twinkled like stars in a midnight sky. Her cheeks contorted into a perpetual smile. A time when you were covetous of your big sister, of the beauty she possessed that you were not born with. Of the hearts she inhabited that you could not – like the boys at the Grammar School. Like your mother’s, before she passed. Like your grandmother’s, before...

That time seems all too distant now.

Laurel fans the blistering afternoon heat away with a folded newspaper.

"Laureen and Laurel!" grandmother calls from the kitchen. It is her habit when she cannot recall whether she actually wants you or your sister.

Laurel sucks her teeth, so you close the black and white exercise book you were doing your homework in and make your way to the kitchen.

Granny is making stewed chicken again. You know because she has cut the yard fowl Richard caught this morning into eight seasoned pieces – neck, thighs, breast, wings, drumsticks. Richard is your grandmother’s “special friend” - a huckster by profession, often travelling to sell some of Granny’s produce to the neighbouring French islands. He is a man of few words and many mysteries, appearing every morning with the sunrise to slaughter and pluck the day’s boiler and vanishing to his house behind God back after supper.

Even now, as you enter your grandmother’s den of spices, you can still hear the hen’s violent clucking ringing in your ear, the way it rose to a crescendo at daybreak as Richard wrung her narrow feathered neck until eventually, her voice collapsed into nothingness.

"Chile, come make de browning fuh me," Granny orders when she senses you gawking at her from the doorway. She is dicing yellow yams and carrots next to the sink.

As you are about to open the mason jar of sugar, she grabs your hands. Her eyes instantly dart to your inky fingers.

"Wash your bloody hands before you touch this food, chile." Her voice is a venom you have not yet learned how to swallow, despite seven years of living with her since your Mammy’s death.

You nod as she shoves your palms beneath the scalding hot faucet. When she twists the pipes closed, you wonder how long it will take her to realize you are not Laurel – you are not the one she taught how to make browning.

Your sister has tried to teach you three times already, but you have never gotten the recipe quite right.

Either it is too bitter, or the broth is too thin. No matter how hard you try, you can never get the flavor or the consistency the way Granny does – perfection.

Granny had taught Laurel how to burn the sugar into browning last Christmas, when the cold had aroused her arthritis so that she needed an extra pair of hands in the kitchen. After all, the fruit cake was not going to bake itself.

Laurel had burned the sugar just right on only her first attempt. This was another reason you were jealous of your sister. The way she navigated the world with an ease you had not yet learned how to wield.

As Laurel stirred the thick, dark paste into the pearlescent batter with a wooden spoon, you watched the thing transform from ballad to calypso. From plain butter and sugar and essence to the Caribbean symphony that is fruit cake. From mundane to magnificent. You wondered whether that would ever be you.

Today, you will try again for the fourth time, although your grandmother’s tutelage and patience are wearing as thin as her silver hair. She turns the stove up to a high heat. "Go head chile, throw some oil in this pot before you mek it get too hot."

You pour the oil as Granny has instructed.

There were two boys before the day it happened – one was Dante Joseph, whom you had secretly loved since the first day of high school, and the second she had met at the market while running an errand for Granny. He had walked Laurel home and Granny had chased him out of the house with a two by four, after she found them kissing in the drawing room, stuck to the plastic-covered love seat you were sitting on just moments ago. Your grandmother had cursed her on both occasions. You enjoyed being the favoured granddaughter for the first time in your adolescent life.

When the oil begins to sizzle, Granny nods. It is time to add the sugar. You measure a quarter cup of

Demerara brown sugar and pour it into the deep pot. The air crackles.

Two weeks before the day it happened, you stared with admiration as Laurel glazed her plump lips with rose-coloured lip gloss in the girls’ bathroom at the Grammar School. Freshly relaxed hair framed her round umber face. She shoved her hand into her skirt to make her crisp white shirt nice and taut. It was easy to trace the curvature of her firm breasts and slim waist. The box-pleated skirt cascaded over her fleshy buttocks to fall just above her knees, revealing shapely legs that vanished into chocolate-coloured knee-high stockings. It was no wonder she was selected to represent the school at the upcoming Miss Teen Carnival Pageant. It was all Laurel ever wanted to do since she started the Grammar School. At fifteen years-old, she was simply breathtaking. And she was the closest person in the world to you.

Granny shakes her head and you know it is because you used the measuring cup. 'In this kitchen, measuring cup is just for style," Granny laments.

But you prefer to be precise. You want so badly to get it right, even if it is just once.

"Granny is a damn soucouyant! As soon as I reach eighteen, I leaving that blasted house," Laurel declared that day in the girls’ bathroom, puckering at the mirror on the wall. Then she turned to look at you. "You coming wid me?" she asked softly.

You held your breath before answering. You remembered the grandmother who settled your confusion after your Mammy died, who doused you with Alcolado and Vicks Vapor Rub when your nose was red and runny, who comforted you on nights when thunder and lightning reigned their fiasco in the sky.

"But who gon’ tek care of us?" you responded.

A tear trickled down your sister’s face. You sensed her disappointment. She darted out of the bathroom door, leaving you to stare at yourself in the mirror.

You were a full two years younger than Laurel, yet prepubescent acne had already festooned the landscape of your cocoa face. Your coily hair was a spectacle of cream satin ribbons, onyx bobbles and ivory barrettes. Your school uniform hung loosely over your sunken shoulders, your chest as flat as the ply board that fenced your grandmother’s yard to keep the chickens in. You despised the reflection glowering back at you.

You let the pot come up to a temperature until the sugar starts to melt. You ogle the brew, timing when you will need to begin stirring. The sugar continues to slowly melt until all the crystals dissolve, revealing a rich, dark hue. You smile as the sugar caramelizes.

The night before it happened, you were awakened by the sound of indistinct quarrelling in the drawing room. You realized that Laurel was not on the bed next to yours. You tiptoed out of the bedroom, trying your best to avoid the squeak of the floorboards. You peeped through the narrow corridor, hiding behind the sheetrock so that no one sees you. Laurel was there. And your grandmother, rolling her crimson rosary beads. Only the soft flame of a candle lit the quaint drawing room. Laurel’s arms were open in argument, but you couldn’t make out the words she was saying. Granny shook her head.

"I hate you!" Laurel eventually yelled.

Almost instantly, Granny slapped her across the cheek, the rosary still in her palms. "You ungrateful chile!

You better stop repeating these lies before you see the wrong side of me!"

Laurel gasped, cupping her cheek.

Even in the glare of the candlelight, you could see the rubicund bruising from the chaplet on your sister’s face. You leaned closer to hear better, but the floorboards exposed the secret of your presence.

Their eyes shot across the room to look at you. Laurel ran back to bed sobbing.

The pot starts to bubble and smoke, so you give it a stir to prevent the sugar from burning. You add water and continue to mix the brew together.

On the day it happened, the scorching sun was merciless, as if it were punishing us all for our misdeeds.

At school, you wanted so badly to ask Laurel about what had happened the night before, but the words could not find the strength to leave your lips. The pageant was to be held on Sunday night – just two days

away – and you found yourself wondering how much face powder it would take to cover the scar on your sister’s face.

You had afternoon lessons that day, but you could barely concentrate on what the teacher was saying.

Pythagoras theorem something or the other. You decided that you would muster up the courage to ask Laurel when you got home. Granny would still be at the market selling her produce. You two could finally be alone.

When you arrived home, Richard’s white pick-up truck was parked in the yard. The boilers were running to and fro about the yard, clucking uncontrollably and flapping their golden wings as if to guard their territory.

You dropped your school bag off on the veranda and went into the fowl coop to gather the evening’s eggs before Granny came home. You were sure she would be proud of you for this.

Not long after, you saw Granny walking briskly into the yard. She was home early – too early. You found it strange that she entered through the back door instead of the front door, like she usually does. You resolved that this would not thwart your chance to speak with Laurel – that you would do so before supper.

As you finished gathering the eggs into the basket, you smelled the familiar aroma of Granny’s browning.

Your mouth began to water at the very thought of stewed chicken for supper, especially with some hot yellow yams smothered in orange salt butter. But before you had even finished entertaining the thought, you heard a loud scream coming from the house.

You dropped the basket of eggs, breaking half of them in the process, and ran inside. Laurel was laying on the sofa wearing only her blouse and underwear, crying. A stark naked Richard was covering her, his oversized belly protruding over the parts of him you had only seen in the pages of science textbooks. And Granny stood over them holding a pan of hot oil and sugar, bawling "Lawd! Lawd! All you trying to kill me this good Thursday afternoon."

You saw the pain on your sister’s face, the embarrassment on Richard’s, and the horror on your grandmother’s. You wanted to scream, "Granny no!" But fear consumed you. Your feet were the roots of a zaman tree. Your voice, misplaced. No words. Just the strident clicking of woodslaves in the corner of the drawing room with their bodies intertwined.

Richard got up and escaped through the front door behind you. And before Laurel could follow him, Granny threw the pan of burned sugar after her. The shriek that followed was deafening.

You recalled your sister’s bathroom plea to leave with her, her sudden heightened interest in boys, and her clandestine conversation with your grandmother last night, and now you wondered how you had been so blind – so foolish.

The hospital asked what happened, and Granny lied. "Laurel trip in the kitchen and the browning accidentally fall pon her and she get bun up in the process." Your sister nodded when they ask her to corroborate your grandmother’s story.

The day after, you told the school that Laurel could no longer participate in the pageant because of her “accident”. You were a basket of broken eggs on the inside – a mess of yellow goo.

When the bandages were removed, you could not recognize your sister. Her face was distorted, her skin a bouquet of anthuriums – pink and white and white and pink. Patches of her once thick, shoulder-length

hair were missing. Your visage betrayed your best attempts to contain your shock. Your grandmother wept and wept, perhaps from her own guilt. Her grasp tightened around the prayer beads in her hand. She

was no saint. You saw then that your sister’s words were true: 'Granny IS a damn soucouyant!'

It is not long before Richard returns from Martinique. At first, he only passes by to buy Granny’s produce.

Soon his visits linger, until he is back in the place you once knew as home. He doesn’t dare to look at Laurel, pretending not to know what happened to her. Now, his interests are more... diverse.

Granny ignores the way he stares at you, and how he glides his hands over your bottom whenever he walks by. You bite your tongue each time his fingertips touch your skin.

You smell the charring of the pot as the sugar hardens. You have ruined the browning again.

Some of the mixture splatters onto your khaki shorts. "Shit!" you exclaim, dabbing the spill with a damp towel. You immediately know it will be impossible to get the stain off.