Carnival Souls

Soul Food

Mitsi inhaled deeply as steam rose in a great billowing cloud from the pot of dumplings he had just poured water over. He could detect the faintest trace of spices in the dense, hot air, and he set a cover over them to let them steam.

He returned to the bowl of sauce he was making from scratch and surveyed the collection of spices lined up like tiny glass battalions along the countertop. In his two years of being the carnival's chef, he had discovered that souls warmed better to certain seasonings, regardless of whether they were from Asia, Europe, or the Americas. He always tried to include at least one in every dish.

A subtle lace of ginger in more flavorful dishes; sprinkles of cinnamon in layered deserts; bay leaves soaked in warm, fragrant drinks. It calmed them, soothed their restlessness, made them more amiable.

And, of course, he always added a teaspoon of powder from the vials that Bebinn provided him. They were mostly tasteless he had found from licking a coating off his finger, but he had felt funny for hours afterward--as though something had untethered inside him.

He picked up one of these vials now, filled with a fine white powder that was almost iridescent in the light and heat of the kitchen. Carefully, Mitsi measured out a teaspoon, scraping a knife along the top to ensure it was even, before tossing it into his sauce. Under the steady beating of the whisk, it vanished into the mixture as though it was never there.

Mitsi glanced up through the kitchen window where he had a view of the funhouse that hid the so-called staff quarters. At the foot of the stairs he could see Lira arguing with the new recruit.

Owen, he reminded himself.

He hadn't met the newcomer yet, although it was rare Mitsi had much contact with anyone. Lira sometimes came to visit him, but more often than not he was too busy to hold long conversations.

There was always a certain heaviness about Lira too--something that went deeper than just plain exhaustion. It was a pervasive kind of sadness that was most apparent when she was practicing music. Deep, melancholy songs that were very different than what she played at nights for the kids. Though he never asked Lira what was troubling her, feeling it was too invasive to ask, Mitsi would add warming spices to her food to help cheer her up.

He could tell she was particularly fond of cinnamon, perking up like a wilted flower in the rain and losing the lines around her mouth when she took the first few bites. He had always had a feeling there was a fire burning deep inside her that was tempered by the weight of whatever she was carrying around. Away from the carnival and her duties, he wondered what her true nature would be like and if that long dormant fire would bring her to life.

Now, as he watched her arguing with Owen in front of the funhouse, he realized that this was the most animated he had ever seen her. There was color in her cheeks and her curly, lavender-tinged hair seemed to crackle with electricity. She was gesturing wildly with her hands and he momentarily paused in his stirring when he saw her slap Owen and storm away.

The side of his mouth quirked. First flares, he thought. In the kitchen, you needed high-proof alcohol to flambé something over the stove. He wondered what was high proof enough to set Lira off.

Mitsi went back to his stirring. He assumed it had something to do with her missing home; he had seen more than one stolen kid snap when someone mentioned their home. Though he didn't know Lira's backstory, he figured it was probably more enjoyable than his own home-life. He personally didn't think it was so bad at the carnival where he got to spend his day doing what he had always wanted to do: cook.

Even now, with all the sounds of the kitchen whistling and sizzling and bubbling around him, he could still hear his mother's disappointment when he had told her he wanted to go to culinary school.

Mitsi had never understood what the problem was with learning to cook. In the past two years alone, he had learned to cook dishes from more cultures than he knew existed; had seen different foods calm and comfort kids from around the world as they first arrived at the carnival. Sometimes, he even had the kids themselves teach him new meals.

He could concoct rich beef soups from Myanmar, stuff squid worthy of the Philippines, roast and season rabbits from Budapest, grill parrot fish over rice in The Seychelles, cobble together paellas and pizzas and pastas that would make even the pickiest eaters ask for seconds.

But even when he had persisted, his mother fell into the mantra that he would "grow out of it," as though by sheer force of will she could get him to change his mind. And she would get even angrier when she brought the subject up to his father and he dismissed it with a shrug of his shoulders. It hadn't exactly been a secret around their house that she thought he was a failure with nothing more than a tiny grocery store that made just enough to pay the bills and maintain the house.

And now Mitsi would be a failure too. At least in her opinion.

Looking around the kitchen once more--his kitchen--with the luxurious smells of cooking, simmering, baking food washing over him and the light gleaming off spotless copper pots and silver knives that were always the right degree of sharpness, Mitsi knew this is what he wanted to do, what he was good at.

He gave one last cursory glance out the window, where Owen had now been joined by Jacks, and turned back to the stove.

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What do you think of Mitsi as a character? Do you have any predictions about his role in the story? Let me know!

(For readers who had read farther ahead before I slipped this chapter in, sorry for throwing you off! Lol I decided to add a bit from Mitsi's perspective earlier on in the story)