Chicken and Broccoli

She said it sounded good, nice and healthy. I said it was just chicken and broccoli, broccoli and chicken like it always is. And she said she liked chicken and broccoli or broccoli and chicken, whatever order I was eating it in. And I said, yes, but I have it all the time, and she said that doesn't mean it's not healthy and delicious. Do I doctor it up, she asked me. Yes, I said, always with salt and pepper, sometimes cayenne, sometimes too much cayenne. Or maybe some rosemary or paprika if I find a container in the back somewhere. Usually it's just salt and pepper, that's usually all you need, and sometimes too much cayenne. She said, well, why don't you put on less cayenne, then it wouldn't be too much. And I said we're way beyond that now, that that's a point that's far behind us, that if we're going to put on cayenne it's going to be too much and that's just the way of things. She said, OK, that seemed a little strange but fine I guess, and was there water, did we have water to go around. I said I wait for water. I leave it for the end. I don't use it as a palette cleanser, I don't use it to wash my chicken down, I don't use it to curb the violent spice. But if I don't have water at some point the meal feels incomplete. And I'll admit, I like the way it rushes down and cools me off. I like the hot and the cold, the rising and falling, the stakes. The cayenne makes me feel full and the water makes me feel complete and day after day I can almost forget I'm eating the same thing.