Steak

‘I’ll tell you a story,’ Pam said. I leaned back into the sofa and cupped the tea in my lap. ‘I’ll tell you a story about an old girl I know’.

Pam is seventy-seven. She has no teeth and white hair; she wears slippers without socks; she is quite small and squat; she gets easily out of breath, and she is an avid reader. She was a part of Neighbourhood Watch until four years ago – the meetings were moved from the local church, to the centre of Chichester, then to Lewes. The journeys were too long, too frequent, and too expensive, she complained.

The time is not relevant. She had started talking about the butchers, I think. No, no: I had been speaking about this or that, when I had mentioned Lidl. I said that we might go there soon for a big shop – the four of us. She’d gone on to tell me about the old girl.

‘She’d gone out there for her shop, and she’d bought some steak – a big bit of frying steak. When she came home, she got onto cooking it. But the damn thing kept spitting! It was full of water!’ Pam glowed with the soft light coming from the small, white lamp; outside, it was beginning to get dark.

‘So,’ she went on, ‘she tried eating the thing.’ She stops talking, pauses, throws a small glance to the side – it’s almost coquettish; she does this often, and it’s wonderful. ‘It was solid! The damn thing couldn’t be eat!’

She went on to talk about the local butchers – how you can buy individual slices of bacon and eggs there. You see, Pam has a heart condition – she suffered two heart attacks in 1999 and, for months afterwards, could not have much salt in her diet. ‘I don’t think anyone would buy individual eggs, though!’ 

Pam stopped talking, smirked to herself, and went on: ‘but that steak,’ she said, ‘that steak: she told me she could’ve bitten into it until the cows came home!’ We both laughed at that, a real exchange with depth: mirth and respect twinned.

When I got ‘round to leaving, about 8.45, she asked me what I was cooking for tea. Chicken and chips, I said. Oh, she said... do you want a curry? I said yes, and I went across the road to get it. 

Once we’d finished eating, it was nearly 10 pm. I showed her some videos of cats capering on YouTube – she hasn’t a television, and certainly has never touched a computer. She enjoyed herself. She always enjoys herself. She is golden.