A Short Story - The Cookies

Rachel looks out the window. Her children are playing in the garden. Their occasional shrieks of laughter break the silence in the empty house. Rachel’s husband, Martin, is attending a conference for the whole week in Detroit. She peers out again; gazing lovingly at her beautiful children. Her eldest, Cheryl, is nine. Her daughter’s silky long hair shines luminously under the clear summery morning. Her son, Ezekiel, is two years younger. Ezekiel is a handsome lad, with deep piercing blue eyes.

Rachel’s eyes darted back and forth – from her offspring to the baking cookies in the kitchen. She feels happy, yet sad at the same time. She is blessed with a wonderful family –the Johnston’s household is one of picture perfect. Their home in Denver is a semi-bungalow, semi-ranch house. Sprawling, yet modest, with wide garden spaces for the two large Labradors to roam freely. The interior of the house is cozy and snug. The rich-wood furniture is informally blended into its comfortable surrounding. Dozens of photo fames, some hanging, while others carefully placed on table pieces, provide an intimate display of the family’s togetherness.

Martin is a successful attorney who specializes in patent work. He is quite a sought after speaker as well, many a times in a year he is on the lecture circuits around the country, sometimes even abroad. The conference in Detroit will be one of the many which Martin will present insights on his area of interest. Rachel smiles to herself. She remembers how she first met her husband. They both attended the same university – he was a 2nd year law student, and she, a first year sociology scholar. They met during the many grouping that students were informally attached to. They both share the love for photography; and the many snapshot outings the group organized, had inadvertently brought the both of them drawn closer together. They got married right after she graduated, and were blessed with Cheryl a year after.

Rachel has been a full time mother ever since her son was born. She has worked a few years before, dabbling into social work relating to children, before finally opting out altogether to concentrate on her role as maternal nurturer. In any event, Martin is able to provide for the family financially.

The aroma of Rachel’s baking cookies begins to fill the air. It smells of sweet butter. An assortment of fancy encrusted cakes packs the baking tray. All of it is buttery yellow – of almost similar small round shape. Some resembles Van Gogh’s Sunflowers; others in the mould of Picasso’s cubists. Rachel sighs. Her cookies will probably go to waste again – as in all previous years. “Those are weird looking cookies Mummy,” her children will say. “It’s much smaller than the ones in the mall,” they retorted. Martin avoids her cookies as well. “Children, these are festival cookies. In celebration of the New Year,” she will patiently try to explain. “But Mummy, we just celebrated Christmas, and the New Year has just passed. Its February now,” her children would answer.

Rachel is disappointed, yet year after year, her cookies are being churned out despite its anticipated wastage. She will never stop making them. Her dear cookies hold such special meaning in her life. Rachel takes a deep breath, inhaling all she can of the sweet familiar smell. And as she sat waiting for her baking cookies, her mind begin to wander back to her childhood days.

Life was breezy and happy in the PJ Township in those early days. Rachel is the middle child of three siblings. The Chan were the typical Malaysian Chinese family.

Rachel remembers her double-storey terrace house well. She remembers the wood cushion settee in the hall, complete with the little coffee table. The table is always heaped with stacks of the New Straits Times. There is also the worn-out magazine rack, filled with outdated Her Worlds and Readers’ Digest. How she used to spent many hours reading those magazines again and again. She also recalls the china cabinet, placed at the deeper rung of the hall, complete with cheap glass ornament. Well, it didn’t look quite tacky then. And the Kawai piano, a common item of Chinese homes for those who can afford. Rachel would be forced many hours on tiresome composition practices on that dear piano. “If you cannot study, at least you can teach piano,” her parents would incessantly lecture.

Yes, she misses her family house. So much so, she quietly yearns for the faint smell of the joss stick incense that used to pervade the interior of the house.

But the best time she misses most of all is the Chinese New Year. How she looked forward to the festivities. Excitement filled the air weeks before the actual celebration day. There were greeting cards to be sent out, and Rachel’s assigned task was to put the cards into the pink envelopes and stamping them. The decorations were also needed to be put up. Stacks of used ang pow packets were neatly cut into frilly trimmings, to be either pasted on the walls or placed on available spaces on the table. Greeting cards received were quickly opened up and decked on the cabinet to add on to the atmosphere. Little red trinket decoration – some in the mould of Chinese lanterns; others in funny animal shapes carved out in conjunction to that particular years’ zodiac, were cheaply purchased from the pasar malam, together with the mandatory poster of the clasped hand smiley pig-tailed boy. The pop-pop firecracker and the sparklers, left-over from the year before, were also taken out, all ready to be played out once again.

But most of all for Rachel, it was the baking of the Chinese New Year cookies that was the most looked forward activity. She, being the only daughter, was naturally roped in by her mother to partake in the cookery.

The baking process was a laborious chore. It was a task solely held in the kitchen, where the white Zanussi oven was. Rachel would get to participate in all the baking stages. Sometimes she would get to press the little steel shape cutlery against the dough. Other times she would get to gloss over the unbaked cookies with honey egg-yolk. The best time was when the smell of the cookies oozes out of the oven – she would look into the stove to see the little cookies burning in bright yellow. The sight of the accomplished task gave the young Rachel a sense of achievement.

“Mummy.” Rachel jolts from her daydream. She looks out and sees Cheryl waving. She waves back to her children. And as she takes out the baked cookies from the oven, a drop of tear falls onto the hot cookies. This year around, the cookies appear even more beautiful and glowing.