"What are you doing?" Angie said, leaning one hand on her hip.
"Cleaning," I said sheepishly, dusting some glass knick knack I couldn't recall ever seeing before.
"Why? It's just Craig. He knows you're a slob," I couldn't get used to the sulky teen age voice on my sweet daughter, but she was 15 now. Still, if I squinted I could still see the five year old she would always be to me.
My son Craig, on the other hand, was 24 now. He found a moderate success with his music, the bands changing over the years, sometimes he went it solo. But for me he'd always be 15, a sulky teenager stealing my car. I shook my head, glanced at my 41 year old face in the mirror. I wasn't quite sure how old I should be, but I didn't think it was 41. That was too old. Too old by far.
"When's he coming?" Angie said, and despite the bored coolness in her voice I knew she wanted to see him. They'd had a special sort of relationship, and I knew they saw bits of their mother in each other. Now that they were getting older I could see her a bit more clearly in them, too. It made me sad. So much in getting older made me sad.
"Tonight. He should be here for supper," That was one thing that had changed for the better, suppers. I used to be the frozen pizza king, sandwiches, grill cheese, macaroni and cheese. I could boil water for pasta and dump in cheese sauce. Now I was really cooking, braising meats and roasting stews and making curries and sauces and tartars. I'd found something rewarding in cooking.
"What are you making him, Beef Wellington?" Angie said, and everything she said dripped with sarcasm. Mostly I ignored it. Sometimes it amused me. This time it made me mad.
"Look, Missy, if you don't have anything positive to say-" I stopped mid sentence. The thing was, she was right. I was planning an overly extravagant menu just to keep my mind off of how much I've missed him and how infrequently he comes around. I knew we'd be staring at each other with little to say, or saying a lot with nothing in it. I groaned inwardly, thinking about how much I hated talking about the weather.
Sauces and grains were merrily bubbling away on the stove top, Angie was up in her room lost in whatever she got lost in. The computer, her ipod, the T.V. whatever it was. I glanced outside at the fading light, the growing gloom. I spaced for a moment, remembering my dead wife. The way she would tilt her head back and laugh, and the feeling of pride if I was the one who caused that laugh. It still hurt to think of her, all these years later. I couldn't quickly come up with the number of years. Then the bad luck number popped into my head. 13. It had been 13 years.
"Hi," I looked over at the creak of the door and my step son laden with suitcases and his guitar.
"Hi," I said warmly, feeling the smile crinkle my eyes. I went over to him and hugged him before he got his coat off. I could smell the cold clinging to his clothes, trapped in the fiber of the coat.
He shrugged out of his coat once I finally let him go, pulled off his hat and hung both neatly in the closet. This was new. He used to drop things where he took them off, and after school you could find him by following the trail of his discarded items. I noticed the slight receding of his hair, not anything drastic, just the normal hairline of a 24 year old as opposed to, say, a 15 year old. There was that older look to his face, a maturity I couldn't wrap my head around. Where was the wounded teenager I used to know?
"How are you, Joey?" he said, and his voice was the same, at least.
"Good," That was the only way I ever answered that question, and I didn't know if it was true. There were layers to how I was, and I was sure that one of them was okay. Why burden my loved ones if I didn't have to?