"What's for dinner tonight, Ma?"
"Italian," I said.
Joe looked in the pantry. No spaghetti, no spaghetti sauce. In the spice drawer, no garlic powder. "How?"
"I have a plan." I took out a big pot, filled it with hot water, turned on the burner. Will came over looking interested.
"But there's no spaghetti," complained Joe.
While I went to the pantry to look for pasta with Joe, Will took the opportunity to dump pot of water down the drain. "Will!" scolded Joe. Will giggled and rubbed his hands together in glee.
"See," I said, "macaroni elbows!" I took them from the pantry and brought them over to the counter. Will's twin George came in, looking interested. I refilled the pot with water, put it back on the burner. "George, do you want to dump these in?" George dumped all the macaroni from the box into the water. Will grabbed the box, folded it up, then ran outside to put the box in the recycling.
"There's also no spaghetti sauce," said Joe.
"Perhaps if I use apple sauce instead?"
Joe rolled his eyes.
"OK, OK, I've got these little cans of tomato paste, see?" I fished out a can opener. George took out the Morton's Salt. I opened the the tomato paste. George dumped about half a cup of salt in the macaroni noodles.
"George!" said Joe. George giggled and rubbed his hands together in glee. Will came back in.
"Don't worry," I said. "I have a plan. Everything is fine." I took out a frying pan, turned on the burner under it.
"No way are noodles supposed to have that much salt," said Joe.
I checked the fridge, pulled out an Italian sausage, plopped it in the frying pan. Went to the tea cabinet, palmed a childproof magnet from hiding, used it to unlock the locked sauce cabinet, opened it. Pulled out some olive oil. Meanwhile Will took the boiling salt noodles and rushed them to the sink, pouring them all through a strainer, splashing hot water everywhere.
"Will!" said Joe. "Those aren't done yet!"
I refilled the pot, put it back on the burner, and dumped the macaroni out of the strainer back in the pot. "See, no more salt!" I said. "Still going to plan." George had found a jar of molasses and dumped about a tablespoon of it on the Italian sausage, which was starting to sizzle, leaving a long trail of molasses across the counter.
"George! Will! Stay out of the kitchen!" said Joe, exasperated. Will left giggling. George dumped some olive oil on the pan too before getting shooed away. I put the molasses and olive oil back in the locked cabinet.
"Joe, you need to chill," I said. "I am the master. All is going according to plan."
"Plan schman," said Joe. "You're making this up as you go along."
"I find your lack of faith disturbing, young one." I gave Joe a wooden spoon. "Here, hover over those noodles and stir them occasionally." George was back, prancing about, eyeing the salt. Every now and then he'd do a little spin, which to him meant he was being sneaky. Meanwhile, I took a spatula and cut up the sausage, which was now boiling in olive oil and molasses. Halved it, quartered it, eighthed it, minced it further.
I fetched a teaspoon and gave it to George. Then I went to the fruit corner, fished through it, and pulled out a clove of garlic. George used the teaspoon to get all the tomato paste out of its can and dump it on top of the sausage and oil and molasses. George put down the tomato paste can, which Will promptly grabbed and rinsed. "Wait Will," I said. I took the can, filled it with water, dumped it on the sausage, then gave it back to Will. Will went outside to throw it in the garbage.
"Joe," I said, "now you have to sometimes stir the sauce too." I proceeded to chop up the garlic. Joe stirred the sauce. George dumped about a tablespoon of salt in the noodles again.
"George!" yelled Joe. "Mom, there's no way you could have planned any of this madness."
I ignored him and started whistling "The Bridge over the River Kwai". I opened the locked cabinet again, pulling out the Italian seasoning. I sprinkled some on the sauce. George looked on. Will was back. I gave Will the Italian seasoning, which he put back in the cabinet. I stirred the salty noodles some.
"Joe," I said, "here go back to the noodles. Press them against the side of the pan every now and then, see if they squish, yeah? When they look like they squish as much as you'd like them to when you want to eat them, they're ready." I scraped the minced garlic into the frying pan.
George edged in, dumping a couple glugs of soy sauce into the frying pan too. "George!" yelled Joe, shooing him out of the kitchen.
Will took advantage of unsupervised pot and dumped the noodles in the strainer again. I refilled the pot with hot water from the tap and put the noodles back in, on the burner again, added a generous sprinkling of hot pepper flakes to the sauce, then went back to the fridge.
"General Chou's noodles," I said. "Chinese, just like I promised."
"You said Italian," said Joe.
"Joe, Chinese and Italian sound nothing at all alike. Are you sure your hearing is OK?
"Ma"
"I should schedule an audiologist appointment for you." I pulled out some celery stalks and started cutting them up roughly.
"General Chou's noodles," groused Joe. "There is no such thing. You're making this up."
More Bridge Over River Kwai. I brushed in the celery and went to the pantry for some cashews. "How are those noodles doing?" I asked.
Joe checked. "Not really close, the new water's not boiling." George had found an apple cider vinegar in the still-open cabinet and dumped the rest of a bottle in the sauce pan. Will took the empty vinegar bottle and ran out to put it in the recycling.
I stirred the sauce. Olive oil, molasses, Italian sausage, garlic, Italian seasoning, tomato paste, water, soy sauce, and a lot of vinegar. It certainly had a strong smell. George hovered.
"And this is all going according to plan," said Joe.
"Oh yes," I said. Will was back. "Joe, I need you to stir this sauce for a minute."
Joe stirred the sauce. Will grabbed the pot and dumped the water and noodles through the strainer. George grabbed the noodles in the strainer, edged in on Joe, and dumped them in the sauce.
I turned off both burners. "Will," I said, "this all needs to be dumped in the compost. We're ordering pizza tonight for dinner." Will dumped it all in a recycling bag and ran out of the house to make it All Gone.
"Ordering out pizza was my plan all along," I said to Joe. "Italian. Just like I promised."
This was in response to a prompt on reddit.com r/WritingPrompts, "What do you mean 'All according to plan'?! There's no way you could've planned any of this madness!"