The heat in Piedmont, Alabama, that November was a blasphemy. It clung to the skin like a wet plastic shower curtain, and the air, thick with the scent of decaying magnolia leaves and simmering resentment, made every breath a chore. Still, the ovens across town glowed. Thanksgiving was coming, and in Piedmont, that meant one thing: beating Bertha Mae Pettigrew.

Bertha Mae’s roast turkey was not merely food; it was a transfiguration. The skin wasn’t just golden, it was a vitrine of crispness, shimmering with a patina of herbs and something unnameable. The meat, white and dark, fell from the bone with a sigh, yet was impossibly moist. It tasted of smoke and memory and a profound, savory depth that made Baptist deacons weep. For years, the ladies of the Piedmont Altar Guild had tried to bribe, cajole, or steal the recipe. Bertha Mae just smiled, a little slit of a smile, and said, “A little of this, a little of that. It’s all in the wrist.”

The truth was, the recipe was in the back page of a water-stained, leather-bound journal titled Domestic Compendium & Sundries that had belonged to Bertha Mae’s great-grandmother, Cora. The final instruction, written in a frantic, spidery hand, was always followed by Bertha Mae to the letter: “And for the final baste, a teaspoon of the attendant’s sorrow, wept directly into the pan.”

Bertha Mae had no sorrow of her own. She was a dry, bitter woman, her heart a little stone in her chest. So, she harvested it.

This year, her attendant was young Myrtie McCarley, new to town and married to Bertha Mae’s shiftless nephew, Ray. Myrtie had the wide, doleful eyes of a kicked hound and a spirit that was rapidly being crushed by Ray’s drinking and general worthlessness. She was perfect.

“Now, child, you’ll peel the Brussels sprouts,” Bertha Mae commanded the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, her voice like the rustle of a snake in dry grass. “And while you do, you’ll think on how Ray forgot your birthday last week.”

Myrtie, already sweating in the oppressive kitchen, flinched. “Aunt Bertha Mae, I don’t much like to dwell—”

“Dwell,” Bertha Mae cut her off, pointing a bony finger toward the stalk of sprouts. “Dwell on the empty chair at supper. Dwell on the sound of his truck pulling away after a fight. It’s good for the soul. Cleans the pipes.”

As Myrtie peeled, her shoulders slumped. Bertha Mae watched, hawk-like, as a single, glistening tear escaped Myrtie’s eye and traced a path through the flour dust on her cheek. Not yet.

The next day, Thanksgiving morning, the real work began. The bird, a colossal heritage turkey, was prepared with a butter that Bertha Mae had infused with thyme from a patch adjacent to an ancient grave, and a dusting of paprika the color of old blood. The kitchen was a temple of aroma—onion, celery, sage—but underneath it all there was a colder scent, like turned earth after a rain.

“Now for the final baste,” Bertha Mae announced, her eyes gleaming. She shoved a paring knife and a mountain of onions toward Myrtie. “Chop these. Fine. And while you do, I want you to think about the baby.”

Myrtie froze, the color draining from her face. “How did you… We haven’t told anyone. We lost it just last month.”

Bertha Mae’s smile was a grim, knowing thing. “A woman knows. Now, think on it. Think on the little booties you’d knitted. The silence in the nursery.”

The tears came then, not delicate but great, heaving sobs. They dripped from Myrtie’s chin onto the cutting board, mingling with the pungent onion juice. Bertha Mae, with the efficiency of a surgeon, used a clean spoon to collect the salty, sorrowful brine from the board. She carried it to the roasting pan, where the turkey sizzled and popped, and with a murmured incantation that sounded like a rusty screen door swinging shut, she drizzled the tears over the glorious, crackling skin.

The pan hissed, and for a moment, the steam that rose smelled not of turkey, but of damp violets and heartbreak.

That afternoon, the Pettigrew table groaned. The turkey was borne in on a great platter, and a collective, reverent gasp filled the room. It was, everyone agreed, Bertha Mae’s masterpiece. The flavor was so profound, so layered with an almost painful nostalgia, that Uncle Jasper was heard to murmur, “Tastes like… like rememberin’ when your first dog died.” He then took another huge forkful.

Bertha Mae held court, her slit of a smile wider than ever. Myrtie, red-eyed and hollow, pushed a piece around her plate. It tasted to her of salt and loss.

It was Cousin Beatrice who fell first. She was mid-sentence, praising the savory notes in the dark meat, when she clutched her chest, gave a small, surprised “oh,” and slid from her chair onto the worn linoleum rug. A moment later, Old Mr. Hogue, who had survived two wars and one divorce, simply lay his head on his plate, a beatific smile on his face, nestled in a pool of giblet gravy.

A quiet panic ensued. Dr. Hamilton, his mouth still full, pronounced them both victims of “acute gustatory euphoria.” However, as the afternoon wore on, a pattern began to emerge. The ones who had devoured the turkey, who had been transported by its sublime flavor, were the ones who grew pale, sighed contentedly, and expired. Those, like Myrtie, who had only picked at it or who had taken only white meat, survived.

The sheriff, a slow-moving man named Dooley, arrived and looked from the two corpses to the magnificent, half-eaten bird.

“Bertha Mae,” he drawled, wiping a bit of gravy from his lip with a nervous tremor. “This here turkey… It’s mighty good.”

“It’s my own secret recipe,” Bertha Mae said, her chin high. She wasn’t sad. She wasn’t scared. She was, for the first time, truly satisfied. The recipe had promised a turkey to die for. Cora’s journal had been literal.

They never charged her. How could you prosecute a woman for a turkey so good it stopped a heart? The deaths were ruled a tragic, bizarre coincidence.

The following year, no one came to Bertha Mae’s Thanksgiving. The house sat dark, the oven cold. She sat in her parlor, the “Domestic Compendium” open on her lap. She was alone. Truly alone. And for the first time in her life, a profound, aching sorrow welled up inside her, a bitter tonic of isolation and regret.

She looked at the empty kitchen, then down at the recipe. A single, hot tear of her own splashed onto the page, blurring the ink.

“A teaspoon of the attendant’s sorrow,” she whispered to the silence.

And for a fleeting, terrifying moment, Bertha Mae Pettigrew was struck with a truly magnificent idea for next year’s turkey.

*****

And, you know there ain’t no way I’m gonna neglect the obligatory shameless self-promotion. New Yesterdays, a very nice stocking stuffer, is available through the following links: Books-A-Million, Barnes & Noble, and Amazon as well as your favorite bookshops. The Audiobook is available from Libro.fm, as well as Amazon.