LIKE RIPE FRUIT

That June night in 1969 when the border closed between Spain and Gibraltar, my mother cooked rosto. She stood by the beige electric oven and tended to the pork cheeks sizzling in the pan, turning them over with a metal spatula. With her other hand, she flipped open the cupboards above her, pulling out OXO cubes and a jar of tomate frito.

I sat at the kitchen table and peeled carrots slowly with an ancient metal device that I had seen Mamá and Abuela and all the other women in my family use with a speed that felt careless but never resulted in injury. I was seventeen years old and Mamá had decided that tonight of all nights, I would learn this recipe. When I turned up with a notebook and pencil, she grabbed them and tossed them on the counter saying, Violeta niña por Dios. She talked about pinches and handfuls, a complex alchemy I wasn’t very bothered about learning. Gibraltar family recipes were not written down, they were absorbed into the soul and never spoken aloud again.

My mother lowered the heat on the hob and turned to look at the pile of carrots uncrushed, the nabo unsliced. She wiped her hands on her purple bata, leaving an imprint of oily fingers at her hips, and sat down opposite me at the table. With a small kitchen knife, she started quietly whizzing through each vegetable, small heaps of prepared ingredients lay before her on a chopping board while I battled to chop a second half-peeled carrot. I stopped to turn on the radio. , she snapped. Not even music? I asked. Her non-reply, her eyes focused on the food before her, was a reply. How had I made her so angry?