Amuse bouche... Vegan Stress

‘I couldn’t work for them,” said Heather, “the house smelt hammy. A house of ham. Disgusting.”

“What do you mean?” asked, Una, putting two cups of tea on the table and sitting down to join her dejected daughter. Or maybe just indignant.

“I mean that the second the mother opened the door, I could smell the ham,” said Heather. “And she brought me into the kitchen for the getting-to-know-you chat and there was half a pig boiling away on the hob. And you should have seen her face when I asked if they had soya milk when she made me coffee.”

Una jumped up and made for the fridge. It had been a few months now, but she still couldn’t get used to Heather being vegan.

“Well,” said Una, putting the soya milk on the table in front of her 23-year-old, out-of-work, qualified-childminder, boomerang child, “you can’t really expect the woman to have niche milk in the house.”

“Yeah, but she looked at me like I was rude,” Heather said.

“Maybe you should bring your own soya in these situations,” said Una tentatively. “Or tell people in advance that you’re vegan, so that they can maybe not put a ham on the hob or get in some fake milk.”

“Are you being funny, Mum?” Heather asked.

“No,” said Una, “but maybe you should just tell prospective families that you’re vegan in advance, you know, so they can come to terms with it.”

“Mum, you’re not really helping here,” Heather said.

Una was silent for a minute. She wasn’t really sure how to help. Sure what family was going to take on Heather and all her notions unless they were notion-y themselves? No ordinary, ham-eating Irish family was going to be thrilled about having to watch what they ate in front of her or, worse, having to ask her to cook anything normal, like fish fingers or sausages.

Jesus, Heather would lose it if that happened. Since she had turned vegan, she was a tyrant to live with, and freaked if her father’s Friday steak went on the same pan as any of her pretend meat. Una thought the lack of protein was making her cranky, but Heather got more cranky if you said that.

It was going to be a very special family that took her on as a minder. But Una needed Heather to find work soon and get a flat. Una needed to have a Sunday roast in peace.

“Maybe I need to find a vegan family,” Heather said.

“The O’Neills down the road are vegetarian,” Una answered. “Jesus, Mum, not the same!” said Heather, “And anyway, you always say the O’Neills are weirdos.”

“Well, yeah,” said Una. “You really should check them out.”