Meet the uncompromising, unconventional Elizabeth Zott, heroine of the new and most exciting debut of 2022.
CHAPTER 1
November 1961
“Back in 1961, when women wore shirtwaist dresses and joined
garden clubs and drove legions of children around in seatbelt-less
cars without giving it a second thought; back before anyone
knew there’d even be a sixties movement, much less one that its
participants would spend the next sixty years chronicling; back
when the big wars were over and the secret wars had just begun
and people were starting to think fresh and believe everything
was possible, the thirty-year-old mother of Madeline Zott rose
before dawn every morning and felt certain of just one thing: her
life was over.
Despite that certainty, she made her way to the lab to pack her
daughter’s lunch.
Fuel for learning, Elizabeth Zott wrote on a small slip of paper
before tucking it into her daughter’s lunch box. Then she paused,
her pencil in midair, as if reconsidering. Play sports at recess but do
not automatically let the boys win, she wrote on another slip. Then
she paused again, tapping her pencil against the table. It is not your
imagination, she wrote on a third. Most people are awful. She placed
the last two on top.
Most young children can’t read, and if they can, it’s mostly
words like “dog” and “go.” But Madeline had been reading since
age three and, now, at age five, was already through most of
Dickens.
Madeline was that kind of child—the kind who could hum a
Bach concerto but couldn’t tie her own shoes; who could explain
the earth’s rotation but stumbled at tic-tac-toe. And that was the
problem. Because while musical prodigies are always celebrated,
early readers aren’t. And that’s because early readers are only good
at something others will eventually be good at, too. So being first
isn’t special—it’s just annoying.
Madeline understood this. That’s why she made it a point
each morning— after her mother had left and while her babysitter
neighbor, Harriet, was busy—to extract the notes from the
lunch box, read them, then store them with all the other notes
that she kept in a shoebox in the back of her closet. Once at school
she pretended to be like all the other kids: basically illiterate. To
Madeline, fitting in mattered more than anything. And her proof
was irrefutable: her mother had never fi t in and look what happened
to her.
It was there, in the Southern Californian town of Commons,
where the weather was mostly warm, but not too warm, and
the sky was mostly blue, but not too blue, and the air was clean
because air just was back then, that she lay in her bed, eyes closed,
and waited. Soon she knew there’d be a gentle kiss on her forehead,
a careful tuck of covers about her shoulders, a murmuring
of “Seize the day” in her ear. In another minute, she’d hear the
start of a car engine, a crunch of tires as the Plymouth backed
down the drive, a clunky shift from reverse to first. And then her
permanently depressed mother would set off for the television
studio where she would don an apron and walk out onto a set.
The show was called Supper at Six, and Elizabeth Zott was its
indisputable star.
“According to her calculations, Madeline’s daily intake was exactly what her daughter required for optimal development, making weight loss scientifically inconceivable.”
CHAPTER 2
Pine
Once a research chemist, Elizabeth Zott was a woman with flawless
skin and an unmistakable demeanor of someone who was not
average and never would be.
She was, as all good stars are, discovered. Although in Elizabeth’s
case, there was no malt shop, no accidental bench sighting,
no lucky introduction. Instead, it was theft—specifically food
theft—that led to her discovery.
The story was simple: a child named Amanda Pine, who
enjoyed food in a way some therapists consider significant, was
eating Madeline’s lunch. This was because Madeline’s lunch was
not average. While all the other children gummed their peanut
butter and jelly sandwiches, Madeline opened her lunch box to
find a thick slice of leftover lasagna, a side helping of buttery zucchini,
an exotic kiwi cut into quarters, five pearly round cherry
tomatoes, a tiny Morton salt shaker, two still- warm chocolate
chip cookies, and a red plaid thermos full of ice- cold milk.
These contents were why everyone wanted Madeline’s lunch,
Madeline included. But Madeline offered it to Amanda because
friendship requires sacrifice, but also because Amanda was the
only one in the entire school who didn’t make fun of the odd
child Madeline already knew she was.
It wasn’t until Elizabeth noticed that Madeline’s clothes began
to hang on her bony frame like bad drapes that she began to won
der what was going on. According to her calculations, Madeline’s
daily intake was exactly what her daughter required for optimal
development, making weight loss scientifically inconceivable. A
growth spurt, then? No. She’d accounted for growth in her calculations.
Early onset food disorder? Not likely. Madeline ate like
a horse at dinner. Leukemia? Definitely not. Elizabeth wasn’t an
alarmist—she wasn’t the type who lay awake at night imagining
her daughter was plagued by incurable disease. As a scientist, she
always sought a sensible explanation, and the moment she met
Amanda Pine, her little lips stained a pomodoro-sauce red, she
knew she’d found it.
“Mr. Pine,” Elizabeth said, sweeping into the local television studio
and past a secretary on a Wednesday afternoon, “I’ve been calling
you for three days, and not once have you managed the courtesy
of a return call. My name is Elizabeth Zott. I am Madeline Zott’s
mother—our children attend Woody Elementary together—and
I’m here to tell you that your daughter is offering my daughter
friendship under false pretenses.” And because he looked confused,
she added, “Your daughter is eating my daughter’s lunch.”
“L-lunch?” Walter Pine managed, as he took in the woman
who stood resplendent before him, her white lab coat casting an
aura of holy light save for one detail: the initials “E.Z.” emblazoned
in red just above the pocket.
“Your daughter, Amanda,” Elizabeth charged again, “eats my
daughter’s lunch. Apparently, it’s been going on for months.”
Walter could only stare. Tall and angular, with hair the color
of burnt buttered toast pulled back and secured with a pencil, she
stood, hands on hips, her lips unapologetically red, her skin luminous,
her nose straight. She looked down at him like a battlefield
medic assessing whether or not he was worth saving.
“And the fact that she pretends to be Madeline’s friend to get
her lunch,” she continued, “is absolutely reprehensible.”
“Wh- who are you again?” stammered Walter.
“A man can make lunch, Mr. Pine. It is not biologically impossible.”
“Elizabeth Zott!” she barked back. “Madeline Zott’s mother!”
Walter nodded, trying to understand. As a longtime producer
of afternoon television, he knew drama. But this? He continued
to stare. She was stunning. He was literally stunned by her. Was
she auditioning for something?
“I’m sorry,” he finally said. “But all the nurse roles have been
cast.”
“I beg your pardon?” she snapped.
There was a long pause.
“Amanda Pine,” she repeated.
He blinked. “My daughter? Oh,” he said, suddenly nervous.
“What about her? Are you a doctor? Are you from the school?”
He leapt to his feet.
“Good god, no,” Elizabeth replied. “I’m a chemist. I’ve come
all the way over here from Hastings on my lunch hour because
you’ve failed to return my calls.” And when he continued to
look baffled, she clarified. “Hastings Research Institute? Where
Groundbreaking Research Breaks Ground?” She exhaled at the
vacuous tagline. “The point is, I put a great amount of effort into
making a nutritious lunch for Madeline—something that I’m sure
you also strive to do for your child.” And when he continued to
stare at her blankly, she added, “Because you care about Amanda’s
cognitive and physical development. Because you know such
development is reliant on offering the correct balance of vitamins
and minerals.”
“The thing is, Mrs. Pine is—”
“Yes, I know. Missing in action. I tried to contact her but was
told she lives in New York.”
“We’re divorced.”
“Sorry to hear, but divorce has little to do with lunch.”
“It might seem that way, but—”
“A man can make lunch, Mr. Pine. It is not biologically
impossible.”
“Absolutely,” he agreed, fumbling with a chair. “Please, Mrs.
Zott, please sit.”
“I have something in the cyclotron,” she said irritably, glancing
at her watch. “Do we have an understanding or not?”
“Cyclo—”
“Subatomic particle accelerator.”
Elizabeth glanced at the walls. They were filled with framed
posters advertising melodramatic soap operas and gimmicky game
shows.
“My work,” Walter said, suddenly embarrassed by their crassness.
“Maybe you’ve seen one?”
She turned back to face him. “Mr. Pine,” she said in a more
conciliatory manner, “I’m sorry I don’t have the time or resources
to make your daughter lunch. We both know food is the catalyst
that unlocks our brains, binds our families, and determines
our futures. And yet . . .” She trailed off, her eyes growing narrow
as she took in a soap opera poster featuring a nurse giving a
patient some unusual care. “Does anyone have the time to teach
the entire nation to make food that matters? I wish I did, but I
don’t. Do you?”
As she turned to leave, Pine, not wanting her to go or fully
understanding what he was about to hatch, said quickly, “Wait,
please just stop—please. What—what was that thing you just said?
About teaching the whole nation how to make food that—that
matters?”
Supper at Six debuted four weeks later. And while Elizabeth
wasn’t entirely keen on the idea—she was a research chemist—
she took the job for the usual reasons: it paid more and she had a
child to support.”
Extracted from Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus, out now.
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