by Jessica Park
“He doesn’t have a girlfriend that we don’t know about, does he?” I whisper to Danny.
“No, he doesn’t. He had one a few years ago, but I haven’t heard a thing about anyone else since.”
“It’s too bad. He’s so … solid.”
“I’ve been keeping an eye out for him, but none of us have found the right match. At least, not yet.”
“Something to work on?” I suggest.
“Agreed.”
As I look at the group, I am taken aback. Such an unexpected pivot in my life and one I will never stop being thankful for.
The flames from the firepit dance in front of me, their rich hues vibrant and alive, and I still cannot believe that my mother made this happen. After all of the tension between us, she still wanted me to have something as beautiful as this.
For the first time in my life, I miss her. I miss my mom.
thirty-one
Slowski suddenly jumps up and points a finger at Danny. “You do know what tonight is, don’t you? You can feel it, right? I feel it, man!”
Danny laughs hard and then chugs the rest of his beer. “Is it? You think tonight’s the night?”
“Ohhh, yes! It’s Lake Air Band night!” Slow kisses Mary Ann before he backs toward the dock.
“And I know what song we’re finally doing!” Danny hollers.
“Really?” Slowski lets out a big whoop, and bends to pat Danny on the back. “Wasn’t sure this day was going to happen but glad it has. Happy for you, man.”
Danny grins mischievously and kisses me. “Apologies in advance for what you’re about to see. But it’s a tradition. Mary Ann?”
“Yeah, I’m on it.” Mary Ann claps her hand against her forehead and then grabs her phone. “Christ, here we go. Every year, it’s the same thing with these adorable assholes.”
Danny meets up with Matteo and Slow, and the three of them dive into the lake and swim like mad out to the floating dock.
“What? What is happening?”
“Watch.”
Her amused look tells me that she’s looking forward to whatever this is, and I try to relax.
I can’t see what she’s been texting, but suddenly, lights blare out from other lake houses, and I know that she’s alerted people of … something. Mary Ann laughs and grabs my arm, pulling us to front row seats on my dock for whatever is about to happen.
When bananas music suddenly blasts from multiple hidden speakers—not only from my house, but also from many others stationed in nearby houses—and lights shine on the guys, who are now positioned on the dock, I turn to Mary Ann. “Really, what the fuck is happening?”
She grabs my hand and paddles us closer. “Danny’s usual ’80s shit. But this is gonna be awesome. Just watch!”
“Watch what?”
She tosses her head back and laughs. “You’ll have to see for yourself. But he’s been saving this song.”
“Saving it for what?”
“For the right person.” Her arm goes over my shoulders, and she leans her head against me. “For you.”
Music blares, and I look to her. “What in the fuck is this?”
She laughs. “A wonderfully fun ’80s song called ‘Summertime Girls’ that we’re just going to enjoy.” She kicks and splashes me with water.
As the music picks up, the boys start crazily strumming nonexistent instruments and singing into pretend microphones. Danny points at me as he mouths lyrics, making me laugh and fall even harder for him, and Mary Ann clasps her hands over her heart when Slow does a dramatic spin and falls to his knees. I cannot figure out if I am more amused or turned on by this lip-syncing air-band act, but I cannot take my eyes off of this wild, captivating boy who is performing for me in the most outrageous way. I’m nearly melting when they’re done.
“Next week’s tune is for Matteo and his boy, Jackson!” he yells to the lake viewers. “Text us your suggestions, and we’re on it! Thank you and good night!”
Cheers and hollers from across the lake ring out as he throws his hand in the air and signs off like a true rock star; it’s completely hilarious and perfect, and I want him back in my bed more than ever.
When Danny dives off the dock and reaches me, I lean down and haul his wet body against mine.
“Yeah, it’s stupid. But we always love the air-band stuff—” he starts to excuse tonight.
“I loved it. As that song goes, you, too, make my whole world go round. In case you didn’t know.” I stroke my hands over his shoulders and make him fall against me. “Now, let’s set it on fire.”
Suddenly, right on time to ruin the moment, Slowski splashes us all hard before crawling up Mary Ann’s body, making her squeal with laughter as he climbs up to sit with us. “Check out our summertime girls, being all hot and shit.”
“Oh, we’re just summertime girls, huh?” Mary Ann teases.
Slow throws his arm around her and pulls her close. “Not by a mile.”
Not only does Danny not flinch, but he also smiles at the two of them.
“Hey, Callie?” Slowski taps my arm. “I don’t suppose you’ve ever made agedashi tofu?”
Danny laughs. “And the award for the most random question ever goes to …”
“Okay, fine,” Slowski admits. “But you never know. It’s been on my mind.”
“I haven’t,” I answer. “But I do know what you’re talking about. It’s a fried tofu in a rich broth, right? I’ve had it before.”
“Yeah. It’s something my mom always makes, and I’ve had a craving. I miss her cooking. It’s one thing to go to a Japanese restaurant, but home cooking always tastes better.” The pleading sad-eyes look he shoots me is not subtle.
“So, maybe I’m you’re only shot, is what you’re saying?”
“You know, only if you want …”
“I can try. I’m not sure that I can get the broth right though.”
“But if I get my mom’s recipe?” He looks all hopeful now.
“Then, I’ll definitely give it a go.” Why I am agreeing to cook someone’s mother’s recipe is beyond me, but I’m up for the challenge.
The repulsed face Danny makes causes us all to laugh. “Oh no. Tofu? Really? Callie, didn’t you say something about hating foods pretending to be other foods? Isn’t tofu something trying to be meat?”
I giggle. “You’ll like it, if I do this right. It soaks up all the flavor from the broth.” Then, I lean in. “If you can believe it, it’s pretty sexy when it’s on point. Silken, smooth, glides over your lips …”
“You are not going to make tofu sexy. But still, we’re outta here.”
Danny graciously says good night for the both of us and leads me inside. “I’m going to shower, and I hope you’ll join me. But first?”
“First what?” There’s nothing I want more than to strip down with him.
He lifts my chin. “Call your mom.”
I sigh.
“I didn’t mean to, but I overheard part of your conversation with Paul this morning. It’s important that you talk to her.”
While I don’t want him to be right, he is. “Wait for me?”
“Always.”
So, I pick up the phone and make the call that I’ve been both wanting to make and dreading. “Hi, Mom.”
“Callie.” Her relief is palpable. “I’m happy to hear from you.”
“I should have called sooner.”
The silence between us goes on forever, it seems, but at last, she says, “I really regret our last call. I said things I shouldn’t have. You’re doing gorgeous work there.” Her words tumble out as I have never heard. “Paul showed me. The pictures of how you’re overhauling the house.” There’s a long pause, and I brace myself for how she’s going to criticize me, yet she does the opposite. “Callie, you’re a designer. What I said about the house last time was wrong. I was wrong. It’s all stunning.”
Praise like this is not something I’m used to hearing from her, and I really don’t know how to respond. “You thi
nk so?”
“I know so.”
There’s another long pause, and I pour a giant glass of wine.
My mom lets out a big breath. “Your brunches sound incredible.”
“They have been going well,” I admit. “But I have huge help.”
“I’d like to be there for one of them.” There is a shyness in her voice that I’ve never heard before.
I nearly drop my glass. “What do you mean?”
“I’d … I’d like to fly out and visit. Would that be okay? A week or so from now?”
At first, I panic about how much work I’d like to get done before that, but surprisingly, I am equally struck by how much I want to see her.
So, maybe I can balance both.
“Two weeks from now?” I suggest. “Then, you can be here for Sunday brunch the next day.”
“Of course. Whatever works for you.” My mom’s usual flat tone has faded, her voice now soft and sincere. “It’s going to be great to see you. I’ve really missed you.”
When we hang up, I finish my wine and pace for a bit, trying to process our call, trying to decide how I feel about it. I settle on hopeful. That’s, well, good enough for now.
Before I have even left the kitchen, I’ve yanked off my shirt. By the time I’m in the bathroom upstairs, I’m nearly undressed, and it’s seconds before I further strip down and step into the steam.
After water has crashed over us for some time and I’ve scraped my hands over Danny’s tanned skin more times than I can count, after I have dropped to the tiled floor, and after he has groaned solidly and lifted me up from my knees and shut off the water, I finally speak. “I know what I want.” My lips press against him with a fervor that ignites us both again, my tongue hot against his.
“I know one thing you want,” he says with a smile as he pulls back. “And you’ll get that. But what else do you want? You talked to your mom.”
He knows me too damn well, and I let him wrap us in towels and ease us to the bedroom.
“She’s coming here in a couple of weeks. I really want the kitchen to be done. And the living room painted. And the stairs all set with new banisters.”
“It’s not a problem.”
I love how he grabs one of his T-shirts from a drawer that I insisted he take, how he raises my arms, and how he pulls it over my body before I can say a thing.
“Don’t even worry about it. We’ll get that impossibly beautiful kitchen done.”
“It’s a huge ask—”
“It’s not,” he assures me. “The kitchen is small. Everything is ordered. Paul and I can finish that room off in days. Painting? Pfft. We’ll knock that out. You might want to cut out of here for a day or more while it all dries, if only to avoid the smell and shit from demolition. I have no idea where you can stay, so that’s gonna be a whopping problem. Perhaps there’s a motel room somewhere? Or you could pitch a tent in the yard?” he suggests as he tickles my waist.
“I’m at a loss. I’ll obviously be homeless for a while.”
Then, he’s got me on my back, and he’s burying his hands in my hair as he eases my legs apart.
“We’re gonna kill your kitchen. Redo the shit out of it. And your living room. That’s a promise.”
thirty-two
My alarm goes off, and before I can sit up, Danny’s vise grip stops me.
“Nope. Stay. I was having dreams that I’d like to make come true.” His raspy, tired voice is endearing and enticing, but I still have to get up.
“There are fresh blueberries from Mary Ann that need to become oatmeal-yogurt parfaits,” I whisper. “And Alex and I are doing these cool waffle egg sandwiches with a spicy maple butter and a bunch of other dishes.”
He loosens his hold a bit and rolls his head onto my chest. “Okay, fine. Those sound fantastic.”
I keep him close for a few minutes, listening to his breathing, appreciating how sweetly he embraces me in his half-sleep.
“I feel much better today.”
He murmurs, “I’m glad.”
The question that I want to ask is difficult, but I think it’s an important one. “When was the last time you talked to your mother?”
Immediately, I feel guilty for asking him now—when he’s not really awake, when he’s vulnerable.
Then again, maybe that is exactly why I’m asking him now—because maybe he’ll be honest.
His body tenses slightly, but it’s enough for me to notice before he whispers, “It’s been a while.”
“You can talk to me about her. About anything. You do know that, right?” I cradle him against me, trying to make him feel safe.
“I know that.” Yet he hugs me tighter.
“Or about your father. If you wonder about him.”
“Sometimes, I do,” he admits, his voice quiet, his vulnerability apparent. “I asked my mother about him once when I was a teenager, and she mostly avoided answering. Said it didn’t matter. That only the two of us mattered. And that was the end of that. I knew then that it was something I shouldn’t bring up again.”
“I’m here if you decide it is.” I give him a squeeze. My hands stroke through his hair over and over before I move to leave and let him dream again. “Sorry, maybe I shouldn’t have brought this up so early in the morning.”
But then he pulls me back in and adds, “The truth is that she really doesn’t know who my father is. She clearly had a number of one-night stands. Whoever’s DNA I have isn’t a father in any meaningful way. It’s not like she had any kind of a relationship with him, so it’s more on par with … I don’t know.” He thinks for a bit before he responds. “Not sure kids born from a sperm donor or kids who are adopted always want to find their biological parents. Some do, and some don’t. I think I’m in the don’t category.”
What he says makes sense. He is more settled about this than I thought, and I’m glad. I can hear his breathing slow as he begins to drift off again.
Right before he falls back asleep, he clenches me even closer. “This week is going to be cool. Smashing out kitchen cabinets? My kind of fun.”
“And I’ll love watching you crash and rebuild,” I say so softly that I’m sure he can’t hear me, but despite that, maybe he does. Maybe I don’t have to say a word for him to know what I’m really telling him. “Sleep, baby.”
When he’s fully out again, I ease out of bed, tuck him in tightly by wrapping the sheet and duvet around his body, and tiptoe downstairs.
This is one of the last mornings that I’m going to see my house as it is. My difficult, tiny kitchen as it is. The outside changes have been easy to take, but the inside ones that are coming up might be harder. Ones I want and ones that need to happen, but ones that will also strip away part of my childhood. This house will not look as it did when I grew up here, but it shouldn’t. I know that now.
This is the last brunch that I’m going to be able to cook until the one when my mom is here, and I want to get it right. A worthy send-off to this kitchen in which I found myself.
When Alex arrives, I have him start cooking off waffles and frying bacon—which will both be easy enough to reheat in the oven later—while I put together the green chili and cheese casserole. Given that it’s mostly layers of cheese, mild chiles, and heavy cream, I figure that it’s got to be a crowd-pleaser. Then, together, we mix butter with local maple syrup, cayenne, cinnamon, and a pinch of salt. The only last-minute thing we’ll have to do is fry up a bunch of eggs, top those with cheese, and then assemble the sandwiches—waffle, maple butter, egg and cheese, bacon, second waffle. These are going to be messy and fantastic—of that, I have no doubt.
“We have two no-bacon requests,” I remind Alex.
“Yes, two no-bacon and one extra-bacon.”
He’s right. At least one of us remembers.
While I sort of regret that Paul created the brunch sign-up sheet because I don’t like excluding anyone, it was definitely necessary. There’s only so much Alex and I can handle. Maybe the new kitchen will
make things easier.
When the coffee is brewed, the orange juice pitchers are filled, and the new outdoor tables are filled with hungry friends, I pick up the casserole dish. “Ready?”
Alex looks over my shoulder. “Yes, I am ready.”
“Do you remember that this is the last time this kitchen will look the same? And there won’t be a brunch next week.”
“Yes, because it will all be ruined. Then, there will be a new kitchen.”
“Are you okay with that?”
“We’ll see.”
“Would it help if I sent you a picture of what inspired the new one? The new colors and counters and stuff?”
“No. Because that is not your kitchen. It would be someone else’s.”
“Got it. How about if I send you pictures as the guys demo it? And rebuild it? Then, you can see the changes as they happen.”
It takes a long time for him to answer, and selfishly, I wish he’d think faster because the food is getting cold, but at last, he nods. “Yes. That is a good idea.”
“Then, let’s roll!” I dart ahead, but after a few paces, I realize something and yell behind me, “Alex, buddy! That means, bring the food out!”
After we plate waffle sandwiches and dish out slices of the chili casserole, all I want to do is stand back and watch as everyone devours our food, but Paul motions that I should sit and eat. Alex is eating, so I suppose I can too. For a minute. The parfaits with Mary Ann’s ripe blueberries aren’t going to assemble themselves, but I give myself a few minutes to enjoy the group’s storytelling and laughter.
When I’m back in the kitchen, ladling out yogurt dishes, I start thinking about what in the hell I’m going to do for brunch when my mom is here. As much as I want to show off, I don’t want to try things that are impossible, especially in a new kitchen. But as I work, I figure out what I want.
Cocoa banana bread with banana slices on top. A mushroom and Brie strata. And a cantaloupe smoothie.
All fine but also all safe choices, I realize. Nothing cooked in the moment.