I run my hand along the top of the recliner now but the leather is cold. Untouched and unused. I take my hand away before the feeling can linger, moving through to the dining room and into the kitchen to find my mom and my sister, Jen, sitting at the oval oak table.
For as long as I can remember, my mom was always a pretty mom. She had a great figure, she ate what she liked, she had a piña colada every Friday and dessert was something we enjoyed as a family. These days, she’s a different kind of pretty.
Once my dad died, she became fixated on fitness. She walks over five miles a day, is on a first-name basis with every employee at her local gym and our family desserts are a distant memory. I can’t even utter ice cream without having anxiety that I’d set off some kind of Goonies-esque booby trap. Not that working out and eating only healthy food is a bad way of life—obviously it’s not—but I’m more of a fan of everything in moderation.
Stepping deeper into the kitchen, I pass her weekly weight and BMI chart that’s pinned to the fridge with a popsicle stick magnet I made in kindergarten. Her stats are impressive and she meets her every fitness goal with gusto.
“Hello, family,” I say, giving Mom a kiss on the cheek. She stands up and gives me a hug that makes me gasp. She’s clearly taken her free-weights routine up a notch.
“Hey, honey. You’re right on time.” I glance at the clock above the stove, relieved to find that it’s 5:30 p.m. on the dot. Mom gets prickly if she has to eat past 6:00 p.m. I look to the counter next and find the meal that she prepares every Sunday. Baked salmon, mashed cauliflower, and salad made from the organic greens and tomatoes she now grows in the backyard.
“What, no cheese fries?” I joke. She rolls her eyes and I hold up the mail. “I picked these up on my way in. There’s a couple in there for Dad.”
“Oh.” She takes the letters and her smile fades for the briefest of seconds before she plasters it back on. “Okay, thank you. I’ll just sort through these later.” She puts the mail into a drawer and closes it. Jen and I pretend not to notice when her hand stays on the handle for longer than necessary.
I then turn to kiss my pale and pregnant older sister. If someone didn’t know that Jen was having a baby, they would never notice her tiny bump. I choose not to think about the nagging fact that my expecting sister and I could share the same jeans.
“Where’s Denny?” I ask her. Denny is Jen’s husband of four years.
“He couldn’t get out of work. He’ll make it next time.”
Denny runs the radiology department at Long Island Jewish Medical Center. Even though he has nothing to do with obstetrics, it still means delivery room VIP treatment for Jen when the baby comes. Would you like a hot-stone massage after your next contraction? Yes, please!
“How are you feeling?” I ask.
She answers with an unhappy “Humph,” as I sit down in the empty chair beside her. “I throw up every two hours, have migraines every three hours and I sweat so much when I sleep that it looks like I swam night laps in the ocean.”
“You mean like a beautiful mermaid?” I try.
“Like a beautiful mermaid’s angry, constipated stepsister.”
“That’s a really vivid description.”
“I can get more vivid if you have the stomach for it.”
“I don’t.”
Mom sits down at the table with a sigh. “Don’t be gross, Jen.”
“I’m not being gross.”
“Yes, you are. And, Kara, don’t forget to take home the grilled chicken I made for you. Yours has the blue lid, mine’s in the red container. I made it just the way you like it with extra lemon.”
“Thank you! As if I’d ever forget my weekly grilled chicken haul.”
Jen turns a little green. “If you two keep discussing poultry, I’m going to start dry-heaving.”
“And moving right along,” I interject. “Mom, do you still have that silver serving tray Aunt Grace gave you?”
“I think so. Why?”
“I’m late for an Instagram post and I need to shoot a book by tonight. Also, do you have any flowers? Flowers would look great with this cover art, but if you don’t, I can use your antique tea set instead. I’ll stage it on the front room windowsill, or I can use your bed if you have your fluffy white comforter out.”
“I’m beginning to think you only bought me that comforter for your own selfish reasons.”
“Your assertion is both highly offensive and partly true.”
My mom grins and shakes her head. “Okay, you know I fully support your booksta-pictures but—”
“It’s bookstagram,” Jen says. “Bookstagram. You should know that since it’s one of the keys to Kara’s livelihood.”
“Whatever it’s called,” my mom groans. “You should be focusing on your own book. The longer you wait, the more difficult it’s going to be. You don’t want to take too long and then get stuck in a funk.”
Too late.
“I know, Mom, and for the record, I did start my next novel.” Thank goodness. “It’s in the very early stages, though, so I’m still figuring it out.”
“That’s exciting! Do you have pages for me to read?”
My mom can be my toughest critic but she’s also my biggest fan. Even though reading on the computer hurts her eyes, she still read my first manuscript after every edit I went through, which ended up being about ninety-seven drafts. I never would have worked so hard to get published if she wasn’t there encouraging and pushing me along the
