Nonfiction by Leslie Lisbona
Perched on a footstool, I plunged my five-year-old hand into the sink full of cold water and grabbed for the parsley leaves that my mother had soaked. They were elusive; it took me several tries to catch just one. My mom was behind me, close enough that I could smell her Bal à Versailles perfume.
Although the kitchen was small, it didn’t feel cramped. The window was open, and the spring air wafted in. I placed the leaves on a towel on the counter to dry, my hands dripping water to my elbows. My mom used a handheld metal contraption to shred the parsley. It was about the size of a book and had a crank that she wheeled around. She pushed her dark hair off her face with her wrist. Her eyes were lined with kohl. After a long while, we had a salad bowl full of leaves.
We soaked bulgur wheat into a big bowl of water. My mom said it in Arabic: burhol. She chopped scallions and let me sprinkle a thick layer of salt on top. She cut up tomatoes into little pieces as her gold bangles made soft chime-like sounds. She guided me to press the lemon halves onto a glass juicer. She smiled and said we needed a rest.
We lay on the hammock on the terrace overlooking 83rd Avenue and the empty lot across the street. We lived on the second floor, and the terrace was an extension of our living room. My mother smoked a cigarette, pressing her red lipstick onto the filter tip, while I slid alongside her silk dress. I played with her gold bracelets. Pigeons swooped around the courtyard below. She opened her book and slit a page open with a butter knife, leaving a jagged edge. Only the French books were like that.
In the afternoon, we returned to the task. Back on the footstool over the sink, I took a handful of bulgur wheat from the water, and I squeezed as hard as I could, tightening my stomach to get every drop out. I farted with the effort, and my mother laughed, her mouth open, her head back. I couldn’t help but laugh, too.
I tossed the drained bulgur into the bowl with the leaves. Then we did the same with the scallions. The juice from the scallions was viscous, turning my hands slimy. She added the tomatoes, lemon juice, and olive oil and mixed it all together. Then she gave me a taste. “Maybe more lemon,” I said through a mouthful of parsley, and she hugged me saying, “Ya rochi,” my darling.
Debi, my sister, came home from Russell Sage Junior High, her long blond hair hanging like ribbon past her shoulders. “Ohhh, taboule,” she crooned. She went to our room, and I followed her like a magnet. She threw her bag on the waterbed, and I fell beside it, making waves, my body jerking up and down. She kissed me and called me Leslie Pie. She smelled like rebellion, cigarettes and Herbal Essence shampoo.
My brother, Dorian, came home from work and said, “Oh wow, taboule!” and I scrambled to follow him around the apartment. “Hey, Arn,” his name for me, and he picked me up and swung me onto a shoulder. I loved the sheer strength of him. I rested my hand on top of his head, his dark wavy hair laced around my fingers.
My dad came home, and I ran into his outstretched arms. His cheeks were prickly, and I put my hands to mine to protect them. He kissed my neck. I giggled. “We made taboule,” I said. “I can’t wait,” he said.
I stood in the middle of my family as they moved around one another, reaching for bowls from the cabinet. We ate the taboule with whatever else my mother must have cooked when I wasn’t paying attention. The parsley stuck to our teeth; “Don’t ever eat taboule on a date!” my mom said. The taste was kaleidoscopic, citrusy, dense, complex, and comforting.
My parents talked to each other in Arabic, with French words mixed in. My mother called my dad “Cherie.” The singsong of their voices was tender and affectionate, their expressions frozen in time and unchanged since they had left Lebanon in 1949.
The taboule gone, my mom washed the bowl and laid it on a towel on the counter, swatting the hair from her eyes and exhaling deeply. She smiled at me and checked that her nail polish wasn’t ruined. Sleepy, I went to the living room, dragging my feet on the tan shag carpet to find my father asleep in front of the TV, still in his suit and shoes. I reached up and changed the channel to “I Dream of Jeanie.” I sat on the rug near my father as he dozed, the sensation of taboule and the nearness of my mother still present in my body.
Leslie Lisbona has been part of a writing workshop for ten years. She recently had her first piece published in Synchronized Chaos. She is the child of immigrants from Beirut, Lebanon, and grew up in Queens, NY. Most of her writing has to do with her upbringing.
