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7
Momma was sittingat the small, round, eat-in kitchen table with Mary.She seemed thinner than Katie remembered.Maybe it was the way she sat scrunched, with her shoulders slightly rounded.Katie leaned over to hug her, feeling her bony frame under the soft fabric of her plain cotton top.
“Momma,” she murmured, putting her lips on the weathered cheeks of the woman she had remembered as tall and strong when she was a toddler, tugging at her dress and playing hide and seek between her legs with her sister.
The hand reaching out to hold Katie’s arm was small, but the grip was strong.
“I’ve missed you,” her mother said in a firm voice.
“I know, Momma.But I’m here, and I promise I won’t be working this time,” Katie said, looking into the steely blue eyes of the woman who would hold her to her words.
Momma nodded slowly, as if sealing the agreement.
“Sit and have some hot chocolate,” Mary said as she pushed Katie’s favorite mug, the one with the kitties, toward her.
Katie moved to her seat, sliding in the worn chair with the frazzled weave on the backside.Momma threw nothing away as long as it was functional, ever since she could remember.They were poor.She wore Mary’s hand-me-downs, but she didn’t know any better.But things changed the year she had a growth spurt and caught up with Mary.From then on, they both got new clothes for school.
“We’re going to go shopping for Katie’s new outfit,” Mary said.She turned to Momma.“You wouldn’t believe what Laurie just did.”
“She talked Katie into going to her wedding?”Momma replied.
“Well, it’s more like arm-twisting and an order,” Katie said.
“She knows how hard you work,” Mary chimed in.
Katie laughed.“Oh, she did more than convince me to go.Laurie got me a date for her wedding, a plus one.”
“Who?Don’t keep me waiting,” Momma said.
“You’ll never guess.”Katie took a breath.“It—it’s Chase.”
“She hasn’t seen him in ten years,” Mary interjected, giving a wink.
Katie felt the heat on her cheeks.Chase was her old boyfriend.They knew that.But they also knew about the breakup right before she went off to college in the city.It’d taken her years to forget him.She had thrust herself into her studies, and later, her work.Seeing him after all these years was going to be awkward.
