I don't know why I call her "Muffin". She doesn't resemble one except that she is plump and she fits her dresses, or rather her dresses fit her, as snugly as a muffin in its paper cup. It may be because she is soft, tender and comforting like a breakfast of a fat, golden-crusted corn muffin next to a cup of steaming coffee on a dismal Sunday morning. It could also be that the sensation of peeling the corrugated wax paper off the muffin and hungrily sinking my teeth into its moist pith is perhaps like undressing my own Muffin on a bitterly cold winter night and snuggling into the warmth of her delicious ample bosom. Call me what you will: carnal, hedonist, epicure. I am all that, and as a result, my Muffin has me wrapped around her little finger because she is a matchless cook and a lover who holds her own.

I fell for her over two years ago. We met when I was possessed by a fickle demon that had me hoping from bed to bed, quickly finding fault with every partner that came along. Muffin would have been one of a bunch of women with whom I had whirled briefly in the frenzied dance of infatuation until the blaze turned to ash. She would have been just a recollection fading into the misty horizon of my past; an instance of feminine form, texture and character in the growing repertory of my encounters with the fair sex, had it not been for her culinary might.

Three months into our romance, when the demon in me awoke once again baring its fangs and I began squirting at her the repelling spoor of out-and-out meanness, Muffin unveiled her own weapon, more potent than a legion of fastidious demons: she assumed absolute control of my kitchen. Armed with a pile of cookbooks, a cabinet packed with exotic spices and a full measure of unflinching tenacity, she transformed my kitchen into a conveyer belt of out-of-this-world dishes whose mouthwatering redolence pervaded the hallways and caused my less fortunate neighbors to steal envious glances in the direction of my home.
Muffin has always known about my weakness. Try as hard as I did, I haven't been able to hide from her my deep attachment to the delights of hearty food. She has witnessed how a short spell of hunger robbed me of a good portion of my sanity and turned me into an unsmiling, foul-tempered swine ready to kill for a bowl of soup. She has been with me at many such moments of crises and watched me sitting over a plate of one of my favorite dishes, such as lamb stew, and observed how I trembled greedily like a ravenous calf thrusting its muzzle to its mother's udder; she has seen me scooping up chunks of lamb with a flimsy piece of injera and shoveling it into my mouth, chewing it with lustful fervor like one sucking the sap of a life-saving fruit, and swallowing it to the spasmodic twitch of my Adam's apple. Horrified, astonished, amused, she has seen me communing in munching silence with the intensely sensual pleasure of lamb stew juice tingling my taste buds; she has seen the serenity of relief returning to my eyes as partially chewed gristle hurtled down a chute of cartilage into the sac of my stomach. She has noticed how every mouthful chipped away at the dark cloud of bitterness and hostility that hunger had cast over me; how satiety banished the rapacious monster and a gentler, kinder side of me came shining through. It must have been at one such moment that she realized I would always be hers as long as she cared to keep me around. Seeing me shamelessly baring my soul of a glutton before her, she resolved to bide her time and to spring a foolproof trap at me if and when I get it into my head to wriggle out of her clutches.

Now the table is turned, and she is the one that holds the strings. Don't get me wrong. She loves me; I know that. She wouldn't have bothered to tame me by bartering her culinary gifts for love and to hold me by the scruff of my gourmand's neck. I love her too, although I was not aware of it till she anointed herself as the undisputed queen of my kitchen. In the process of holding me captive by tending to my dietary needs, she has mastered the art of cookery so marvelously that I have lately begun to suspect she might even have figured out ways to manipulate my behavior with the magical craft of her cuisine. When I grow lethargic, she injects energy into my limbs through what I ingest into my belly. When she feels the need for excessive attention, she knows what spices to throw in the stews to fill my head with thoughts of her. When I smother her with copious affection and she longs for a breathing space, she garnishes the steak with the relish of indifference. I believe she knows what herbs to infuse in my tea to bind me in apathetic torpor when her carnal appetite is at its lowest. When she senses the rudiments of rebellion feebly simmering in my chest, she peppers my salad with the condiments of submissiveness and turns me into a spineless lambkin weakly whimpering at her feet. When my diet abounds in zesty lentil paste sprinkled with pieces of spiced sausage, I brace myself up for nights of erotic storm.

They say the way to a man's heart is through his stomach. To Muffin, my stomach has surrendered the keys not only to my heart, but also to my mind, my soul and my will, for she had discovered early on that one who chooses "Muffin" out of all endearments for the woman he loves, is an incurable hod amlaku.