Page 2 of ClickBack

“Are we discussing clothes?” I ask. “Because I have questions about that picture.”

He cups a hand over the printed basketball. “It was going in.”

“Then I’m happy for both of you.”

Behind him, Rae laughs so suddenly she loses her grip on a stack of plates. Trina catches the top half and sets them down crooked. My daughter immediately straightens them. Burgundy scrubs, ringlets piled into a puff, one earring missing. She has come straight from a night shift and is managing a birthday party on whatever was in the cup by the register. I know that determined expression. I spent most of her childhood wearing it.

“You’re late,” she says.

“I’m here before the cake.”

“You’re usually here before the employees.”

“They seemed qualified when I booked.”

Trina takes a step back to get all of me in. “Rae. Why your mama walk in here like she the bar?”

“Don’t start,” Rae tells her, although she is looking, too.

“Bobiana got the bob bobbing.” Trina gestures from my freshly cut hair to my bare thighs. “And these shorts did not come here to supervise children.”

I spent two hours in Nia Renée’s chair and considerably longer deciding whether to wear the outfit. Now that I’ve made it through the door, I’m not about to apologize for either expense. The shorts sit high on my waist, tailored beautifully, with a length I’ve tried to negotiate in three different mirrors. My sheer blouse hangs open over a fitted tank. Every time I move, the gold hoops brush beneath my bob. Nia left the gray at my temples alone because I asked her to. I like it. Today, I even like the way other people have to look twice to decide what they think.

“Miss GiGi,” Trina says, “turn around.”

“Find something to do.”

“I am doing it.”

Rae pushes the plates into her hands. “Do this over there.”

Trina leaves us with a last appreciative look, then begins negotiating with a boy who believes the entire stack belongs at his seat. Zion follows, protective of the party supplies now that somebody else wants them. Rae and I get perhaps three feet of privacy.

“You know Daddy and Sutton are coming,” she says.

“I was present when you invited them.”

“Ma.”

“Rae.”

She rubs beneath one eye, carefully avoiding her lashes. “I’m not telling you what to wear. You look good. I just don’t have enough sleep in me for whatever face Daddy makes when he sees you.”

That is fair. It is also an admission I would prefer not to make while holding a box of birthday candles.

“His face has never been your responsibility.”

“Apparently everybody’s face is my responsibility today. Zion has already cried because the shirt company made his head too big.”

“That was an accurate rendering.”

She laughs, then glances at the shorts again. “You really do look good.”

“Thank you, honey.”

I mean it. There is something about a compliment from my daughter that can still catch me unprepared. She has seen me in every version of getting through a day, including the ones I would rather she hadn’t. For once, I want her to have nothing to check behind the answer when she asks whether I’m all right. I put the candles beside the cake and take my hand off the serving knife before I can move that, too. Rae has arranged everything. She knows what she’s doing, even if she has placed the forks on the wrong end of the table.

The outfit began with an invitation. Byron and Sutton have been celebrating their wedding for almost a year, and apparently there are still people who have not had sufficient opportunity to applaud. Their latest envelope arrived on a day when I had nothing charitable left to say about either of them. Instead, I opened Ariya Harper’s page, found the Main Line boutique she kept tagging, and drove to Maison T.