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“Calm down there, puppy,” I said, as he whined for more treats. I made him sit again and gave him another, but that was it. I distracted him from begging me for more by getting his loudest toy and throwing it across the room for him to chase. I burst out laughing when he skidded on the slick floor in his attempt to barrel after the toy. So cute and so enthusiastic.
I made myself a cup of herbal tea and fixed a quick snack as I unpacked my library books. I wanted to read them all at once, but that was physically impossible, so I sat down with the one that I wanted to read the most and cracked it open, completely ignoring the stack of books I’d bought with Emma on the day we’d gotten Vegas. I set a timer for myself because if I didn’t, I’d get completely lost in the world and be here reading for the next ten hours straight.
Vegas danced around with his toy and every now and then I’d look up and throw it for him. I couldn’t remember an afternoon like this during a weekday in forever. My new job had better vacation time, so I was definitely going to make days like this a priority in the future. Getting things done was important, but so was taking time to do a whole lot of nothing.
An hour later, I reluctantly put a bookmark between the pages and set the book down. It was one of the hardest things I’d ever had to do. The book was everything I wanted it to be and there wasn’t a dull moment to take a break, but I had stopped myself anyway. I had a quick stretch break and then went to the kitchen to figure out how to make an impressive dinner for when Emma came home. I always wanted to impress her because I felt like I failed so often at everything.
We had shrimp and chicken and peppers and kale and rice and quinoa and limes and barbecue sauce and a spice cabinet full of everything you could possibly want. I put a bunch of the ingredients into a search engine and decided to make barbecue shrimp over rice on a bed of kale. Healthy and delicious. I could pull this off, I was sure.
––––––––
EMMA WALKED IN THEdoor just as I had started to cry.
“What are you doing home?” she asked, and then she saw my tears and immediately dropped her backpack and came over to hug me.
“I’m sorry. I left work early because I had too much caffeine and then I was trying to make dinner and I ruined everything somehow.” I gestured to the burned shrimp and gluey rice. At least the kale was okay, but all I’d had to do was wash and put that on a plate.
“Aw, it’s okay. We can have chicken on a salad. It’s all defrosted and everything. Don't worry. Thank you for making dinner for me.” She rubbed my back and soothed my tears and I sniffed and tried to get my shit together. I didn’t know why little things going wrong always upset me more than bigger things.
“It’s fine,” I said, wiping my eyes. “I don’t know why I’m making such a big deal of things. I’m just being dramatic.” Emma squeezed my shoulders and looked down at the burned shrimp.
“You’re not. I remember when I was learning how to cook and I ruined an entire lasagna and I felt so horrible because the ingredients weren’t cheap and it was completely inedible. It’s okay, we can buy more shrimp. And maybe I have been remiss in not teaching you how to cook.” I shook my head.
“No, that’s on me. I’m a grown fucking adult and I should have learned on my own. Just because my parents didn’t want to teach me doesn’t mean I couldn’t get on the internet and figure it out.” In fact, I was going to do that. There were plenty of videos online that would break it down so simply so that a child could follow them. I could at least handle that.
Emma tossed the ruined food and I scrubbed out the pans in the sink as she got the chicken started in a pan with some lime juice and spices. She asked me to cut up some peppers, so I did that.
“How was your day?” I asked, because she’d been conspicuously silent.
“Good. I have a huge test next week, so I’m probably going to have my nose in the textbooks this weekend. Sorry.”
“That’s fine,” I said, trying not to chop my finger off. “Just let me know when you need breaks and I’ll bring you tea and take your mind off it. I can quiz you too.” Emma was a huge fan of flash cards and I had quizzed her dozens of times before.
“Sounds good. I’ll probably hit you up for that on Sunday.”
We lapsed into silence again and I could feel the tension in the room.
“Everything okay?” I asked. She turned around and gave me a startled look.
“Yeah, why?”
“Um, because of last night? And we’re not being like we usually are.” She stared at the chicken, pretending that she had to watch it as if that was the most important task in the world.
“What do you mean?” Okay, now she was just being obtuse. I sighed and she glanced up at me.
“You know what I mean, Emma. We had sex and you told me you loved me and now things are weird, which is probably why you waited for so long to tell me that you loved me in the first place. You probably could have done that without the sex, even though the sex was . . .” I trailed off because my brain tended to shut down when I thought about the sex. I’d done my bestnotto think about it because when I did, I forgot everything I was doing, including how to breathe. I dove headfirst into my memories and my face flushed and it became uncomfortable to be around people. Like they could see me thinking lusty thoughts about my best friend.
It was happening right now and I had to snap myself out of it.
“Are you okay? You look like you’re stoned. I’ve never seen you stoned, but this is probably what you would look like.” As she said it, I could feel my cheeks heat and I had to stare down at the peppers.
“I’m fine,” I said, chopping the peppers into smaller pieces.
“No you’re not, tell me.” This was probably a derailing tactic, but whatever. If she really wanted to know, I’d tell her.
“I was thinking about what it was like fucking you. I can’t stop thinking about it. I messed up so much stuff at work and the new girl had to keep asking me if I was okay because I’d trail off in the middle of a sentence because I was thinking about you.”
I wanted to see her face when I said it, so I made sure I was staring right into her eyes. They were a mix of blue-green right now.
