Land of Milk and Honey

In October, the community becomes smaller as some residents are told to leave. Aida sets the cicadas that she bred in the labs free instead of simply killing them. The narrator wonders if they are jeopardizing the secrecy of the labs, but most of the cicadas will die when they hit the electric fence.

The residents who don’t make the list react with minor acts of violence, like smashing windows and urinating in an alcohol bottle. The smell of this bottle causes the narrator to remember living in San Francisco in a building filled with both the reek of urine from a nearby bar and the appetizing aroma of a nearby bakery. Aida is disgusted that the narrator didn’t immediately throw the bottle out.

Dwindling food stores affect the menu. The narrator eats more and gains weight, which upsets her employer. When she needs new clothes, he tells her to diet. Instead, she gives in to cravings like one for panna cotta, although the one she makes is less satisfying than the one remembers made with cheaper ingredients, like corn syrup. Aida works overtime in the labs and with her father and sometimes tells the narrator about scientific breakthroughs in a manic state. Exhausted from work, Aida is unimpressed by the dishes that the narrator spends hours making for her.

One night, Aida is late to dinner and pushes away the food. She tries to distract the narrator with sex, but the narrator finds food wrappers in Aida’s coat. This upsets her more than cheating would. The narrator asks to get lunch in Milan. Aida’s father stipulates that they travel with guards to the edge of the city and with Aida’s dogs beyond that. They are also supposed to wear protective gear. Aida wears black and drives a black convertible, but the protective gear is gold. They bring apples that are too finicky to be a sustainable variety for the move off the mountain. Aida talks about the symbolism of apples in myths and legends until the narrator asks her to stop. Aida lived in Milan until people painted “eat the rich” on their door and broke their windows (182).

They park and leave one dog in the car. The narrator feels like they stand out in their gear and is embarrassed. She can’t see through her helmet and takes several wrong turns. Then, she takes off her helmet and breathes in the smells of the city. When they get into Chinatown, the narrator remembers visiting it in her early twenties. In the present, she finds a food stall and orders jian bing; the taste reminds the narrator of other street foods, Oreos, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and the peanut butter that the narrator’s mother used to put on her bing. They eat second and third helpings; the narrator figures out that the special ingredient is hazelnut butter—the cook gives them scoops of it out of the jar. The cook gives them an extra bing for the road, on the house, and says to come back a week later for an even better recipe.

As they walk through Milan, Aida takes off her helmet as well. They dance to a song on a radio, and the narrator explains that she chose to study French cuisine because that was the way to become a successful and respected chef. When Aida points out that there were many successful Chinese restaurants before the smog, the narrator replies that she wanted to cook “real food” (187), which means food made with love and for joy, not sustenance. Aida assures the narrator that she is now a respected French chef. The narrator doesn’t agree, feeling like she was forced to reject Chinese cooking.

The dog alerts Aida that there is trouble and leads the women back to the car. There, children have gathered to look at the dog that they’d left behind. As Aida opens the car door, the children grab at the two dogs, blocking in Aida and the narrator. The narrator throws their apples; the children run after them, but those who take bites immediately spit them out, preferring food made from mung-bean flour. The narrator tries peeling an apple, but even a girl who looks hungry still spits out her first bite of the inner fruit, though she enjoys the bitter peel more. Aida slowly drives away, complaining that fast food ruined the palates of children. The narrator ignores her. Aida claims that she is saving macadamia nuts because the narrator likes them. The narrator continues to ignore her, and Aida screams, demanding to know what the narrator needs to be happy.

The narrator wants to go back to the jian bing cook for new recipes. She also wants to try out innovations that people off the mountain, with limited resources, have come up with. The two women talk about foods that are wrapped in other foods, like tacos, crepes, and bossam. Aida offers to find a Korean restaurant that serves bossam in Milan. The narrator complains that she will be left alone in a kitchen while Aida works after they leave the mountain. Aida tells the narrator that she needs her, but when the narrator asks whether Aida would like to travel to Seoul to try the food there, Aida counters that street food will die out in the following year. The two women argue about the potential of improving the smog. Aida claims that she is more optimistic than the mountain leadership, though the narrator disagrees.

The narrator opens their leftover bing, warms it in her mouth, and feeds it to Aida, who is driving slowly. As they share food, mouth to mouth, a child reaches in the car to grab at the dog. Aida swerves and hits the child with the car. When they stop, the narrator tells Aida to call her dogs away from the child, but when Aida is frozen, the narrator slaps her. Aida whistles at the dogs. Police sirens approach.

Just then, Aida’s father arrives with the security personnel, who force the local police to cooperate. Only after Aida’s father gives permission can the child’s mother come through the yellow tape.

Aida hugs her father and doesn’t speak to the narrator. He has Aida sedated and drives her and the narrator back to the mountain. Along the way, he claims that the police have ruled the collision an accident, that the child is injured but not dead, and that he will give the family money to help with the child’s medical costs. The narrator calls it blood money. Her employer counters that the Italian government wouldn’t come to the aid of his Romani people. In any case, they’ve run out of time: The government is passing legislation to take back the mountain and its labs, which they learned about from the zoologist that Aida fired. Even Kandinsky’s influence could only delay the inevitable.

Aida’s father points out that Aida is all he has left, while the child she hit has siblings. The narrator realizes that her employer is a smoker and offers him a cigarette. He says that it’s bad for health and dulls taste buds, so she shouldn’t smoke. As she smokes, she thinks about all the chefs she knew who smoked. Aware that they were mortal, they smoked and ate various unhealthy foods for pleasure. The narrator sees that her employer fears many things.

When they get back to the mountain, Aida has food poisoning from the bing. The narrator is glad that Aida is suffering. Aida writes a note asking for Korean steamed eggs but no longer comes to the kitchen.

In the winter, as the narrator goes for a run, she considers how to generate an appetite for various foods and how to be her own muse. She arrives at the meteorologist’s house and tells him, but not the reader, her real name. He is unsurprised at her deception. She offers him her spot on the list if he leaks the fact that she is only pretending to be Eun-Young. This way, she can get severance and a California burrito. He writes down directions to his uncle’s restaurant, which serves the best burritos, and she realizes that he lied about being from Iran: His family is from Los Angeles.

The last thing the meteorologist tells the narrator is that the grass that smells like honey was planted after Eun-Young tried to leave the mountain with Aida when Aida was a teenager. In retaliation, Aida’s father burned down the estate in Korea that his wife was trying to escape to and planted Korean grasses. The meteorologist is sure that Aida’s father killed Eun-Young; having the narrator pose as her has persuaded those who also believed him to be a murderer to stay and donate money. She realizes that she didn’t ask for enough money to cover up this crime.

Once the meteorologist’s rumors about the narrator’s identity reach her employer, he cancels Sunday dinners. She receives hate mail, although some residents, like the meteorologist, send encouraging letters, and a member of the kitchen staff offers her a cigarette. The narrator’s employer calls her into the dining room and says that he should fire her for breaking her non-disclosure agreement but is instead firing her for gaining too much weight, which goes against her contract to pretend to be Eun-Young. He offers her a new contract, one where she hides from the diners but is on the list. She refuses.

He looks coldly at her and says that Eun-Young regretted leaving. The narrator asks if he regrets what he did to Eun-Young. The narrator’s employer holds the door to the dining room, forcing the narrator to squeeze past. As she does so, he pulls her to his chest and suffocates her. Before she loses consciousness, she says “Aida”; he releases her. She collapses briefly, calls her employer a parasite, not an apex predator, and leaves. Later, she learns that this happened around the time Kandinsky stopped donating money. She wonders if Aida knew.

On the narrator’s last day, Aida meets her outside. Aida criticizes the narrator’s smoking but then smokes her first cigarette and tells the narrator to keep it a secret from her father. Aida was demoted after the zoologist leaked information. The narrator shows Aida the bruises on her chest from Aida’s father’s most recent assault. Aida says that her father is an idiot with a temper, like her. The narrator disagrees; she asks Aida to leave and come with her, but Aida replies that her father protected her after the car accident and didn’t judge her. Neither made an effort to repair their relationship after the accident.

The narrator says that she might go to Mexico, Paris, or Seoul. She guesses that Aida’s community is headed to the Arctic or Finland, but Aida won’t say. Aida gives the narrator the lab’s first batch of ramps—an allium related to onions. The cat comes out at their strong smell; the narrator asks Aida to keep the cat, but Aida refuses. The narrator cries, and Aida holds the narrator’s face, wiping away tears. The gesture reminds the narrator of how Aida touched the chimp in the lab. Aida just wanted the narrator to be happy. They talk about Eun-Young choosing ignorance and Aida choosing knowledge as the cat sits on Aida’s lap.

The narrator thanks Aida for ensuring severance pay. Aida tried to visit the family of the child she injured. She brought a loaf of bread, and a mob attacked her, knocking her bread onto the street, so Aida gave up and went back to the mountain. The narrator refuses Aida’s request to stay until her birthday in the first week of January. Aida hopes that they will meet again one day, maybe in Seoul.

The narrator’s severance is larger than she expected, and Aida secures the narrator residency in France. There, the narrator hides in a hotel room and only goes out at night to visit restaurants. She even asks to pay locals for their home-cooked meals. On television one night, she sees Aida, her father, the meteorologist, and other guests of the mountain restaurant. The field at the base of the mountain opens up to reveal a rocket, which travels up into the sky toward Mars and then explodes. The narrator runs out of the bar. She later learns various theories as to why the rocket exploded; some suspect that Aida and/or her father never got in the rocket in the first place. The narrator imagines Aida becoming weightless in space and entering a new world. However, she sees Aida’s face everywhere.