French Feast by William Rodarmor

Author:William Rodarmor
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: French literature, short stories, culinary fiction, travel, France, food. Contributors: Christiane Baroche, Calixthe Beyala, Philippe Claudel, Albert Cohen, Mariette Condroyer, Philipe Delerm, Maryline Desbiolles, Henri Duvernois, Cyrille Fleischman, Pascal Garnier, Michèle Gazier, Laurent Graff, Roger Grenier, Joseph Incardona, Claire Julier, Anthony Palou, Martin Provost, Fabrice Pataut, Chantal Pelletier, Jacques Perret, Claude Pujade-Renaud, Alina Reyes, Nadine Ribault, Marie Rouanet, Annie Saumont, Dominique Sylvain, Tiffany Tavernier, Michel Tournier, Tranh Van Tran Nhut.
Publisher: Whereabouts Press
Published: 2011-07-20T00:00:00+00:00

Fast Food

Joseph Incardona

Joseph Incardona (1969– ) lives and writes in Geneva. His books include Lonely Betty (2010), Remington (2008), Banana Spleen (2006), and Le Cul entre deux chaises (2001). This story appears in his 2005 collection Taxidermie.

It must be something like ten years since we hit the road, Odette and me. One day we just got fed up with being sedentary types with no kids, boring jobs, and depressing office parties at the end of the year. We were working in the same place, me in accounting, her up on the second floor, in fabrics. That’s how we met, in the Bougons’ family business. We took a good long look ahead, and what we saw coming was an ulcer for me and a nasty menopause for her. She wanted to travel and I liked to drive. Bougons-Frères thought we were playing an April fool’s joke on them, because that was the day we handed in our resignations. Just a twist of fate, letting us leave with a smile. They believed it in the end, though. So did our office mates, the ones we saw getting older every Christmas, telling stories about the good old days that wheezed with asthmatic nostalgia.

We had some money in the bank, but mainly we had our Saviem truck, and we spent our nest egg on a second van to tow behind it. We adopted a nomadic life in an unusual way. The idea of selling French fries and merguez sausages, that was Odette’s. We got our license without too much trouble: the mayor and the city hall clique thought Mami and Papi were a sweet old couple. We were treated to a full-page column in the local paper, with Odette and me looking blank in front of the sky-blue À la bonne franquette sign painted on the side of the Saviem. We headed south, to the sunshine. It wasn’t new to us, but pretty sights are always nice when you haven’t seen any for a long time.

Between rest stops and Sunday markets, the time flew by. Fries and sausages is what the sign said, but Odette actually whipped up fancier stuff, like paupiettes, or a tart she made with cumin, goat cheese, and spinach. Michelin-quality eats, made out of thin air. And she had a secret: she always cooked as if the world were going to end tomorrow. It gave a kind of urgency to the food, sort of spiced it up.

Time always passes too fast, and it had nearly passed us by, because we had kept on saying that we’d leave tomorrow. We hit the road just in time, avoiding rocking chairs by heading down winding roads instead of backing into the garage with our bifocals and old-age pensions.

So anyway, we’re parked along one of those winding roads, waiting for a traveler with hunger pangs, and we see them swerve over to us. I could feel Odette get all giddy when they parked the motorcycle on its kickstand. The girl had blond hair and a cute little ass in her leather pants.

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