honest review of making an egg sandwich while you use the bathroom 2/27

you said you want an egg sandwich so i go to make you an egg sandwich, pulling out the only clean pan and imagining myself in front of a big flat top, slinging eggs across it like a skilled diner cook. i light the stove, put the pan on it, and still smell whatever it is that’s making the room smell so i take out the trash while the pan is heating. before i do, i make sure to toss the kimchi, which has been sitting in your refrigerator in a plastic bag i tied off to seal in the smell. down in the alley, the garbage men are pulling in as i open the lid on the dumpster and toss the trash in. i turn back to walk upstairs and wave. they wave back, and i wonder for a moment about the lives of garbage men. me and the garbage men are sitting around a poker table exchanging small talk and i can’t relate to them at all. my hands are soft. my gag reflex is strong. i try complaining about the struggles of office work, but carpal tunnel and sciatica seem very embarrassing by comparison. i don’t tell them i sometimes have to wear a brace for my wrist while sitting on a cushion for my lower back. back inside, the room still smells the way rooms smell when something that’s not meant to ferment has been fermenting in them, and you can only really smell how bad it is once you leave and return. i remember removing the guts from yesterday’s chicken, but don’t remember what i did with them, and decide that this must be the reason for the smell even though i originally thought it was cat shit. i take out the eggs, pour a thimble’s worth of olive oil into the pan – which i consider to be a demonstration of immense self-control considering my Greek heritage – and crack the eggs and drop them in. i yell to ask if you want your egg over hard, but i already know, and so i wait for the bottom to cook before i flip it. instinctively i reach to my back pocket for my phone, but it’s not there, and instead of going to get it i remember my mission. i go back and watch the eggs in the pan. it’s a strange thing watching eggs in a pan. specifically sunnyside. vaguely eye-shaped and amorphous, two of them give the impression of Edvard Munch’s scream. stare at them long enough and you too can feel yourself losing shape, turning yellow, cooking through as the pan heats beneath you and a hungry figure looms overhead. i remember once standing over some sunnyside eggs and realizing that the only thing keeping me from falling through the floor was my hand wrapped around the handle of the pan. i am not falling this time. there is no narrator to carry me off, no flying monkey to snatch my head, no Sylvia Plath to dance with Death, who for once is also not present at this time. the eggs sizzle and i flip the one with the more contained perimeter of egg white. it lands softly and i don’t see the yolk break. i take out the english muffins, cursing whoever priced them over $5 a bag, and stick one in the toaster. at this time, you come out of the bathroom and ask me what i asked you and i tell you. you say, “oh, yes.” when the toaster pops, i go to the fridge for a slice of the Kraft singles i like and place one on the bottom of the english muffin. how do you know it’s the bottom? because it’s a fatter, better base for the egg. then, the over-hard egg comes off and goes onto the cheese to make it melt. i hand it to you open-faced on a plate – that way, if the yolk is still runny, i absolve myself of responsibility for the explosion when the top goes on. and it does end up exploding, all over your hands, shirt, and even your hair. i laugh. “sorry,” i say, “i thought i cooked it long enough.” you laugh too, “it’s not your fault,” you tell me, and take a small bath in the sink like a bird. i put on another egg for myself and pop an english muffin in the toaster, turning up the dial to get the darker, crispier texture i like. it pops out, i lay it on a plate and put cheese on the bottom, the first egg on the top. as i wait for the second egg to be done, i notice that the garbage is gone, and ask me “did you take out the trash?” “no,” i say, “it grew little legs and walked itself out.” you chuckle. “thank you, i was going to do it myself but it’s my least favorite chore.” “it is?” i ask, “i’ll take out the trash every time as long as you wash the dishes. that’s my least favorite chore…though sometimes it can be quite meditative.” by now, the second egg is ready and before i scoop it out, i open one more Kraft single the way Kraft singles are so efficiently designed to be open – pinching the little plastic flap and pulling up and around to undress the cheese in one smooth and satisfying motion – and place it on top of the other egg. i bring it over to the table and sit down across from you as you work. “i can’t believe my mother used to pay 15 dollars for 9 of these on our weekend trips to McDonald’s,” i say. when i take the first bite, the cheese oozes out of the back, looking very much like the sludge it probably started as. i watch it for a moment as i hold up my sandwich, then scoop it onto the next bite with the english muffin. “i love the taste of this processed cheese,” i tell you, “reminds me of my grandmother.”