Melt butter, sugar, and honey on a low fire.
The oldest among them, Ryta lit the match. In a blink, gas swallowed the heat and burped out a blue holo around the burner. A piece of butter in the pan began to soften. A clump of honey, however, didn’t rush to lose shape. Golden and sugary from the months of leisure in a jar, it grabbed onto the wooden spoon, and Niusia had no choice but to push it with her finger into the butter. The very next moment, her finger slid across her tongue, reporting on completing the task. “If only Ma saw it!” Ryta exclaimed, pushing her sou chef away from the stove with her hip. “So what?” the latter laughed. “She would do the same, wouldn’t she?”
From the sofa in the kitchen corner, Toma watched her elder sisters playing around the stove. In the dim light of a single light bulb, the scene resembled an old-day TV show. Toma’s thoughts, though, were away from the spectacle. She kept flipping through the culinary notebook on her lap. Its cover—stale like an old baguette—crumbled under her fingertips. Curly letters on faded paper blurred here and there from years of marinating in the stuffiness of the kitchen.
Wait until the sweet chrystals on the pan sides dissolve and add one teaspoon of soda.
Aware of what was coming, Ryta grabbed a scapula and nodded to Niusia to add the key ingredient. The audience held their breath. In a moment, honey, butter, and sugar all foamed and hissed against the sour flavor stepping in between them. The storm waves were about to break out of the pot, and Ryta skillfully moved her hand across the mixture to calm it down. Finally, the storm subsided and the foam settled, leaving behind a dark golden treacle.
The fragrance of honey and butter—like freshness after the rain—evoked nostalgia. As if together with sweetness, one could breathe in a glimpse of the past. Somewhere in this flavor hid the images of this kitchen long before the cobwebs covered the cupboards. Yet, every time Toma tried to draw out a specific memory, it slipped away, overcome by present with its persistent smell of chlorine. After all, the whole morning of cleaning couldn’t have gone unnoticed. Its positive effects pleased Toma’s eye. A small window next to the oven was so polished now that the sunlight could finally break through. The cooking table in front of the sofa was clean and ready to welcome new owners. All pots and pans lined up on the hooks along the walls. But this long-awaited, much-needed cleaning also revealed an emptiness Toma didn’t know how to fill.
“What’s next?” Ryta turned to her youngest sister and caught a puzzled look on her face. “Darling,” she went on, “forgive me, but you are not helpful at all!” The emptiness was instantly filled with a sense of guilt. Toma shook her head as if to brush a fly off and read the instructions from the notebook to the chefs.
Take the mixture off the stove. Add eggs one at a time, stirring them well into the base.
The action moved to the cooking table, and now, from her spot on the sofa, Toma could see the golden viscous molasses evolving into the honey dough under her sisters’ lead. Crack. Niusia broke an eggshell against the knife. Plop. Yolk joined the base. Whisp. Ryta stirred the mixture gently but fast enough for an egg not to curl up. While the scapula in Ryta’s hand traced circles within the pan, Niusia sifted flour on top of the substance. “Like snow,” Toma thought. Her fingers relaxed on the notebook, no longer pressing into the pages. Shortly, Ryta put the scapula away to knead the dough with her hand. Soft and elastic, it followed her lead, curling up and rolling out, gaining its shape and losing it again. Ryta’s hips swayed from side to side, wide and bounteous like a full moon, commanding the rivers to flow and the oceans to freeze.
Knead the dough until you feel it’s ready.
Niusia snorted. “What does it mean—ready? Is it two minutes or half an hour?” Toma giggled. “It’s not funny! Ma would never give us an adequate answer!” Indeed, their mom always said the dough needed enough time to mature. Be patient, she would insist. The dough has memory. Your task is to fill it with warmth and love. Toma looked around the kitchen again. This time, though, instead of a shiny window or a polished floor, her glance was caught by notes written in marker on a kitchen drawer. The notes she couldn’t make herself erase. Birthdays, anniversaries, phone numbers. This kitchen had memory, too. It had seen so much warmth and love. But how could one tell if that was enough?
“Do you want to roll it out?” Ryta pulled her youngest sister out of her thoughts again. Not waiting for a response, Niusia tied an apron around Toma’s waist and gently pushed her toward the wooden board on the table. “Ma always boasted you roll the layers so thin one could see the light coming through. Now is your time to prove that!” Powdered with flour, Toma’s palms laid over the golden dough. It was incredibly soft and warm, like a living creature speaking to her through its touch, telling her of the sweet taste of honey and the oily texture of butter. The dough has memory. What could she fill it with? Toma moved her hands across the board, rolling layer by layer, recalling the moments she had spent in this kitchen, like tasting the cream from the bowl while her mom was baking a birthday cake, like writing her college phone number in marker on the drawer, like hanging the photos of her children on the wall next to those of her sisters’. Give it your warmth and love, she heard echoing in her head.
Once the layers are rolled out, bake each of them until the soft crust forms.
It was time to put their cake together. Responsible for the filling, Niusia mixed sour cream, sugar powder, and a touch of lemon zest in a bowl. Surely, she didn’t miss a chance to taste it, but this time, neither did her sisters. One spoon into the cake, one—into the mouth. One by one, Ryta, Niusia, and Toma spread the crispy layers of dough with the filling. The golden crumbles were now all over the table, but it no longer bothered any of them. Once the 12th layer of the browned honey dough covered the white cream, the cake was finished. The sisters’ sand castle towered over the coastline, filled with the strongest feelings and sweetest memories.
Don’t eat yet! Give the cake a few hours to absorb the moisture.
That day, after cleaning the kitchen (again!), the sisters prepared the rest of the house to welcome its new owners. Embroidered curtains—ironed. Carpets—shaken. Multiple photo albums—carefully packed into the boxes. Barely moving their feet, Ryta, Niusia, and Toma fell onto the bench by the tea table in the garden. Under one of the many apple trees, they listened to the leaves whispering in rhythm with the spring breeze. No one dared to break the silence, as if hoping to hear someone in it. On top of a white tablecloth with dark red poppies stood four equal pieces of their favorite honey cake.
Writer | Kateryna Havryshchuk ’26 | khavryshchuk26@amherst.edu
Editor | Claire Macero ’25 | cmacero25@amherst.edu