about Katsnelson
Peter Katsnelson is a 15 year old author and spoken-word poet based in Calgary, Alberta. He has been creating since he was nine years old, and got his first stories published in E-Zines that same year. He is passionate about exploring all emotions and genres in his writing, and never really sticks to just one style or theme. He's a sucker for a fresh strawberry banana smoothie and a good guitar solo.
Mustard
By Peter Katsnelson
And then we were kissing. Which, in case you were wondering, isn’t ideal to do if you’re sitting parallel to each other at a bus stop, but what else were we going to do? Stand up, turn to each other, and then kiss? That’s, like, thirty-seven seconds of non-romantic, awkward build-up. I don’t even know if I could call it build-up. It’s just a weird pause.
Or, even worse, if she wanted to kiss me and I politely turned her down, and then instead of an awkward thirty-seven seconds leading up to a kiss, it would be ten minutes of miserable, dull conversation leading up to sitting on a bus together with more miserable, dull conversation.
So we kissed.
Her name was Martha. I was kissing her. On a bench. We rotated towards each other to the best of our ability, her waist flexible and mine not. Her feet were dangling off the side of the bench and mine were planted into the snow. I attempted to turn to her, pulling my boots through an amalgamation of sleet and snow and spraying said snow into the surrounding area. Flakes descended lightly from above, landing on our heads and instantly melting from our collective body heat.
She tasted like mustard. Which was a weird thing to notice, if it weren’t so prominent. Probably from that shitty deli sandwich I got her from the gas station. It was still a good kiss, don’t get me wrong. Except I figured she’d taste like strawberries, or bubble gum, or nice soap, just based on what I’d read in those many young adult romance novels my uncle gifted me on my thirteenth birthday. We were supposed to be laughing, and she was supposed to look into my eyes after the laughter subdued, then my lips, then back at my eyes. And then we were supposed to both instantly get the cue to go in for a kiss. And she was supposed to taste like strawberries, or bubblegum, or nice soap.
Instead, it was messy. It was awkward. She blurted, wanna kiss? and I nodded frantically, and then we both pulled in at the wrong times, and then she tasted like mustard. She tasted like mustard.
I gently pulled away, smiling and turning to face the highway. “That was great,” I told her, keeping my gaze on the road.
“It was okay.”
Shit. “You tasted like mustard,” I blurted.
She turned to me.
“I what?”
No going back now. “You kind of tasted like mustard. It’s not a bad thing. You just did. Probably from the sandwich.”
“Okay? So?” She asked. I opened my mouth to speak, but she beat me to it. “What, did you expect me to taste like bubblegum or something?”
“No.” Yes. “It’s not a bad thing.”
She turned back to face the highway, her pants streaking the collected snow on the bench as she did so. I heard her smirk. Then it was silent. And not the good kind of silent, either. It was a really awkward silence. Weird silence. The kind of silence that mocks you. The kind of silence that follows an offensive joke at a eulogy.
We were trying not to make eye contact, both glancing around the area. She was tapping her hand on her knee lightly. I clicked my tongue and nodded my head.
“It’s not a bad thing,” I repeated after some time.
She snorted. “So it’s a good thing?”
“No! It’s not a bad thing, but it’s not a good thing either. It’s just a thing. It’s just a dumb thing, some stupid, irrelevant thing that I said because I didn’t want it to be really awkward after we were done kissing.”
I played with my hands. My palms itched. “So you told me I tasted like mustard?” She finally asked.
“I didn’t really have anything else to say.”
“We could have just sat in silence,” she suggested.
I shook my head. “No, because then it would be really awkward. It was really awkward. Are you kidding me? After we kissed, it felt like we were strangers in an elevator, trying to ignore the shit out of each other. God, it was such an awful silence.”
“How do you know?” She asked.
“Because nice silences only exist in young adult romance novels. Real silence is awkward. And dull. Unless you’re by yourself, but you can’t really call that a nice silence, because you’re, you know, by yourself. Alone.”
“You’re off track,” she interrupted.
“Better than no track at all.”
She crossed her arms and leaned back into the bench. She said absolutely nothing. I realized what she was doing. It was a nice gesture, but I also felt the need to fill that empty space with more words. Like, immediately. Balloons were growing in my chest. Rising up through my lungs.
“Okay, ha-ha. I get it. You can start talking now,” I said.
Silence.
“So, what, you’re just going to ignore me? You’re gonna make me talk to myself until the bus comes?”
“What do you do when you’re alone?” She asked.
I thought about it. “I have headphones, normally. Music. I can’t just sit in silence.”
The bottom of her toque rubbed against her jacket as she turned her head to me. “You can’t just sit there without any sounds?”
“No,” I said. “But I’m not, like, weird, or whatever. I’ve never seen someone who can just sit there by themselves, without music.”
She pointed to the bus stop across the road. “What about her?”
There was this small girl, probably around six or seven, sitting on the bench by herself. No headphones. No people. No book or phone to look at. Just swinging her legs. I got a bitter taste on my tongue.
Martha lowered her hand and put it in her pocket, her elbow touching my arm in the process. Objection brews in the back of my mind. “I mean, sure, I guess—”
“What if you stopped?” She asked.
“I can’t.”
“What if you stopped talking, just for a—”
“I can’t.”
“What if we just sat in si—”
“I can’t!”
“Yes you can.” Her voice was soft. “Just pretend I’m not here.”
I tried. And then we were sitting next to each other, not talking, not kissing, not doing anything except sitting next to each other. Neither of us were saying any words, and she wasn’t calling me dull, or awkward, or annoying. She was just sitting there, ignoring me. And I was okay with it, because I was sitting there, ignoring her.
It smelled like gasoline. My friends would always talk about how they liked the smell of gasoline, but I couldn’t stand it. It was disgusting. It was overwhelming. And annoying. And I heard the large glass pane in the bus shelter behind us rattle in its hinges with the wind. The snowflakes were melting on my hand as they landed. My other hand was pressed into the wood of the bus bench, my weight leaning on it as I looked at the highway that was a monument to the destruction and imposition of what was natural—of what was meant to be.
And then I felt Martha’s fingers on my hand. They were creeping up, sort of exploring, starting at my knuckles and making their way up to the rest, before holding it. And it wasn’t like the young adult romance books at all, either. Her hand was way smaller than mine. Her hand was warm and dry and small, trying to grasp my large, cold, snow-covered hand. But she gave it a squeeze. And it hurt a little, but I guess it was nice. And it smelled like gasoline. And the sound of the rattling glass behind us was getting on my nerves. And I hated myself for being just okay at kissing, and I was mad at myself for not holding her tight enough or going in at the right time, and I should have been better at kissing, and I should have been better at talking to her, and I should have been better; I should have been bet—
She laughed. “Your hand is so cold.”
“Yeah.” And it wasn’t perfect.
It was messy. Sort of clumsy. But there was this moment, this beautiful, wonderful, warm moment where the smell of gasoline, the less-than-ideal kiss, the rattling glass, the size of our hands, the taste of mustard, the uncomfortable silence—it became okay.
The imperfection finally became okay.