'Fifibel...fifibel. Are you at home? Fifibel!', my mom's voice can be heard from down the street when it's in normal tone. And now, she is practically shouting my nickname to the entire street. I quickly stopped whipping my new frosting recipe, afraid someone will connect that name to me and ask about it. Admit it, this could be a potential blackmail material. There, I said it. Now, whoever learns about 'fifibel' will get a slave for eternity. Umm...on second thought, not eternity.
I rushed towards my front door, hastily opened the latch and checked the vicinity for any potential blackmailers. Phew... saved yet again. I know this won't last-what with my mom carrying 'fifibel' agenda every time she comes to visit me. Someday, some smart neighbour is going to figure it out. And I dread that moment. I pulled my mom through the door and quickly closed it before someone could check.
'Mom!! This is the third visit in this week. I said sorry already. Please don't do this', I whined...literally.
Meet my mom, Olivia Isabel James. Height-5'.2''. Hair color- dark brown that has greyed a little at her temples (shh...we are not noticing it. And we are definitely not going to point it out). Eye color-grey. Weight- Umm...let's skip that part (reason- I don't want to ask. If you want to- be my guest).
Let me tell you some fun facts about her-
1. She puts shame to helicopter parenting- in my opinion, anyway.
2. She can cook like it's no one's business.
3. She likes to watch crime and mystery related dramas like 'how to get away with murder'. She was so into it that if allowed, she could teach criminology without missing a beat. As a result, she checks on me regularly. You know, me being single and staying alone all that. I know it's a weird logic, but go with the flow for now.
4. This one is important if you want to be in her good books. Never, ever, ever say she is wrong. I did that last week and she is punishing me this way. She can hold a mean grudge, I give her that. But when it was you on the frontline, it's not funny to watch. And you want to know what my offence was?
Last week before the doomsday, aka Mom's wrath sentence-
It was a bright day with not a cloud in the sky to lessen the harsh heat.You can feel something monumental was going to happen from the silence of the customers that were spread evenly on our five tables of our bakery 'Sweet Gum Tree' (they are busy eating or scorching the newspaper or drilling their eyes in their phone. But that's not the point. Again, go with the flow). The sun was almost reached its zenith. You can almost feel an eagle gliding in the sky readying to catch its prey, the sweat that's trickling down from your temple, the tension in the air, the rapid bear of your heartbeat...well, not exactly, but around those lines. And there I was standing clueless, sending silly friendly smiles to the customer who cannot decide between chocolate peanut butter cupcake or mint chocolate one. If I was in her place, I would say pack them both. Come on people, it's chocolate! You need to think about that too? So, where was I? Right...there I was smiling, not knowing what was in the store for me that day.
Before we go any further, a quick history lesson is necessary here. My great-great-grandmother started our bakery 'Sweet Gum Tree' at the time of World War I. It was said that her husband, my great-great-grandfather, was a soldier who promised her under the sweet gum tree that he will return soon before joining the forces. Alas, he never fulfilled the promise. By that time, she was already expecting my great-grandmother. Realising the situation she was in- a single woman with a child on the way, my great-great-grandmother started selling her baked goods. And that was the time she decided that no woman of her family must face the difficulties she faced.
So, she made my great-grandmother promise her to give this bakery to her daughter and her daughter to her next female kin and so on. In short, only to the female born to the female side of the family. Fortunately, there was only one daughter of every generation. And as each generation passed, it prospered and became that corner bakery where everyone wants to eat or sit for a while.It was then passed down to my grandmother who tried her to best to compete with 'Julia Child' from our small bakery unbeknownst to her (God, she was such a wannabe-never heard from me). However, there came the problem. This bakery with its epic history of passing it down from woman to woman of our family has found a pause when my grandmother has only one child- my father. She sure tried to fit him in the dresses when he was small, but it didn't go well when he grew up. So, she was stuck with running the bakery (which she gleefully does) until the next-in-line woman can take the reins. Which would be yours beloved!
However, Nana Rosy- she insists on me calling her that, hoping to feel less aged, has gotten used to lording us minions. And she relishes in it. Which stuck to my mother's craw. Since she married to my father, my mother's little dream (that is not related to me and my brother, of course) was to sit on that cash counter of our bakery. She knew obviously from the infinite times my grandmother related the history that it won't be given to her. She was resigned to that fact.
However, she believes she deserves to sit on that seat after the sweat, blood and tears (because she didn't get to run the bakery) she sacrificed for this bakery for 24 years (she was the grocery runner for the bakery). Moreover, she insists that I am too young to hold that position. Oh please, she just wants to run her hands on that money. Thus, the swords were drawn; the horn was blown, and they made the battlefield ready.