Sunday morning in the Pritchett house had a particular rhythm to it — Jay with his coffee and his paper, Gloria with the energy of someone who had already been awake for two hours and had accomplished things in that time, and Manny somewhere in between, which was his natural register for most situations.
The kitchen smelled different this morning.
Good different.
"Just try it," Gloria said.
Jay looked at the plate in front of him. It looked like a burger. It was shaped like a burger. It had the structural integrity of a burger. But it had arrived via Gloria saying I made something new which in Jay Pritchett's experience was a phrase that required careful navigation.
"What's in it," he said.
"It's a turkey burger. With avocado and a sauce."
"What kind of sauce."
"A good sauce. Jay, just try it."
"I'm asking a reasonable question about what I'm being asked to eat—"
"It is a yogurt sauce with garlic and lemon and it is delicious and you are going to love it."
"Yogurt," Jay said.
"Yes."
"On a burger."
"Jay."
"That's not—"
"It's good! Just try it." She pushed the plate slightly closer. "One bite."
Jay looked at the burger. The burger looked back at him with the patient indifference of food that knew it was going to win eventually.
"I'll have eggs," he said.
"You have eggs every Sunday."
"I like eggs."
"You can have eggs next Sunday. Today try this."
"Gloria—"
"One bite, Jay. One bite and if you don't like it I will make you the eggs right now and we never have to talk about this again."
Jay picked up the burger. Looked at it. Set it back down. "Where'd you even get this recipe."
"Leo."
"The kid across from the Dunphys."
"He has a YouTube channel. Manny asked me to make it because he saw it." She folded her arms. "I made it. Just try it."
Jay looked at the burger for another long moment with the expression of a man who had already decided something and was taking his time about it.
He did not pick it up.
***GLORIA's confession***
"Leo I know through Manny. Manny's friends — he doesn't have so many, you know, he is a sensitive boy, very deep — but one of his close ones is Michael. Leo's little brother." She nodded. "And Michael gets along with Luke, so Manny has this group now which is good. It's good for him to have boys his age who don't look at him strange when he quotes poetry."
A pause.
"Through them I knew Leo has a channel. Fitness videos, healthy food. I don't watch fitness videos normally — I am Colombian, we don't need a YouTube channel to tell us how to cook — but Manny asked me to make this burger. He said it was famous, that everyone was talking about it." She tilted her head. "It has two million views. More now, I think."
"I looked it up. I watched the video. He is thirteen, okay, so I am thinking — it will be fine. Something a teenager makes and thinks is good."
She paused.
"I was wrong." Simply, without drama. "It was delicious. Really delicious. The sauce especially — I added a little extra garlic because that is just correct — but the base of it, very good. I stand corrected."
"So now Jay won't even try it." She looked at the camera. "This man will eat a hot dog from a gas station without asking one question. But a turkey burger with avocado—" She made a sound that encompassed everything she felt about this. "Ay, men."
***END OF CONFESSION.***
Jay was still looking at the burger when Gloria came back and found him in the exact position she'd left him.
"Jay."
"I'm thinking about it."
"You've been thinking about it for ten minutes."
"It's an important decision."
"It's a burger."
"It's a turkey burger with yogurt sauce," Jay said. "That's not the same thing."
"Manny has it every week now." Gloria sat down across from him. "You want to know something? Since Manny started making the recipes from this channel — not just the burger, the other ones too — he replaced the junk food. Gradually. I didn't even push him, he just did it himself." She lowered her voice slightly. "And Jay — he's gotten into shape. A little. You can see it."
Jay glanced toward the hallway. "Manny's working out?"
"A little. Don't say anything, he'll stop if he thinks people are watching."
A brief pause.
"Still not eating the burger," Jay said.
Gloria looked at him.
From down the hall came a sound.
Rhythmic. Effortful. Manny's door was mostly closed.
The camera pushed it open slightly.
Manny was on his bedroom floor doing knee supported push-ups, counting under his breath in the specific focused way of someone who had recently decided this was their thing, his copy of Neruda sitting on the desk behind him, completely undisturbed.
***MANNY' s confession ***
"There is a girl," he said. "She made an observation, in conversation, that she expressed a preference for — she said she likes guys who are in shape." He looked at the camera with the dignity of a man delivering a complicated legal argument. "I am approaching this as a personal development exercise. That is all I will say about that."
***END OF CONFESSION.***
Back in the kitchen Gloria had refreshed her coffee and Jay was still at the table.
"I'm not having the burger," he said.
"Okay, Jay."
"I want eggs."
"Okay."
"That's it. Just eggs."
"Fine." She picked up her coffee. Looked at him over the rim. "I won't wear the new lingerie then."
Jay looked at her.
Gloria looked back with the serene expression of someone who had played a card and was waiting to see how the table responded.
"That's blackmail," Jay said.
"Take it what you will."
"Gloria."
"Mmm."
"That is a completely separate — those two things have nothing to do with each other—"
"Jay." She stood. "I'm going to check on Manny. The burger is right there. You do what you want."
She left the kitchen with the unhurried dignity of a woman who knew exactly what was going to happen next.
Jay sat alone with the burger.
He looked at it for a long moment.
He picked it up.
Put it back down.
Picked it up again.
Took a bite.
Chewed.
Set the burger down very carefully.
His face did absolutely nothing.
***JAY' s confession***
Jay , looking at the camera and saying something as if being forced to say it.
"It was delicious."
***END OF CONFESSION.***
Gloria came back into the kitchen and found Jay's plate empty.
She looked at it.
She looked at Jay.
Jay looked at his coffee.
"Well," Gloria said.
"I was hungry."
"You said you wanted eggs."
"I changed my mind."
"You ate the whole thing, Jay."
"A man can change his mind."
"How was it."
"It was fine."
"Fine."
"It was fine, Gloria."
She looked at him for a long moment with the expression she had when she had already won something and was deciding whether to press the point or let him keep a small piece of his dignity.
She let him keep it.
"I'll leave the rest in the fridge," she said casually, already moving. "In case you want more later."
"I won't want more later."
"Okay, Jay."
She put the remaining portion in a container, placed it in the fridge with the particular care of a woman who was absolutely making a point while appearing not to, and went about her Sunday.
The house settled into its evening rhythm. Manny appeared for lunch looking slightly more tired than usual and slightly more pleased with himself than he wanted to show. Jay watched his game. Gloria did the things Gloria did on Sunday evenings, efficiently and well.
By nine PM the house was quiet.
Gloria was upstairs.
Manny was in his room.
The kitchen was dark except for the stove light.
At nine fifteen, Jay Pritchett came downstairs in his slippers.
He moved with the careful quiet of a man who had done nothing wrong and was not behaving as though he had. He came into the kitchen. Looked around once. Opened the fridge.
The container was right where Gloria had left it.
He took it out. Got a plate. Transferred the contents with the focused efficiency of a man who was simply having a late snack, which was a normal thing that people did, and it meant nothing that he was doing it quietly.
He stood at the counter and took a bite.
Then another.
The sauce especially.
He was halfway through and genuinely thinking about nothing in particular when—
"I KNEW IT."
The fork hit the plate.
Hit the counter.
Hit the floor.
Gloria was in the doorway.
She was wearing the new lingerie.
She was pointing at him with the complete vindicated triumph of a woman who had set a trap, waited patiently, and watched it spring exactly as planned.
"I KNEW YOU LIKED IT."
"I—" Jay looked at the plate. At her. At the plate. "I was hungry—"
"At nine fifteen—"
"A man can have a snack—"
"In your slipper feet, Jay, being all quiet—"
"These are comfortable slippers—"
"JAY."
He stood there in his slippers, the plate in front of him, whatever remained of his position largely gone.
"It's good," he said finally. "The burger is good."
Gloria lowered the pointing finger.
She looked at him.
Then she smiled — the full one, the one that had no effective counter in all of Jay Pritchett's considerable arsenal.
"I know," she said.
"Don't make it a whole—"
"I'm not making it anything." She came into the kitchen, kissed him on the cheek, and opened the fridge. "Sit down. I'll heat up whatever's left."
Jay sat down.
Picked his fork up off the floor.
"The sauce," he said, after a moment. "What exactly is in the sauce."
Gloria looked at him over the fridge door with the expression of a woman being gracious in victory.
"Greek yogurt," she said. "Garlic. Lemon." She closed the fridge. "And a thirteen year old who knows what he is doing."
Jay looked at his plate.
"Don't tell anyone I said that," he said.
"Tell anyone what?" Gloria said innocently, already at the microwave.
Outside the Pritchett house the Sunday night neighborhood was quiet and entirely unaware of what had just transpired in the kitchen, which was probably for the best.
Jay ate his burger.
It was really very good.
End of Chapter 35