“Try it, Tani. It’s delicious,” Maile urged.
“Too fatty.”
“I can make you a cup without milk,” Livvy responded.
Tani wrinkled her small nose. “I’ll be up all night if I have coffee now.”
It was barely three p.m., but there was no point in arguing with her mother. “Sure. I’ll drink it, don’t worry. What are you watching?”
“This doctor is so smart. It’s a show about how to lose fifteen pounds in a week on his new diet. You only eat vegetables that start with the letterc.” Maile’s bright, dark eyes went back to the television.
Livvy’d grown up with little to no television in her home, but her mom had apparently changed her views on T.V. time over the years. The olderwoman spent most of her day sitting in the armchair of her bedroom, switching through various channels like it was her job, pausing only to move to the living room and the T.V. there. “I really hope coffee and chocolate are on that list,” Livvy said.
Maile snorted. “And carbs.”
“Speaking of carbs, I was thinking of what to make for dinner. Pasta, maybe?” Livvy perched on the arm of the couch where her aunt sat.
“You don’t have to cook,” Tani said.
“I want to.” No, she didn’t. But she’d ordered pizza yesterday, and she couldn’t do that two days in a row. “I make a really great marinara sauce too.” More lies. She could open a jar.
“Hmm, maybe not marinara,” her aunt said. “Your mother’s allergy.”
Livvy looked at her mom. “What allergy?”
Tani shrugged. “I’m allergic to nightshades.”
“Since when?”
“A few years back.”
She thought of all the meals she’d prepared since she’d gotten home. The omelettes. The pizza she’d ordered.
All made with tomatoes.
Suddenly, Tani’s pecking made more sense.
“Why didn’t you say something?”
Tani gave another delicate shrug and put the ball of yarn in the basket next to the sofa. “I didn’t want to be a bother.”
Livvy took a drink of her coffee to hide her annoyance. This was so like her mother, not to communicate one simple thing. Livvy had thoughtTani didn’t like her cooking, not that she couldn’t eat her cooking.
Start a fight. Do it.
No. No. That would be the immature thing to do, and she wasn’t immature. At least, not that immature. “Any other allergies I should know about?”
Tani frowned at the coffee table and rubbed a stain there. Cleaning was definitely not one of Livvy’s skills, but she’d spent most of the day tidying up in here. The gesture felt like an implicit rebuke. “Dairy.”
Livvy thought of the cheese she’d put on most everything. “Got it. Sure.”
Aunt Maile nodded at the T.V. “This doctor did a whole episode on adult allergy onset.”
Livvy took another sip of coffee. “I’ll have to catch that later. Or we could go for a walk around the neighborhood, Mom. Do those exercises the physical therapist gave us. I don’t have to work tonight.”
Livvy waited, but Tani’s only response was silence. She’d talked about her part-time job about a dozen times over the past week, but Maile had been the only one to show any interest. Once upon a time, Tani would have leapt up to tell her exactly what she thought about her only daughter being a tattoo artist.
Olivia, really, I was fine with you not having any interest in the business. I spent a small fortune on art supplies and classes, and this is how you want to use it? To pierce people’s skin with ink?
