Aunt Martha’s Cheese
No one really remembers where Aunt Martha—Mum’s friend—came from. To me, she just always existed, like bad weather, garden gnomes, and Cliff Richard. Dad was convinced she was some kind of government plant, slipped into normal life to test human endurance. Grandad swore she was the fifth horseman of the Apocalypse, kicked out for being too much. Even Mum couldn’t quite explain how they knew each other. Aunt Martha was like that mystery key on your keyring—no idea what it’s for, but you’d never dare throw it away.
Aunt Martha had no husband, no kids, but she had *time*. Women like that are more dangerous than a flu epidemic. Drop her in the ocean, and she’d have the fish organising a book club before you could blink.
Business-wise, Aunt Martha had a gift—if ‘gift’ meant stubbornly ignoring the word ‘no’. Every year, she’d rope us into her latest ‘project’, and there was no escaping, not even abroad. She had a passport, visas, spoke three languages, but could not grasp the concept of ‘not interested’.
First, it was Cuban skincare that left Mum with a silky moustache and an addiction. Then, it was knitted underwear from ‘luxury merino’—Dad’s life sentence. She promised him ‘renewed vigour’ and demanded feedback. Dad gave it after three days. Rumor has it, Tom Jones phoned him for tips.
Grandad suffered too. Aunt Martha sold him ‘detox supplements’—his digestive system turned into a national weather event. The BBC once filmed him ‘for atmospheric disturbance research’.
She had *ideas*: handmade soap with nettle extract, sweets made of coriander and thistles, eel-skin wallets. She’d talk until you regressed to crawling just to escape. When faith, science, and dignity failed, she’d offer a ‘family discount’. And you’d cave. We got ‘free samples’—lucky us.
Then, last month, Aunt Martha started making homemade cheese. Every batch arrived in a new state of chaos. The smell? Imagine a fog of regret. Our flat’s unsellable now—maybe the whole street. Only Grandad was thrilled; no more laundry duty, just praise for his ‘strong principles’.
The cheese was… special. It broke graters, killed microwaves, vanished in ovens. We swore it attacked other fridge items, turning them into cheese-zombies.
Once, I tried it with pasta and ketchup. The result got us banned from international travel for seven years.
Mum begged patience. Aunt Martha swore the next batch would ‘blow our minds’. Grandad carried a hammer for a week, vowing to cut us out of his will if cheese touched his plate. Dad? Poor bloke loved Mum too much—trapped.
And me? Aunt Martha said kids nowadays ‘run on fizzy drinks and crisp packets’, so her cheese was basically health food. When Grandad’s Geiger counter spiked, she scoffed, ‘That thing’s dramatic.’
But then—the twist. The cheese wasn’t awful. We necked antacids first, fortified the bathrooms, braced for impact. But the taste? Shockingly smooth, creamy, with a hint of spice, a nutty finish. Mum made sandwiches, Dad tossed it in salad, even Grandad sniffed his way to the kitchen for seconds.
Aunt Martha had won. For once, her madness worked. Though she *did* confess to Mum: she didn’t make the cheese. Her new husband did—a chef she nearly killed on their first date with ‘cheese fondue’. He spent three days on a drip, woke up enlightened, married her out of duty to humanity. Now, whenever she gets ‘ideas’, he quietly does it properly and lets her take credit.
So now, we root for their marriage. The planet depends on it.
