Meatballs in Private

Flash Fiction

Jade and I discussed meatballs Saturday afternoon. I heard someone talking about Chef Boyardee in the grocery store that morning, and it occurred to me that spaghetti and meatballs would be the perfect dinner for us that night. I bought all the supplies, intending to surprise her.

“I’ve got a surprise, sweetums!” I said around 3:30. “I’m making spaghetti and meatballs tonight!”

“That sounds great!” She liked the idea, as I expected she would.

Later, while I was cooking, Jade sat down at the kitchen table. Our meatball conversation began in earnest.

“I really like your meatballs, Raymond,” she said seductively. “When will they be ready?”

“Oh, they’re always ready,” I replied, welcoming the suggestive tone she was taking.

We said a few more things about meat and balls that are not relevant to the point of this story, other than to say we wouldn’t have said them if we thought someone was listening.

Then, because we are in our mid-50s and not our 20s or 30s, we left the witty repartee behind. The conversation turned toward the methodology of the meatball cooking process. We talked about meatballs for a couple more minutes, then she decided to go upstairs and fold laundry.

This story ends with a delicious meal, right?

Not so fast.

About two hours after dinner, all manner of meatball-related stories began appearing on my phone’s Google app. Meatball recipes. Reviews of the old Bill Murray movie, “Meatballs.” Criticisms of Kansas City Royals’ skipper Mike Matheny’s managerial style when he piloted the St. Louis Cardinals.

I had not looked up meatballs for even a single search before I began cooking — no need to. I learned how to cook meatballs from an Italian chef who used to frequent one of the same San Francisco bars I did back in the early 1990s. His name, of course, was Tony. Tony knew meatballs. One Sunday, when the 49ers were losing so badly that watching the game at Gagliano’s was like watching a prolonged tooth extraction, Tony filled me in on the intricacies of cooking meatballs. He really laid it all out for me. I learned everything I ever needed to know about cooking meatballs from Tony.

So why, after eavesdropping on a conversation I had with my wife, did my cellphone want to steer me toward more meatball content than I could ever digest? Does it not know how much Tony taught me about meatballs? Does it not know it could never surpass Tony in meatball wisdom? Does it not know I still have handwritten notes with Tony’s meatball tips packed away somewhere deep within a box in the garage?

If it does know, it clearly does not care one iota about any of this.

“Jade,” I asked that night as we were getting ready for bed, “did you use my phone to research meatballs?”

“Why would I do that? You’re the meatball expert in this house.”

I told her about my phone’s Google feed.

“OMG! Something like that happened to Sally!” Sally was a friend of hers from college. She lived on the East Coast, but they talked on the phone at least a couple of times a month.

Sally had been to a garden party with Neil Diamond playing on the outdoor speakers. Some of the party guests started talking about how much they liked “The Jazz Singer.” Later that night, when Sally was back in her living room, she saw a story about Neil Diamond’s musical legacy at the top of her phone’s Google feed. Sally had not entered the venerable singer’s name into her phone as a search term, but she had left her phone on a folding table after texting someone. She also told Jade that she was humming Neil Diamond melodies — and maybe singing some of the words to “America” — on her drive home.

“She said it really freaked her out.” I told Jade I was kind of freaked out, too.

“Yeah, it’s pretty freaky,” she said. “Anyway, honey, those meatballs tonight were some of your best ever.”

“They were pretty good if I do say so myself. But you know, I kind of miss the days when we could enjoy our meatballs in private.”

She sighed sympathetically and gave me a soft love-punch in the bicep. “I know. I miss a lot of things, Raymond.”

We turned out the lights and went to bed. A few minutes later, she nudged me.

“Where’s your phone?”

“Over on the dresser.”

“Yeah, mine too.” She got out of bed, turned on the light, and picked up the two phones before going into the bathroom. She closed the bathroom door behind her and emerged wearing a satisfied look on her face.

“Just so you know, our phones are folded up inside the blue hand towel to the right of the sink.”

“Good thinking,” I said. “I guess we need to start taking more precautions when the phones are nearby.”

“Or never talk about anything more controversial than meatballs and Neil Diamond,” she giggled.

She turned off the light and got back into bed. We said our goodnights again and settled into our favorite sleeping positions, thinking ourselves smart for outsmarting the smartphones.

The light had been off for about five minutes when she nudged me again.

“Are you awake, Raymond?”

“Yup.”

“I think we should get rid of Alexa.”

“Good thinking,” I said. “We don’t really use it much, anyway.”

“No,” she said. “Not too much.”

After a short pause, she added another observation, one that made falling asleep more difficult than I thought it was going to be when all we were talking about were meatballs and a popular singer/songwriter from yesteryear.

“Actually,” she said, both wearily and warily, “it’s more like Alexa uses us.”