Throwback Thursday: ‘Doughboy Lovers and the Appetites of Desire’ by Karlo Yeager

I’m baking myself a boyfriend, kneading him out with my hands, my elbows, my shoulders. I sprinkle flour over his shape: the knot-ted challah of his arms, the pretzel roll of his molded hairline, his back freckled like olive loaf, his pasty legs and the curl of dough resting across his belly. I grunt as I bend over him, bring him into shape, into life.

Love takes work, it takes sweat.

My sweat drips from my brow, onto the dough.

His lips will taste like tears.

Sure, I’ve seen the pre-made and store-bought doughboys: only 30 minutes in the microwave, but they never come out right. The store-bought stuff ends over- or under-cooked in spots, and I want him to be complete all through.

This is the first doughboy I’m making from scratch, an old recipe my grandmother received from her mother: a legacy, an heirloom. She joked the recipe was handed down from mother to daughter since wheat was first ground into flour.

Grandma told me she’d made a doughboy to keep her company when Grandpa was away on business. I remember postcards on the refrigerator: St. Louis, Jacksonville, and San Diego. My first recollection of Grandpa was the perfume of baking bread — perhaps my memories are getting confused, and it’s Grandma’s doughboy I’m remembering.

Career, going back to school, friends all are a blur. Dating a series of ritualized coin tosses, each bet placed giving a diminishing return as I got older. Why settle for someone who would only intersect with my life at bedtime and at meals?

He will be my own protector, my partner, and support me in all things. My smile widens into a low laugh as the ache in my shoulders speaks of the work I am doing. He is almost done, and sweat pours off my brow, seasoning the dough. The oven is ready, as hot as it needs to be to help him rise and be golden.