“Yeah, Vicki’s making casserole.” I inhaled the scent of gravy and Italian herb.
Sam took off running. “I’ll race you?”
“Hey. No fair.” I darted after him, catching up as we both jumped the creaky bottom step of the porch then burst through the front door.
“Sam? Ara-Rose, is that you?” Vicki called from the kitchen.
“Who else would it be?” Sam muttered to me as we dumped our schoolbags on the staircase.
“Come in here and have a snack before homework please,” she called.
As I walked into the dining area to the left, Italian herb blended warmly with garlic and onion, sparking a flashback of cold winters and roast dinners. But the oak dining table by the window, littered with Vicki’s scrapbooking mess, and the island counter sitting centre to dark wood kitchen cabinets, held too much class above the little beach house I grew up in, obliterating any sense of ‘coming home’ after a long day.
“Did you shut the front door? You’re letting all the cool air out,” Vicki yapped from her position at the counter.
Sam waltzed past, grabbing an apple from the fruit bowl. “Sorry—I got homework to do.”
“What, and I don’t?”
He shrugged, biting his apple, and wandered into the forbidden formal rooms through an archway on the other side of the kitchen.
“You’re such a pain, Sam.”
“Be nice, Ara-Rose,” Vicki warned.
I groaned and headed back to the entranceway, slammed the front door, then stomped into the kitchen again.
“Tough day?” Vicki asked.
“No. Why?”
“You just seem moodier than your usual self.”
“Moody? I’m never moody.” I grabbed an apple and plonked into a dining chair facing the window. Outside, across the road, football practice was in full-swing, with shirtless guys running back and forth across the grass. I kind of wished David were on the team this year so I could sit on the tree stump and watch him train. Then again, Vicki would probably be sitting right here, in the chair, watching me watch him. I knew she’d been sitting in it just before we came in, probably watching me talk to that kid Spencer, because the seat was still warm.
“So?” Vicki said. “How was school?”
My eyes narrowed. That wasn’t just a question formed out of a light attempt at decent conversation—it was a probe; she wanted me to tell her she was right—that school wasn't as bad as I thought—and busying herself washing coriander couldn’t disguise that meddlesome undertone. She should’ve known better. After all, it was her profession. Okay, so she hadn’t worked as a psychiatrist since she married my dad, but she still practiced—on me. “School was fine,” I muttered absently, fingering through the tablecloth of photos and cardboard frames.
“Did you make any friends?”
“No one makes friends on the first day, Vicki.”
“Oh. I’m sorry to hear that.”
She wasn't sorry. She didn't really care.
“Did you see any cute guys?” her tone became light, suggestive.
Did she really think I was that clueless—that I wouldn’t notice her trying to get me to open up? With a short sigh, I bit into my apple, licking the sweet juice as it spilled onto my lip.
“Ara-Rose?” she prompted.
“What?”
“I asked you a question.”
I sat back, rolling my eyes. She wasn't going to let this go. She was hell-bent on having a ‘conversation’ with me this afternoon. If I didn't attempt to ‘play along’, she’d tell my dad I was exhibiting anti-social behaviour again.
“Ara-Rose?” she said, standing right beside me.
“Cute guys? Uh…yes.” I grinned widely, keeping my face down. “A guy that’s so cute he makes Stefan look like a dweeb.”
“Who’s Stefan?”
I groaned. “Never mind. He’s cute, he’s fictional—that’s all that matters.”
“Do you…like him?”
“Who, Stefan?”
“No, this boy you saw today.”
“Like him?”
“Yeah, do you like him?” she repeated.
Yes, I do. “No. I just met him. But he’s cute.”
She breathed out, her shoulders dropping. The movement was small, but so obvious to me; I was accustomed to the casual displays of indifference she used in order to psychologically assess or relate to me. She counted on the fact that I was a docile teen with no clue what went on around me. Clearly, she’d never been a teenager. I knew all the tricks, and I never gave anything away about my psychological well-being. I wouldn’t give her the satisfaction.
She walked away again, and I shifted the photos until the dark wood of the table bared itself from under them. Not one of those photos was of me. I spent every summer and at least six winters here since I was a child, but the absence of my face in these scrapbooks was just another indicator that I really was just a walk-in—a temporary fixture made permanent by circumstance. I was like a painting you hung on the wrong wall using your last nail.
“Did you sit with anyone at lunch?” Vicki asked.
I spun around again and watched her fussing about near the stove. “Yes.”
“Well, that’s good. I knew you wouldn’t end up sitting alone—even though you were so sure you would.” She laughed lightly.
“Guess you were right.”
She ignored my disingenuous tone, tipping the chopping block over the pot, breaking the cloud of steam as she scraped the veggies in. “So, do you like any of your teachers?”
“No.” But my friend likes your husband.
“What about Dad? You’re in his class, right?”
“Yeah, but he gives boring lectures.” I assume. Not that I was listening.
“Well, don’t tell him that—you’ll hurt his feelings.”
Feelings? Do dads have feelings? Almost as if his past self heard me, his smiling face appeared among the pile of photos. He was so much younger then. His hair was darker and the crinkles around his eyes weren't as deep. Vicki was younger, too. Her hair was still the same straight blonde, but her thin, white face had no smile lines. They were abysmal now, running down from her nose to the outside corners of her mouth like a V… for Vicki.
“What did you think of the cafeteria food?” Vicki asked, tasting her casserole.
I spun my apple core between my fingers and watched her rinse the spoon off under the tap. “It was okay. Pricey, though.”