Almost There

- 2 -

Tess was putting the dishes away as her mother prepared to cook dinner. As usual, the first step in this process was a critical review of the organization in the pantry. Tess's mom had rearranged the pantry half a dozen times since they'd moved into this house, and she still did not seem happy. As Tess gathered up the silverware, her mom was giving the canned goods a severe look, her hands on her hips.

"What's for supper?" Tess asked. She frowned as she realized she'd opened the wrong drawer...again. When would she get used to this new kitchen? She reached for the right drawer and began to arrange forks, spoons, and butter knives into the silverware holder.

"Well, I've got some chicken thighs and a couple cans of chickpeas, so I think I'll do a little chicken bake thing," her mom said. "What are you feeling? Lemon and rosemary? Oregano? Or should we do something spicy?"

"I'm always up for spicy," Tess said, "but Dad might have a different opinion."

"Well, he's not here to voice an opinion." Her mom turned away from the pantry, chickpeas in hand. She bumped the door closed with her hip. The canned tomatoes and boxes of cereal were safe from her repeated reorganizations, at least for now. She smiled at Tess. "And besides, he won't be home until 8:00."

"Oh. Work?"

"Work." Clarette began to rummage through the spice rack, pulling out some of her favorites.

"That new job..." Tess began, but she trailed off, uncertain how to finish her thought.

"...is hard on him. I know, baby. But people need dentists; I'm sure lots of people appreciate the late hours on week nights."

Tess didn't respond. Having emptied the dishwasher, she took the few dirty dishes that had accumulated in the sink and loaded them in. "How is your job going, Mom?"

Her mom had opened a small, unlabeled glass jar and was giving the contents a sniff. She liked to grind and mix her own spices and often had a dozen jars going at a time. "Oh, you know. Same as it always was."

But that was a lie, and Tess knew it. Nothing about their family was the same, and it never would be again.

Cooking with Clarette, a recipe blog, had been her mom's dream and pet project. Before Clarette had started a family, she'd gone to culinary school and had worked in the kitchen at a very nice restaurant, hoping to be an accomplished chef someday. The crazy hours of the restaurant industry had made it challenging to balance work and family, and she'd deferred her dream to raise her daughters.

Then, five years ago or so, she'd launched the blog. It had been very popular and had reinvigorated Clarette's passion for cooking. But the blog had taken a hiatus for nearly half a year, and coming back to something like that wasn't easy. Tess didn't know all the details, but she knew that getting Cooking with Clarette started up again had stressed her mother out to the max, just like working under another dentist was stressing out her dad. Back home—their old home—her dad had had a small practice of his own with limited hours.

Everything was different now.

Tess reached for the pendant on the necklace she wore: a gold ballet slipper. Closing her fingers around it, she searched for something to say to break the awkward tension that had risen up between them. "Is this a new recipe, then?"

"I think so. We'll see how it goes. If it's good, we'll make it a couple more times. Get it ready for publishing. You okay with testing another recipe?"

"You know I'm always up to be your food tester, Mom."

Her mom turned her attention to assembling the rest of the ingredients for dinner, and Tess, free of homework for the first time in weeks, settled down on a stool at the kitchen island and thumbed through one of her mother's thousands of recipe books, all of them well-worn and liberally scribbled with additions and variations.

She wasn't reading, though. She was thinking about the first day of school, which was coming up fast, and how she'd survive senior year.

Some time later, Clarette broke into Tess's thoughts. "I think we'll have a salad, too. I've got some romaine and some gorgeous tomatoes. Want to mix up a quick dressing, Jules?"

Tess looked up in shock, feeling as if ice water had been splashed down her back. She looked at her mother, who had bent down to slide their dinner into the oven. Her mom paused with the dish halfway onto the rack, and Tess knew she'd realized what she'd said.

"Sure," Tess said in half a voice.

Clarette stood up and closed the oven door. She leaned against the counter, her head lowered.

"Mom? I can help." Tess stood up.

The quivering of her mom's shoulders revealed what she was trying to hide by not speaking. She was crying.

Tess went to the fridge to pull out the ingredients for a salad dressing, fumbling to find the mustard as she blinked back her own tears.