Mom set down the black lumps of banana coal near the small sink. “I can’t have my daughters going hungry!”
Given the strong smell of burnt bananas, we definitely were going to go hungry. Olivia, who was too sweet to ever hurt anyone’s feelings even with the truth, reached for a charred hockey puck and gently nibbled the edge.
“Mmmm—good,” she said, lying straight to Mom’s face.
Mom offered me one. “Go on, then!” she demanded.
“They’re burnt,” I told Mom, because I wasn’t going to lie to save her feelings. I never did. It was why, more often than not, I was the problem child.
“They’re welldone,” Mom clarified. When I didn’t take one, she shrugged and put the muffin tray down again on the tabletop. She flashed me a smile. “I’m just so glad you’re home.”
Mom hated every second I lived away. When I’d first left to go to college, she’d burst into tears at Northwestern’s iron gate and hugged me for a good ten minutes straight, loudly imploring me to avoid muggers and dealers of the sex trade. She was convinced Chicago was 100 percent criminals, human traffickers, and graffiti.
I glanced out the Airstream’s window and could see just over the waist-high bamboo fencing that lined the Zen garden with sandy patches and pebbled walkways Dad had created in the backyard for the family’s Koi Inn, so named for the heated koi pond at the center of the Japanese garden Mom designed and helped Dad install.A small wooden footbridge spanned the kidney-shaped pond in the middle.
They’d used the last of Mom’s modeling money to buy the inn and lived here happily hosting tourists for the last thirty years. From this window, I could see Lake Sanguis’s Main Street, which was pretty empty now that the tourist season was over.
“I forgot how quiet it is here,” I said.
“Isn’t it wonderful?” Mom gushed.
No, it wasn’t. I missed the hustle and bustle of Chicago. The traffic. The profanity. Hell, even the rats. It felt unfair that I was missing autumn there, my favorite time of year. A few tourists would return to Lake Sanguis for hayrides in nearby apple orchards and then, of course, ice fishing in January, but most would stay gone until Memorial Day.
The only shop with any customers now was Gordon’s Frozen Custard, which, despite the cool temperatures outside, boasted several customers waiting patiently for their turn to eat a double chocolate custard waffle cone. Or, more likely, a famous mudpack: the blended chocolate, vanilla, fudge, and walnut delight too thick to be sucked through a straw.
“Lake Sanguis is right out of a Hallmark movie, minus the hot owner of a Christmas tree farm,” Mom quipped.
“That’s why I hate it so much, then,” I retorted. “I don’t believe in meeting dates at tree farms. That’s why I use my Spark app,” I said.
“No!” Mom cried, looking horrified. “You can’t use Spark.”
I used Spark all the time. It was the dating hookup—emphasis onhookup—app. Since I ran from anything looking remotely like a commitment beyond a coffee date, it was perfect for me.
“Why can’t I?”
“Because there are strangers on there,” Mom said.
“That’s kind of the idea, Mom. I wouldn’t want to sleep with relatives.”
“Ophelia!” Mom scolded. “The Spark app is how women get kidnapped andmurdered. I know for a fact that Spark is filled with degenerates and serial killers.”
“Mom, you’ve got to stop watchingDateline,” Olivia said.
“I just saw an episode last week where a woman met someone on Spark, and he drugged her and zip-tied her in the back seat…” Mom paused. “And, well, it was very bad.”
And you wonder why I was a tad bit obsessed with true crime. At least I came by it honestly.
“And I can’t believe you’d even think about using Spark in Chicago.” Mom shuddered. “Who knows what kind of monster you’d meet.”
“Mostly just cannibals,” I said dryly.
Mom gawked at me.
“I’m kidding, Mom!”
“No more Spark,” Mom said firmly.
“I like Spark,” I said. “Also, you can’t actually tell me what to do.”
