“I’m a vegetarian, Dad!” came a strident protest from the kitchen.
Yikes.
“I’m not making steak or anything,” Phil said.
“Chicken. Is. Meat.”
“Come on, Kyle. It’s not like chickens have personalities.”
“You don’t have a personality, Dad.”
Gabby stepped tentatively into the kitchen and waved. “I’m home!” She smiled like she hadn’t heard Kyle suggest Phil had no more personality than a chicken.
At the moment, Phil looked like he could reheat chicken with the look on his face alone.
She smiled and said, “Thanks again for taking care of dinner.”
Kyle had been flirting with going vegetarian for a while, her commitment usually related to how recently she’d listened to her favorite vegetarian TikToker or if Gabby was serving meat loaf for dinner. She knew her meat loaf sucked. It’s just that she had subscribed to HelloFresh for a while, and the mini–meat loaf with garlic mash recipe was so good. Everyone gobbled it up, and she’d been trying to re-create that night ever since. Why couldn’t she make it on her own?
“Dad”—Kyle said his name like he’d committed a crime—“I am a vegetarian. I am fourteen years old. You cannot make me eat chicken.” She looked at Gabby for backup. “Right, Mom? You said I should live my truth.”
On the one hand, she had left the chicken for Phil to heat up. If they didn’t eat it, she was going to be the one stuck coming up with something else. On the other hand, it was nice to watch Phil struggle through dinner. “Um…”
Kyle put her hands on her hips and stared both her parentsdown. “The carbon costs of eating meat are going to destroy this planet.”
Phil fired back, “If that’s your only problem, then let’s buy some carbon credits and eat the damn chicken. You can offset anything.”
“Only if you’re rich.”
“What do you want me to do then, offset my dinner and give a homeless guy twenty bucks?”
“That would be better.” A little softer, Kyle said, “Dad, can you just bring Dr. Piggie back?”
Fucking Phil. Gabby rubbed her temples. This was too much after spending a day trying to convince money launderers she was Camille Walker. Hell, she had learned to use Excel today. That had required equations and math, neither skills that Markus had advertised.
“What’s Lucas doing?” she asked Phil.
“Playing a game, I don’t know. Not complaining about dinner at least.”
Gabby sighed. That didn’t sound promising. Lucas was not the kind of kid you could leave to his own devices for long periods of time. You’d think Phil would know that by now.
With a weight on her chest, she walked toward the living room. “Lukie, where are you??”
An ominously gleeful squeal sounded.
Sure enough, Gabby stepped into the living room to find Lucas and Mr. Bubbles covered in paint. She’d left the house for one day, and her children and bichon had gone feral. All she wanted to do was go undercover and work for the CIA. Was that too much to ask? She laughed, not in glee but in despair. Mr. Bubblestrotted over to her with his tail wagging, leaving a trail of blue paw prints.
Lest he misread her reaction, she firmed her face into a mask of disapproval. “Lucas, I need you to clean this up right now.”
“I’m sorry, Mom. I was just doing my homework and…”
She gave him an “I don’t want to hear it” look and repeated herself. “Clean this up right now. I want all the paint back in the cabinet immediately. You are going to clean the rug too.” Even as she said it, she knew that was impossible. She’d have to rent one of those hundred-pound Rug Doctors from the hardware store, lug it home, and spend a couple of hours shampooing the carpet. What had Phil even been doing?
Back in the kitchen, Phil was taking the chicken out of the oven. During the argument over how many carbon credits were needed to offset one dead chicken, he’d managed to almost blacken it, which she was guessing would cost him more credits.
Shaking his head, he dropped it on the counter unceremoniously and poured himself a glass of wine. “You want one?”
She did, but also, why was he staying? He was the one who decided to leave. He couldn’t just drop by and pour himself some wine and act like everything was fine, like they were in it together. They hadn’t been in it together for a long time.
