Ceci tossed and turned for a long time than night, and overslept the next morning. She still lingered in the shower longer than was necessary and took her time with breakfast and getting dressed. When she finally made it downstairs to the store, her mother didn't say a word to her about the lateness of the day. She was busy ringing through a line of customers anyway. Gloria simply flashed her daughter a small smile and waved her towards the cooler where different cases of pop were stacked to fill it.
Before she got to work, Ceci stuck her earbuds in and turned up the music on her iPod to drown out the sounds of the activity around her. It was a song that her grandmother had loved whenever it came on the radio, and it made Ceci's heart surge with a peculiar sense of longing. She missed her, and yet, if she was being truthful, she knew she hadn't been completely happy there either. Not since her mom had left. It seemed like she was forever destined to have these empty spaces. That's what happened when you grew up with your family divided.
"Whew, these people are crazy!" Gloria exclaimed, patting Ceci on the shoulder. Though she had heard her perfectly fine, Ceci was inclined to pretend to the contrary.
"Sorry, did you say something?" she asked, pulling the earbuds out and raising her eyebrows.
"How's the ankle today?" Gloria asked.
"Fine…"
"Was everything okay upstairs when you left?"
"Depends what you define as okay," Ceci shrugged. "Elena got it into her head to feed Julio a snack of peanut butter and crackers, and he made an absolute wreck of the floor. I think the other one was napping"
"Sounds pretty standard," Gloria smiled. "I'm surprised you were able to sleep through all that."
"I had nothing better to do," Ceci replied.
"Well, actually, you were supposed to be down here," Gloria said. "But I'll let it go this time. Once you fill the pop cooler and clean out the bathroom for me, you can call it a day."
"Works for me," Ceci shrugged. She stuck her earbuds in and turned back to the fridge. She could feel her mother's eyes on her and could sense that she wanted to say more, probably about last night. It was to her credit that Gloria didn't bring up how Ceci had lashed out at her. She probably guessed correctly that her daughter would not want to hear it. Besides, it hadn't really been about either of them anyway.
The bell hanging over the door chimed, and Gloria turned to see Nicky entering the store. Nicky looked a little worse for wear. Her curly hair was completely unruly and she had makeup smudges under both of her eyes from the night before. In one hand, she carried a cloth shopping bag.
"Hey, Gloria," Nicky said cheerfully, setting her bag on top of the counter. "Red wanted me to bring you this. Said she accidentally made too much."
"What is it?" Gloria asked, peering into the bag and then pulling out a ceramic dish. "A pie? How does a person accidentally make an extra pie?" She smiled. Galina was always making her extra dishes on purpose. Usually she brought them over herself, a convenient excuse to get out of her apartment and come by for a visit-not that she would have ever needed a reason. This time though, it seemed that Nicky had beat her to it.
"Yeah, I think she was lonely or something last night with just Dmitri for company," Nicky shrugged. "Because when I got back the place was immaculately clean, my laundry was put away, and she had done all this baking."
"That should settle any doubts you have about how much you mean to her," Gloria said gently. "Because I've never seen her happier."
"Yeah…" Nicky flushed slightly. She was often told how happy she made her foster mother, but it was still hard to believe after years of feeling unwanted and being rejected. She kept waiting for the novelty of herself to wear off. It was maybe why she found it impossible to give up her old destructive habits. She was afraid to get too comfortable, since the loss of this home would hurt more than any of the others.
"She wants you guys to come over for dinner tonight," Nicky said, changing the subject. "She told me to invite you."
"That sounds great," Gloria said. She watched as Nicky's eyes focused onto Ceci, who hadn't turned around or acknowledged her presence at all yet. That was strange in itself. Something must have happened last night between the girls, she wondered if Galina would have any insight for her.
Picking up the pie in her hand, Gloria decided to go put it upstairs and give the two girls a little bit of space. She could trust Ceci to handle any customers they received for a short period. Before leaving, she walked around to the back to let her daughter know where she was going. She was pleased to see that Ceci was working effectively today.
"Take a break and go say hi to Nicky," Gloria suggested softly.
Ceci pursed her lips together and removed her earbuds slowly once again. This time she shoved them into her pocket. Her eyes caught her mother's.
"I just need to run this upstairs and check on the kids," Gloria explained.
She took the back door, that had an interior staircase to go upstairs to the apartment. Ceci leaned her back against the pop cooler and sighed. When she finally walked towards the front where Nicky was waiting, it was with dragging feet and stiffened legs.
"What are you doing?" Ceci frowned, catching Nicky sitting behind the counter in front of the register.
"Holding the fort down," Nicky replied. "Until your mom gets back."
"Pretty sure she intended that to be my job," Ceci crossed her arms over her chest.
"I think she wanted me to assist you," Nicky said.
"No, I don't think so," Ceci shook her head.
"Soooooo...you are mad at me," Nicky groaned, collapsing her head down onto the counter. She stared up at her friend with big brown puppy dog eyes. "I said sorry in every way I know how to last night."
"I know," Ceci said dryly. "You blew my phone up last night."
Nicky stuck out her bottom lip pitifully. "You weren't answering me," she pointed out.
"Because I didn't want to talk to you," Ceci replied. "Much like right now, although you're making yourself pretty hard to avoid."
"You're coming over to my place tonight for dinner," Nicky told her. "Our moms already made plans. So, you can't avoid me forever."
"Maybe I'll have a headache tonight and stay home by myself," Ceci shrugged indifferently.
"You can't," Nicky lifted her head, looking worried. "Then Red will know something is up."
"Something is up," Ceci said angrily. "I had to blow all my money on a cab last night because I couldn't take another minute of your crap."
"I'll pay you back," Nicky pleaded.
"I just don't understand you," Ceci shook her head. "Galina and Dmitri have been so good to you, and you've been disrespectful and lying to their faces this entire time."
"It's more complicated than that," Nicky protested. "I have a problem. It's not my fault."
"Then maybe you should get some help for your problem," Ceci said.
"You don't understand," Nicky groaned desperately. "I'll just get sent back to juvie if anyone found out."
"They're not going to send you away, Nicky," Ceci sighed. "They love you. They're completely devoted to you. Even if you haven't been with them that long."
"It's not their choice," Nicky replied urgently. "I'm a ward of the state. I'm not really their kid."
"So, what do you want from me?" Ceci asked wearily.
"Just stop being mad at me," Nicky said. "I'm going to fix this on my own. Please? A person can only apologize so many times."
"Apologies mean nothing if you don't change your behaviour," Ceci told her. "Look at me! Gloria got pregnant with Julio and called promising things would just take a little bit longer and she was sorry, and then what happened? Bam...pregnant again! Different father too…"
"What's your point?" asked Nicky.
"My point is I'm tired of paying for everyone else's shitty choices," Ceci exploded. "I just don't get it. It's like y'all have an incessant need to self-destruct!"
"You sound just like my mom," Nicky scoffed.
Ceci blinked. "Red?" she asked.
"Red's not my mom," Nicky shook her head. "I wouldn't wish that on her."
Ceci paused. She rarely thought about the person Nicky was before she met her. Even before juvenile hall, or causing dysfunction at every foster home she was placed in. What had happened to this girl to make her as angry as she was? Who were these mystery people who had let her down and forgotten her?
She knew from listening to Galina and her own mom talk, that Nicky's mother had passed away about a year before she had entered the system. Nicky's parents had been divorced and her father had not stayed very involved in her life. She'd lived primarily with her mother and now seldom spoke of her. Maybe it was too painful to remember. Or maybe Nicky just didn't miss her very much. That had to come with its own peculiar form of guilt.
"Do you want to talk about your mom?" Ceci asked gently.
"No," Nicky said, a little too quickly to be believable.
"You listen to me complain about my mom all the time," Ceci pointed out. "You can say anything you want to me. I won't judge."
"How could you?" Nicky asked sadly. "We both know how it feels to not belong in our own family."
XXX
"Julio, do you want to watch cartoons?"
"Yes, yes, yes!" the toddler gleefully replied, scrambling up onto the sofa and bouncing in place. Galina smiled, walking over to her husband's chair and swiping the remote control off of the armrest. Dmitri's sound of protest was ignored, as she pointed it at the television and switched off the show that he had been watching.
"You know, you could have at least asked," Dmitri complained.
"But if you had said no, I would have still done it anyway," Galina replied coyly. She turned to a channel of cartoons and then placed the remote control back down. For good measure, next she tugged at the blanket Dmitri had draped over his lap.
"Watch it, Galya," he warned her, tugging it back.
"I need it for the baby," she informed him. Dmitri threw his hands up in surrender and his wife succeeded in pulling the blanket right off his lap. She spread it down on the floor and then went to a drawer in her coffee table where she kept a few toys for visiting little ones.
"Mija, you are way too much," Gloria chuckled. She knelt down on the floor to place Benny atop the blanket, for some tummy time. He stared at the toys Galina placed on the blanket, just out of his reach. Galina sat next to Gloria, and waved a rattle in front of the baby.
"Come and get it, darling," she coaxed him. "Don't you want to crawl?"
"He's so pudgy, he mostly just rolls," Gloria remarked, affectionately squeezing her son's chubby thighs.
"That's okay," Galina said in a babyish voice to Benny, who gurgled back in reply. She gave in. Handing him the rattle, even though he hadn't made any effort to get it himself. Benny's hand wrapped around the handle. He shook it half-heartedly a few times before he accidentally dropped it.
"Waaaaaaaa," the baby cried out, dropping his head back down onto the blanket in defeat.
"Life is just so hard for you," Gloria told him, in mock sympathy. She picked him up, plopping him down on his bottom now so he could sit upright and play. He preferred this position.
"Let's go finish our desserts before he comes up with something else to be disgruntled with," she suggested. Galina nodded, and slowly got up from the floor to follow her back into the kitchen.
"You can take these with you," Dmitri said, holding out his dishes for her to take.
"Girls, you don't have to do that," Galina exclaimed, walking back into the kitchen to find Ceci and Elena had cleared the table and were stacking up the dirty dishes to be washed.
"That's what I told them," Nicky said, before stabbing a piece of chocolate cake with her fork.
"Yes," Galina nodded, setting her husband's plates down and turning around to squint at her foster daughter. "Nicky will help me with them later. Won't you, honey? Would you girls like some more cake instead?"
"No thanks," Ceci replied.
"We're full," Elena added.
"Not to mention someone came by with a pie for us this afternoon that is sitting in my refrigerator waiting to be eaten," Gloria said, sitting back down at the table and taking a small bite of her own cake anyway. "I think you get a kick out of sabotaging my diets."
"Well, if you're going to keep waking up at the crack of dawn to do exercise classes, you might as well give your body something satisfying to burn off," Galina shrugged. Gloria had tried several times in the beginning of their friendship to convince her to attend the gym with her, but she had never succeeded in getting her there. Galina felt she woke up early enough to begin work, and anything more would be inhumane.
"Do you want to have some Bailey's in coffee with me to go with the cake?" Galina offered.
"Sure," Gloria gave in, "but just a little. Tonight's a school night. I've got to get going pretty soon."
"Why don't you girls go hang out in Nicky's room?" Galina suggested.
"I guess that's our cue to leave," Nicky said, wiping her mouth with a napkin and then getting up from the table. She beckoned to Ceci and Elena to follow her. "If you're going to talk about us, make sure you say lots of nice things."
She led the way out of the room, though both of Gloria's daughters seemed reluctant to follow. They walked slowly behind her, not looking at one another, though Elena exchanged a questionable glance with her mother before disappearing down the hall. Galina wasn't paying much attention though. She had gotten two matching mugs out of the cupboard and had poured coffee into both. Now she was adding a splash of the liquor to each.
"Does something seem off about them to you?" Gloria asked.
"What do you mean?" Galina carried their mugs to the table and then sat down in the seat directly beside her friend. She rested her elbow on the back of her chair and looked at Gloria curiously.
"They hardly said a word to one another at dinner," Gloria said. "Didn't you notice? They didn't want to sit next to each other either."
"I don't know," Galina shrugged, bringing her cup to her lips. "Nicky said Ceci didn't enjoy ice skating and that's why she went home early, but she wasn't mad at her for leaving. Did Ceci say anything to you when you picked her up?"
Gloria blinked. "I thought you picked them up?"
"No, only Nicky because Ceci left early," Galina replied. "And actually, Dmitri went to get her. I dropped them off."
"Then how did Ceci get home?" Gloria asked, looking alarmed.
Galina pursed her lips. "Are you sure she went straight home?" she asked. "Maybe she went to go meet somebody else and didn't want Nicky to know?"
"No, she wouldn't have," Gloria shook her head. "That's one of the main things we fight about. Her saying she doesn't have any friends here, aside from Nicky. Who else would she go see?"
"Well, what time did she get home?" asked Galina.
"Ten?" Gloria thought to herself. "No, it was closer to eleven."
"Well, Dmitri didn't pick Nicky up at the rink until twelve," Galina replied. "So, that sounds about right."
"I don't have a clue," Gloria said. "All I know is when Ceci got home, she was upset."
"You're sure she doesn't have any other friends?" Galina asked. "Maybe she left to meet up with a boy?"
"Mmm…" Gloria shook her head. "That sounds more like something I would have done, and Ceci is a lot better than I was at her age."
She sighed. She wished she had the sort of relationship with her daughter where she could ask her about things without making it feel like an interrogation. She wasn't even sure if she wanted to bring up Ceci's mode for getting home last night, because then she would have to punish her for breaking the rules and that would do nothing to help ease the tension that so strongly existed between them.
She picked up her own cup and took a long sip. In the background, Julio was singing loudly along to a song on the television and Benny was laughing at him. The door to Nicky's bedroom was closed tightly. No clue as to what was going on there, but Nicky had been the only girl who seemed to be acting like everything was fine between them tonight. Elena had barely spoken, and Ceci seemed awkward around her friend. She knew there was more to this story than Ceci leaving because she didn't want to skate.
"Mami?" Gloria knew who the voice belonged to before she even turned her head, but she still startled at it anyway. It had been such a long time that she had been addressed by Elena with such warmth and endearment. Trying not to let it show what a big deal it was on her face, Gloria smiled at her daughter and held out an arm to her invitingly.
"Yes?" she asked, her heart swelling in her chest as Elena stepped into the crook of her arm and leaned into her.
"Can we go now?" Elena mumbled.
"Soon," Gloria promised, giving her a squeeze. "Are you tired?"
Elena shrugged.
"What are your sister and Nicky doing?" asked Galina.
"Talking," Elena said softly. "And ignoring me."
"Well, why don't you stay out here and keep us company then?" Gloria suggested. She pulled a chair closer to herself so that Elena could sit down right beside her. She felt bad about her being excluded from the older girls, but a part of her was grateful for the push it gave her daughter to seek her out.
"See, they're talking," Galina said gently, giving Gloria a meaningful look.
"Yeah," Gloria agreed. She wished she could be a fly on the wall. Maybe nothing at all was amiss but she still felt an odd lump in the bottom of her stomach.
Nicky was kept on a pretty short leash. Her foster parents seldom let her go anywhere unless one of them was picking her up and dropping her off. Given her history, they needed to keep close tabs on her and Nicky was always agreeable to them. She'd never given them any sort of trouble, or talked to them the way that Ceci so often spoke to her. Even if they were still feeling one another out, and Nicky hadn't been there that long, there was a level of respect in this home that Gloria's still was lacking. Galina treated Nicky like a daughter, whether the girl considered her her mother or not. She didn't walk around on the eggshells that Gloria felt she was constantly navigating.
Truly, Gloria was becoming tired of it. She didn't have many rules. She didn't care if her kids made their beds, did their homework just as soon as they came home, or stayed up a little too late sometimes. What she did care about, was that the were safe. Ceci had a cell phone her mother paid for and was allowed to go essentially anywhere she wanted, if she let her know where that was. Gloria gave her no reason to be secretive, and the more she thought about it, the more irritated she became. She was done with trying to be a friend to someone who rejected her at every turn. Ceci needed to be parented, and Gloria wasn't going to tiptoe around doing her job any longer.
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