Everything and everything beyond

Adriene papered the kitchen surface with recipe print-outs. She placed the bowl in the middle and ran her hands along its rim, just the once, just to feel satisfied. In the bowl, she put:

- sixteen eggs;
- a yard of flour;
- a jumbo bag of Maltesers;
- mascarpone to season;
- Jeremy Handley’s Guide to Modern Sermons;
- most of her string.
- bacon;

It was too much. The plastic bowl melted on the hob. A brown mess bubbled onto her floor and into electrical sockets. A fire reduced the house to a stinking pile of ash. Into the ash, she put:

- her neighbour's house;
- a secondary school;
- 14 lengths of railway line;
- a local petition;
- children's football kit;
- four books from the A-B section of her library;
- the A47;
- spit.

It was too much. The weight of the rubble knocked the earth out of its orbit. A church full of people in Milan felt a giddy stomach lift as the planet lurched beyond the moon. The earth vanished into a black hole at end of the universe.. Into the universe, she put:

- everything;
- and everything beyond.

Adriene held the entirety of existence in her hands, held it against her beating heart. She enjoyed the dual streams of darkness and light flowing through her bones. Tomorrow, she would make pasta.

(Text updated: August 2012)