I'm sitting in a cozy cafe away from the cold, letting the warmth nestle me in like warm french onion soup. Across the table sits my laptop, as old and dusty as cans on a forgotten pantry shelf, given new life as a writing device. A cup of bitter black coffee I'm pretending is an eight-dollar latte. Half-eaten banana bread. And my purse, which is full of wrappers, receipts, and drugstore makeup — the only kind I can afford with my salary.
But I am nothing if not my ancestors. Like the resourceful peasants before me, I know how to turn a cheap product into a meal fit for royalty. As I turn dried out mascara and scraps of concealer into something akin to beauty… even if it can feel like putting lipstick on a pig at times.
I’m recently out of a relationship. I realize the world is vast and packed with flavour. One such flavour came in the form of freedom — a spice I lacked drastically in the half-baked lasagna for one I called my social life. Freedom, like salt, is a flavour enhancer and an essential part of any palate, with moderation of course.
The freedom that I craved looked like a plate of comfort food full of enough calories to fill the hole left by that past relationship. A plugged-in vibrator and bottle of rosé drunk without a glass in sight. Now some may say that it sounds sad, but to me that is bliss. We all know no love is more pure than a recently single girl and her comfort food and wine. It is second only to the first bite of a bacon, egg, and cheese after a long night of mistakes brought on by said recent breakup — which makes me wonder: is comfort food just an edible rebound?
That first night of recovery left me stretched out on the bed, free from sharing covers. Tipsy and feeling like I wanted to prove my attractiveness, I downloaded a dating app and began swiping while grazing on the fast food I bought in a moment of desperation. The pictures of the people on the app blended together. I got a few matches with dry replies, and it felt as though the only thing that would give me the dopamine I hungered for would be the food. Like a warm hug, it comforted my broken heart and bruised ego.
If rebound sex was filling a sexual void, then food was filling a different one — the kind normally filled by arms to come home to after a stressful day or watching trashy TV in sweatpants on the weekend beside someone. A relationship without the honeymoon phase. Just pure comfort and realness. No pretending, no sucking in, just relaxed bliss.
This, to me, is what is missing in a rebound. And that's the joy of edible rebounds. Where rebound sex is a quick fix of sexual gratification, comfort food doesn’t ghost you. It doesn’t leave at sunrise. It's there in sweatpants and in health. It lets you be messy and fills the space a one-night stand can’t.
The phone on my bedside table went off as I took a bite of a fry. It was a match — a guy tall with espresso brown hair and not holding a fish in any of his pictures, which was a serious positive.
“Hey beautiful,” he messaged, the bubble on the screen lighting up my apartment and my hope that I wasn't completely hideous.
With an eager grin I messaged back after pausing for a moment: “Hey, you feel like late-night drinks?”
I hit send before looking down at my unshaven legs.
Getting ready to venture to the nearby bar, I put on something to cover up while still looking cute. I looked in the mirror and for just a second I saw the girl I was before all the heartbreak.
I made my way to the bar, ordering my usual cosmopolitan as the guy walked through the door. Adorned in an outfit perfect for the occasion, he had the look of a gruff yet sweet guy that seemed exclusive to a select few men.
He sat down next to me. His mocha brown eyes were like espresso in the morning — big, warm, welcoming. We talked through the night. After many drinks we wandered out of the bar, the cold winter air filling my lungs as we walked.
We found a nearby diner. The warmth of the heated room sat heavy as the smells of cooked egg and bacon roamed through the air while the server sat us at a booth. Drunk and starving, I ordered the burger and he ordered pancakes.
He was gentle, and while drunk as I was, kind and sensitive. I confessed I had just gotten out of a long-term relationship and appreciated the conversation. He understood the sentiment and comforted me as I vented about all the heartbreak.
It felt so good to get it out.
My shoulders loosened as I bit into the burger, and my mind reached an epiphany. There was something food couldn't save me from — a hole that couldn't be filled by a 4 a.m. burger or a pitcher’s worth of cocktails.
For the first time I was actually talking about my feelings, and it felt so good. He listened through my mouthful of burger and drunkenness as I poured out my sob story, and he had never looked hotter than he did then.
Grabbing a cab, we made our way back to my apartment. As the door slammed shut we pounced on each other, conversation turning to lust as the night drifted away and the sun poked over the horizon.
Very hungover and unsure what exactly happened the night before, I looked next to me and saw the man lying there. Carefully I got up and went to the bodega downstairs for Marlboros and black coffee, paired with a bacon, egg, and cheese — the poor woman's Advil.
As I took that first bite, I felt my soul leave my body as the cure to my hangover enveloped my taste buds. The gooey cheese, smoked bacon, and rich velvety egg lifted my despairing, headache-ridden mind.
Smoking a cigarette outside, I finally understood the question I asked.
Food has this way of healing the soul the way our loved ones do and the way relationships do. But this kind of healing will never compare to having someone show you empathy when you need it most.
And maybe that's why I'm in this cafe pretending my coffee is an eight-dollar latte.
Because healing sometimes looks like talking —
and sometimes it looks like a breakfast sandwich at 8 a.m.