A Little Joy Beneath the Soil

Beetroot arrived on the kitchen table wearing a little earth.

Red Onion rolled beside her in a purple coat.

“Where are we?” he whispered.

Beetroot looked around.

An open window. An ivory bowl. A woman humming as she washed her hands.

“Somewhere with possibilities.”

Onion settled himself beside the chopping board.

“Good. Being underground was beginning to limit the conversation.”

The woman picked up Beetroot and washed the soil from her skin.

Then came the first slice.

Ruby colour spread across the board.

Onion stared.

“All that,” he said, “and you never mentioned it?”

“There wasn’t much light down there.”

He considered this.

“Still. Quite an entrance.”

The woman smiled at the colour on her fingers.

Then she reached for Onion.

His papery coat came away with a small rustle. Beneath it, purple rings opened one inside another.

Beetroot leaned closer.

“Oh. You’ve been making circles.”

“Many,” he said. “There was time.”

They lay together in the afternoon light.

Earthy sweetness. Bright sharpness. Two quite different ways of arriving at the same table.

Then the woman’s eyes began to water.

Onion went quiet.

“Was it something said?”

“Something released, perhaps,” Beetroot murmured.

The woman wiped her eyes, laughing softly.

A little olive oil followed. Thyme brushed the bowl. Soon, the oven began its warm work.

Onion’s sharpness mellowed.

Beetroot grew tender at the edges.

From the kitchen came a sweetness neither had quite expected.

Later, they found themselves beside lentils in the ivory bowl. A squeeze of lemon caught the light.

“Well,” said Onion, looking at the colours around him.

Beetroot waited.

He seemed, for once, to have run out of words.

The woman carried the bowl to the table.

Her phone lit up beside her. She turned it over and sat down.

For a moment, she simply looked.

Purple softened into gold. Deep red glistened against the pale bowl. A small leaf of thyme rested on an onion’s curved shoulder.

Then came the first mouthful.

The woman closed her eyes briefly.

When she opened them, she was smiling.

Beetroot nudged Onion.

“There.”

“What?”

“That.”

He listened to the quiet kitchen, the spoon against the bowl, the little hum that had returned.

“Oh,” he said.

“Joy.”

Outside, the afternoon carried on.

Inside, there was a warm meal, ruby fingertips, and a woman taking her time.