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Old Tosser
By Linda Parvin
“Leah Anne where have you put my old tosser this time?”
He’s not really cross; just acting piqued because it’s expected.
“Under the sink. It has a shelf of its own now.”
Oh fine. I might contaminate those new pristine, stainless steel - aluminium free - pans.
Fumbling hands, more lined than I remember, move towards me and caress. Our love is consummated infrequently now - she has him on a ‘low fat diet’. She has no idea just how humiliating that is to me! If I were a person she would deem me a bad influence.
I may be celibate much of the time these days, but he loved me first! She never liked me. We were introduced on their fifth date. She saw me as the filthy object he cooked their first meal on. He saw me – still sees me – as the much-loved, flat-warming present his Nan clipped from her Kleeneeze catalogue. I was in vogue in then. My Teflon non-stick coating meant I was a gift of some substance. His Nan scrimped to afford me – had three months of tuna fish, instead of red salmon. I was her goodbye present and he cherishes me for it still.
My culinary C.V. is full of precious memories. Such as the time he invited fifteen student friends to a barbecue, ripened the sausages and burgers in my trusty womb, and then placed them on the griddle five minutes before the doorbell rang. She fakes her orgasms; he fakes his barbecues!
Or the time she was pregnant with the second, after a feverish night with the first, and the combination of unwashed dishes and cravings meant she succumbed to my charms. I have kept the secret well: three fried eggs – over easy – one of his large cumberland sausage rings and five turkey dinosaurs. All in his vegetable oil - highly saturated fat!
He gently leans me over the sink and runs his fingers round my rim. The hot soapy water bubbles round my edges making me feel frisky. He is coarse and unthinking with the other pans, scouring them into submission. Tenderness is shown to me and me alone.
“Pancakes boys!” Two eager little faces, level with my base.
“They had pancakes at school today. They don’t need them twice.”
“Yes, but I bet you didn’t have coloured pancakes at school, did you?
“No, Daddy,” they chorus. He asks them to choose their colours. The little one picks glow-in-the dark yellow, the elder Wellington Boot green.
He carefully swirls the neon mixture into the very core of me. It grows inside, stimulating the release of my chemistry. When it is swollen to its zenith, he performs a loop-the-loop and gives me the other side to nurture. When I am spent, he gently he severs our contact.
He hands the pancake, which is the hue of a fluffy Easter chick, to the boy, who whoops with delight. Then I am enflamed a second time – and I spit with happiness as I am engorged. And I remember why I enjoy this so much
She pokes her head round the door, in an attempt to censor, and announces cheerily, “ I can see that thing finally hitting the bin next week, after your coronary assessment.”
He looks crestfallen, but cleans me sweetly and puts me away in the pan drawer; next House of Fraser’s finest. I yearn to be corrupting, to spread tarnish like chickenpox.
*
When my necre nisi is proclaimed, I am roughly bundled into a bag, and shoved into some corner, to await god knows what. Yet later that same evening, she returns and announces, “I got you this, so you can still use old tosser. After today’s assessment I think we’ll all be using it.”
Very quickly I am lifted out for my reprieve. I cast an eye over my saviour - a spray can, with the words ‘Fry Light – the only 1 cal spray – Slimmers Magazine award winner.’
The bitch! I wasn’t designed for stir frys, I’m a heavy-duty, sausage, egg and bacon frying pan. When he next tries to use me, I slip from his grasp and my bold green plasticised handle smashes on the floor. I am consigned to the bin, pronto. Better that than prostitute myself to a culinary correct household!
