Coming of Edge 8: Method Cooking

He hacked off a sizable chunk from the celery root. Next he sliced the chunk, sliced the slices to strips, sliced the strips to cubes. He put it into the deep pan and drenched it with rapeseed oil to roast it gently.

He more or less did the same to carrots, to a Spanish onion, and the tomatoes, which were standard greenhouse fare but tasted already much better than the ones a month earlier. He felt a certain satisfaction doing the slicing with that large, dull knife. It felt nice to take out the internal pressure on the vegetables.

He added the shroom-based bacon. He would fry and add the soy-meat later, it did not work well in meals which would cook for long hours. He deeply wished to be able to afford real beef for once.

When the ingredients obtained their light brown burns and the air smelled of toasted veggies, he added some water and put the pan to simmer.

Patrick washed his hands, smelling the onion and celery on his finger tips despite the soap. Then he went back to his laptop on the kitchen table. He checked the agent he had built over the last weeks. It had found three matches more in the last days.

“Hey honey.” His wife Caro had just entered the living room and walked up to the kitchen section. She kissed his cheek. “Smells good. Pasta it is, yes?”

“Yep,” he answered, checking the search results.

“What are you doing? Checking your agent?” she asked.

“Hmhm.”

“Oh my, someone’s hyperfocusing,” she commented. “Do you want a tea as well?”

“That would be lovely.”

“So, how is it going, did you find more occurrences?” She filled the old-school kettle, she had inherited from her aunt.

“Yeah, there are three more. I am at sixteen cases now with a high probability of matching Rozalia’s profile. They are all over Germany.”

“Hm, is the number increasing?” She went for their tea collection. “What do you want?”

“Apple. And yes, the numbers increase slightly. Agent says it still far too unreliable to say it’s a trend. There’s a lot of statistical science behind it. Did you ever hear of something like a confidence interval?”

She was fetching the large mugs from the cupboard. “Actually no. I prefer woodworking.” She chuckled and retrieved a carrot from the fridge. Then she leaned against the counter and nibbled at it, passing the time for the water to boil. “So, who are your new recruits, Xavier?”

Her teasing remark made him turn away from the laptop and look at her. She had a mischievous grin on her face. The eyes were beaming with warmth. Sun rays fell through the window and sculpted her body more dimensional. How she crossed her arms over her chest, holding up that carrot. The arc of light curving across her slight tummy, bathing her wide hips in dark and brightness. Her hair looked golden. The focus on anger and the drive to save or repair something, receded for a moment.
She felt safe. He loved her.

He checked his laptop. “A boy from Berlin, thirteen years old. Same symptoms, which does not mean much on its own, but the timings are similar. Then another teenager which I found scraping the databases of the social workers. Also a boy from Thuringia, reported to experience heavy hallucinations and dissociation quite suddenly. And then there’s a girl from NRW, sixteen years old.”

“Which symptoms does she show to turn up in your list?” The kettle started whistling loudly. It ended when Caro took it off the stove.

“She’s pregnant.”

“That’s it? There should be a load more of results like this, right?” She walked over to him, holding both steaming mugs and a small plate to put the used tea bags on.

“She insists she’s a virgin.”

Caro inhaled sharply. “Oha. That reeks of teenage side-hustles. Why do you think she could be floating as well?”

“Let’s call it a hunch.” He pulled up a file. It showed patient records, ultrasonic scans, a report from a social worker, public photos from the net. She was pretty. She had a symmetrical face and a positive attitude while wearing very decent, casual outfits. Came from a middle-class family, had no problems in school. “I don’t think she’s the type,” he said.

“Oh, the invisible ones are the worst. I should know!” she said, grinning again.

He laughed. “You definitely never had been one of those!”

“To my parents, I was,” she pouted. “But I think you might be right, she really does not vibe like that.” She paused and took the tea bags from the mugs.

“What are you going to do with those results? I wonder if you should even dig into the personal data of all these people. Are you allowed to do that?” she inquired.

“Not really.” He closed his eyes and let his head sink. After a few breaths he opened them again, looking into hers.
“I am going to visit them, see what’s what.”

“Okay.” She was surprised. “And then what?”

“I don’t know yet. I am exhausted but hardly find any sleep, thinking. I cannot concentrate at work. I even cannot numb myself with media. I have headaches.” He cast his eyes down on his mug. Then he stood up and walked to the stove to check on the improvised Soffritto. He lifted the lid and a flavorsome cloud escaped.

“First this. Then we’ll see.”

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