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This morning, that’s noon for normal people, while drinking something that I think Sarah (
) calls camel-toe tea and watching a bunch of Brits play Mario Party, Sarah asked if I had ever had curry sauce. Like any other tax-dodging American, I responded with, “What the fuck is curry sauce?” in an attempt to avoid eating another terrible British thing that was probably made out of blood. She smiled while handing me a chip (a fat french fry) that had been covered in a puke yellow sauce.
As I nervously placed the sloppy chip in my mouth, I was greeted with a zesty, spicy flavor that sent shock waves through my young, supple body, but I knew that I had to contain myself since I was in a room full of British people that were all staring in expectation, so I quickly said, “It’s not bad!” without letting them know that I felt like I’d been curry-sauce-deprived my whole life.
“Why don’t Americans get curry sauce?” I began to wonder. “I bet it would taste amazing on chicken and waffles, have I just found a replacement for maple syrup?” I had so many thoughts running through my head as I pretended to look interested in what Sarah was talking about.
The camel-toe tea was kicking in and my normal paranoia began to drift away along with all the thoughts about curry sauce. So, I asked Sarah to make me some more camel-toe tea and the room erupted into laughter the same way it always does when an American asks for tea.
I spent the next few hours trolling folks on Discord while heavily sedated on tea, until it dawned on me that the fish and chip shop was about to close. I was in such a rush that I almost left Sarah behind, which would have been bad because I tend to get confused and she is my interpreter. I ordered the fish and chips along with a warm, styrofoam cup that was filled to the brim with that heavenly curry sauce.
When we returned home I fixed my plate: dumping malt vinegar, apple cider vinegar and salt on everything, but then tragedy struck: I had a muscle spasm in my arm which blasted the curry sauce all over the cabinets.
I went into shock thinking that this wasn’t real, but it was real. The brown curry sauce was slowly dripping down, leaving florescent-yellow trails in its wake as it travelled down the white cabinets and began pooling up on the floor like blood at some horrific crime scene.
I began grabbing paper towels to soak it up, while pushing away thoughts like, “Why me?” and, “How I could be victimised like this?” but I knew I wasn’t a victim, I was just in desperate need of more curry sauce. So, without even waiting for Sarah, I raced away from the half-cleaned Manson-style kitchen over to the restaurant as fast as my legs would carry me.
“One curry sauce!” I said to the cashier in hopes that he wouldn’t remember me, so I wouldn’t have to explain my plight to a stranger. He didn’t ask questions, he just walked to the back and came right back to say, “We’re out of curry sauce!”
“What!?” I said in disbelief. Everything became silent for a moment and then he began to try to make the situation better by hitting on me.
“We’re all out of curry sauce, but you’re my meshy pea!” I quickly lowered my eyebrows at him to let him know that he better rephrase that.
“We’re out of curry sauce, my meshy pea!” he repeated.
“Is this guy fucking with me?” I began to wonder while checking my ears for laughter, as if this was some sort of prank, but there was no laughter and there was no one watching with that giddy look on their face. It was just me and him and I was staring him down as if we were in prison.
“Do I need to slap him a little bit to show that I mean business?” I began to wonder while playing out movies of his head bouncing off the counter, but then I remembered that Cerebral Palsy prevents me from winning fights and that I would have to settle for intimidating him into giving up the curry sauce.
The tension was building and his eyes kept darting from my eyes to my curry soaked hands that were dripping sauce onto the floor. I could tell the guy was getting nervous, because he was repeating “Meshy Pea, meshy pea!”
“What’s meshy pea?!” I barked at him.
“Meshy pea is meshy pea! That’s what it is…” he said with a bemused laugh and then continued, “We might have some gravy, I could go check?”
“Nah man, I’m good!” I quickly said as it dawned on me that he wasn’t trying to punk me out, he was actually offering some sort of British food that was probably made out of blood.
When I arrived home, Sarah made me a huge mug of camel-toe tea to help me calm down and explained that he was offering me mushy peas, which is a bunch of bright-green; blended up marrowfat peas.
Sometimes the cultural difference can be a bit confusing, but tomorrow, I’m going back and mark my words, Im getting that curry sauce or that guy is getting slapped!
EDIT: When Sarah was editing this amazing tale of self-discovery, she explained that I’ve been drinking chamomile tea.
