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Taste of Memory (17) : A small pop-up food stall has appeared among the usual winter vendors. The menu offers simple, traditional dishes that seem to rotate daily. They're not always common dishes either--sometimes they're incredibly niche, and smell unmistakably like home--no matter where “home” is for you. The moment you take a bite, warmth floods through you, followed by an overwhelming wave of nostalgia so vivid it’s almost disorienting. For some, it’s the comfort of a childhood meal; for others, it’s the precise memory of sitting in a familiar kitchen, the echo of a loved one’s voice, or the feeling of being safe and held. The sensation is powerful but harmless, fading after a little while and leaving only a lingering warmth.
Ria needed to get to Michael's this time. Sure, anything she crafted would no longer be between bouts of studying for final exams--those had ended this week. But it would instead be between shifts at work necessary for being able to afford off campus housing for the duration of college. Sure, some of her classmates were going home for the holidays, but not Ria. Ria had gotten a full ride to DCU, and had managed to get housing, and needed to be careful to not burn through the requisite living expenses by way of expensive airfare tickets. Besides, she'd have to take connecting flights to Sacramento, unless she felt like flying in through San Francisco, or Los Angeles, or something. None of those options seemed appealing.
So, here she was, on the wrong side of the continent, alone for the holidays, working hard, and trying to not burn through her surprise bonus from work in one sitting. Fortunately, none of the things she wanted to buy were going to cost very much, in the grand scheme of things. She'd managed to get her hands on sand and paper bags for the farolitos while getting groceries (mostly packets of various dried goods, augmented with packets of frozen veggies, a few sacks of dried beans, and a sack of fresh fruit), but the candles had, thus far, eluded her.
At least this time, she had a few hours to get in the doors this time, in case a monster--a youma--whatever it was, something like that thing from the other night showed up again.
As she cut across a busy plaza that was filled with an impromptu Christmas market she'd passed seemingly a dozen times this December, her nose was assaulted by achingly familiar smells.
Anise intertwined with cinnamon sugar. Masa mixed with chile powder, combined with pulled pork roasted in a red chile pepper sauce.
The cinnamon sugar was common enough at Christmas, but anise was not. Pulled pork in a spicy sauce could come at any time of year in a city as big as Destiny City, but with a spicy masa...that wasn't the norm.
Ria's mouth watered.
She found her feet following the alluring scents to a small pop-up stall, with a sign-board that read "NEW MENU DAILY!" Beneath it was printer paper taped to the pole of the food vendor, showing images of tamales and bizcochitos.
