Mom: Now that they’ve found each other, all I want is for him to be happy. Maybe he can have a family to call his own. He needs more to love than football.
Claudia: excuse me why am I crying
Claudia: extremely rude for you to make me feel my own feelings
Amber: it’s so funny how we only have these conversations over text. Like we’d never say a word of this face to face
Chloe: probably because we spent 5 years watching our father die on a hospital bed in the dining room and that shit never really goes away
Chloe: I’m sorry. Sometimes I’m a self-centered bitch.
Amber: yeah we know
Ruthie: It’s probably good that we’re getting all of this family mess out now. Less to horrify Emme with later.
Mom: He’s been awfully generous to all of us. I think we can give him the time he needs to come around.
Claudia: or we could break into his condo and just wait for them to show up
Gramma CeCe: give him a few more weeks.
Claudia: then we’ll break in!
Gramma CeCe: I’ll bring the crow bar and hooch
Ruthie: It’s not a great idea to put that in writing
Claudia: did it leave a scar, Ruth?
Ruth: what?
Claudia: when corporate law surgically removed the humor and joy from your body?
chapter twenty-seven
Emme
Today’s Learning Objective:
Students will engage in structured play.
I couldn’t explainit but I’d needed to wander around a grocery store this afternoon. Ryan had a prepared meal service and a grocery shopping service, and all of it was fine but I left school knowing I wanted something more.
Bowen pushed the cart after picking me up from school and we talked about his granny’s pork butt recipe. It did sound pretty great but Ryan was training and traveling this week and Ines was never at the condo so I had no one to feed.
The strange part was that I wanted to feed someone. I hadn’t felt that in a long time.
I returned home with a whole bunch of random—a ton of seasonal veggies, a wild rice blend, some fun herbs and spices, and a perfectly crusty loaf of grainy bread. I didn’t know what I was going to do with it. There was no recipe or meal that came to mind but it was all too good to pass up.
I unpacked the items and smoothed my hands over the surface of the countertop. I’d lived here for more than a month but I hadn’t cooked anything other than reheating leftovers ortoasting a bagel. The meal service helped with that but also, I hadn’t wanted to cook anything. The desire wasn’t there anymore.
But now, seeing the veggies and herbs on the counter, I felt something.
Then my phone rang and my mother’s face flashed on the screen, and all those feelings dried up. I grabbed a sparkling water before answering. “Hi, Mom.”
“You would not believe that shoot I’ve had,” she said, the breathless words coming quickly. Either on the treadmill or spin bike. Mom never did just one thing. “We can usually count on Aruba but it rained for twenty-one days straight. They had to fly us to St. Lucia just to find some sun. It was an enormous improvement as far as the weather went but they clearly weren’t prepared for a production of this size.”
I strolled out to the deck. The shoots for her reality show always had these issues. Not enough drama on-screen, gotta add some acts of god to the mix. “That must’ve been tough.”
