Back in Cherrywood

Summer's End

'Your brain can't even perform basic functions before you've had coffee, can it?' Mia teased her. Liane took a sip and looked around. She must have dozed off in her thoughts for some time, she couldn't even tell how long it had been, but it was clearly long enough for Mia to get up, go to the kitchen and prepare fresh coffee, and heat up the milk! She didn't even hear her make any noise. Scary.

'Mom?' Mia looked half concerned, half bemused. 'Did you doze off again?' Liane suddenly snapped out of it and took a huge gulp of her coffee.

'Yes! I don't know what it is today, but I just keep losing track.'

Mia just rolled her eyes, swiftly turned around to take a sip of her own coffee and then turned back to her mother with a devious smile.

'Are you ready to do this?'

Liane looked slightly confused at her daughter as she took another big sip. Mia's smile brightened as she started saying 'Alexa, play The Libertines'. Don't look back into the sun came up and Liane exhaled aloud 'No! No, it's too early for that!'.

'Come on, finish that coffee and let's get crackin!' Mia laughed and immediately launched into taking out all the books from their living room shelf. Liane looked at her daughter swing her hands around to the music as she grabbed the next pile of books. Ah, to be young again...and have more energy, she thought.

To be fair, Mia had had a much more relaxed Friday than her mother. She had gotten used to Liane's long hours, and had made waiting on Friday night for her a ritual. She wasn't into partying, not that any of her friends really were, and she wasn't even that much into going out at all. She had made it a beloved habit of going straight back home after her 3 pm Italian class, changing into her running gear, and going for a solid ten kilometer run around the Tiergarten park, and on her last lap, order a meaty burger that would usually arrive just in time for her to take a quick shower and enjoy it with a new epsiode of How To Get Away With Murder, or now that it was summer, something from the classics. Twin Peaks had recently become her favorite, although depending on how tired she would be after her run, she'd opt for something lighter such as The Fresh Prince Of Bel Air or Friends, although her mother would teasingly get offended at her calling it an 'oldie'. 'Do you mean I am an oldie too?' She would ask in an especially dramatic manner. She'd never think her mother is old, or classic. In fact, Liane sometimes reminded her more of a teenager than she did herself. It was probably not fair, every teenager thinks they're more mature than they are, she thought. But when her mother would throw hissy fits over a silly plot line in a film, or would pretend to cry when she couldn't get something to work (the delivery app, their Alexa device, or even sometimes her own excel sheets), Mia couldn't help but think this is not very adult behaviour. But most of the time she didn't mind, she'd always prefer her mother's behaviour to how some of her school friends' mothers behaved. They all looked very elegant and sophisticated, but they didn't seem like the type of parent you could come to for comfort or advice. When she was younger she thought she would want to be one of those sophisticated, poised women who always wore heels, cashmere sweaters and had their hair perfectly fall into waves on the side of their shoulders. They always smelled like a walking Sephora and had shiny long nails. Not too long to be gross, but long enough so it was obvious they didn't do any housework. Strange how her mother had gotten her into the habit of paying attention to such detail. 'Do you see how that woman's eye liner curls up at the edge there? You can tell it was a cheap eye liner, look how it's already chipping away and it's not even noon yet.' her mother would comment - on strangers, on TV presenters, anyone really. She also had the incredible ability of knowing if a fabric was natural and of good quality by looking at it. They would be out shopping and Mia would grab something with a sparkle in her eyes, and within seconds she'd hear her mom exclaim 'oh, that's great quality!' 'Are you sure?' Mia would ask, and Liane would reach to touch the fabric and say, 'yes, that's silk, I'm sure.' And she usually would be. She'd only get it wrong when it was a blend of fabrics, but she never mistook polyester for nylon or some other fabric. Unlike Mia, who wouldn't even bother checking, and then come home with a handful of tops that would look like a different color entirely after a few washes. That was one of the adult things Liane did. She may have been silly and sometimes even childish, but she did have those adulting senses, as Mia would call them. 'When I'll be able to recognize the quality of a fabric, I'll know I'm a grown up' Mia would jokingly say, although she was dead serious. She always thought it's one of those things that just magically happens when you're grown up. Sort of like knowing how to put Ikea furniture together without a manual and fixing a broken cabinet. But that was still far off, Mia thought. Right now she'd have to get through this move and get used to a new school, new kids, new traditions and new rules...Yet again. At this point, it was almost routine to her. They had been living in Berlin for a solid four years now, so long that her mother had started remembering the German her family had taught her in her childhood, and Mia had started going to the cinema for German speaking movies recently. But Mia was actually a little relieved, Berlin had become tiring and she always thought the program at her American High School wasn't strong enough to help her get into a top tier university. She had dreamed of the London School Of Economics when they still lived in the UK, it felt like the go-to Law School of Europe, but more than anything she just wanted to get into a school that would help her get a job with Humans Right Watch. She couldn't quite remember when she came up with that dream, but she had always felt like she wanted to do something of substance, she didn't necessarily have to change the world, but she wanted to be part of the change. It was aspirational and idealistic maybe, but she always believed in dreaming big. After all, her mother had broken down many barriers in her job and Mia, although she'd never admit it, was often in awe of what a great life Liane built for them, as a single mother no less. That's why she never complained when they moved, or when she had to help her mother with chores or her soggy pancake days. She did often wish she could see her father more often and she did fantasize about having a traditional family, a house, two cars, maybe a pet or a sibling. But as she got older she realized the need came only from wanting to fit in. The majority of her friends were from traditional families, usually with multiple siblings and happily married parents. Well, at least they were still married, how happy some of them were, was debatable. It's not that she was completely OK with how things were, and she did miss having two parents, family around, or even people she could call 'childhood friends' or 'friends from Kindergarten'. She did wish for a more stable, traditional life pretty often, but she also recognized that the way they were living was special and she always felt like she was different, so why fight it. But this time was different. They would be living on a completely different continent, where things were probably very different from any country in Europe. 'America is very different' people kept telling her the past few months as they had heard the news, 'you will need some time to adjust'. That's what they all said, but no one said how! Or what was so different! She knew the food would be different, it would be crazier, as her friend Kerstin kept saying. She only based that opinion on the snacks Liane would bring back from her business trips to the US. It's not that they were crazier, they were just flashier, sweeter, they were more. More colorful, more sweet, more salty, more unhealthy than what they had in Europe. But it's not like all food there would be like this, Mia thought, after all aren't they also obsessed over fitness and wellness, and diets and the sorts? She was sure it would be fine and far less shocking than everyone made it out to be. 'It's still the Western world' Liane would roll her eyes whenever she'd hear these comments. Liane may not have lived in the US since the nineties, but she still felt American at her core, at least most of the time. And while she had also started feeling European over the years, and frowned upon some American peculiarities, she could get pretty defensive of her home country.