I ate my breakfast in bed this morning and let my tea go cold on the stand. I take my tea with milk and no sugar. I frequently forget about it. I hate it when tea has that slightly scummy film on top and when it stains the rim of my mug. My favourite mug says ‘Famous Slugs of History’ on it. An old kitchen of mine used to get slugs crawling all over the tiles in the morning. This kitchen has terracotta tiles and the table is usually sticky. This morning, I sit on the table whilst the kettle boils and read an article about the copyright protection over Albert Einstein’s face. That picture of his tongue slithering all the way down his chin. I think about little pink tongues sliming all over the floor. Out of the cupboard comes a pink mug that says ‘QUEEN OF AWESOMENESS’ on it. At the bottom of the mug in a little yellow star it says ‘YEAH!’ and the idea is that you see this little affirmation only once you finish your tea. It’s a shit mug but I am attached to it. I heat up an apricot and marzipan pastry and return to the article for a few seconds. Kettle pings. I pour boiling water over the teabag and press with a silver teaspoon into the side of the mug. Fill with too much milk, bob the teabag around a bit and put it in the food bin. I get bored with the article and put the warm pastry on an orange plastic flower-shaped child’s plate. These plates are nearly as old as I am – if one day they were missing from the cupboard I would have to change my entire culinary routine. I take the tea and the pastry back to bed and eat the pastry next to the cat. I finish my book. I lick bits of apricot from my fingers. I think of one summer in London that I had friends visiting, we travelled up to the Wholefoods in Piccadilly Circus and ate apricot pastries in the sun, whilst I bled into my jeans.
Sophie Paul (she/her, b. 1998) is a designer and writer based across London and Oxfordshire. Her work intersects critical theory, trashiness, and eroticisms.
Alongside Kaiya Waerea, she is one half of Sticky Fingers Publishing, an intra-dependant feminist publisher based in London.