What had people done before ice cream? Take my phone or iPad away any day. But ice cream? That was something I wasn’t sure I could live without.

As if it heard my thoughts, my iPhone began vibrating on the coffee table, disturbing the Zen-like calm I’d created for my party of one.

Picking it up, I smiled immediately when I saw the caller ID. Did parents have a built-in radar that detected when their children were in distress? Was that installed during delivery? If not, my mother was just naturally gifted because she seemed to be able to sense my mood, even from a thousand miles away.

“Hi, Mom,” I said after stuffing another bite of ice cream in my mouth.

“Did I catch you in the middle of supper? I always forget about the time difference. Isn’t it kind of late there?”

I looked at the clock on the cable box and shook my head. “It’s eight o’clock, Mom.”

“Well, I know. I just meant that it’s a little late for supper.”

I could hear the concern in her voice.

“I’m fine. It just took me a while to get home after work, and Tyler had dinner with a client.”

“You didn’t go?”

More concern.

“No,” I answered, trying to sound light and happy. “I went with him yesterday, and I am still a bit tired from being out late, so I thought I’d stay in. His job really is exhausting.”

“And how is your job? First day go all right?”

I let out a small sigh as I pictured her sitting in the kitchen of our old house. She’d no doubt be fiddling with the long cord, winding it around her fingers, as she spoke and listened. I’d tried to talk them into getting a cordless phone over the years, especially around the age of twelve when the phone had become increasingly important to my social life, but they’d never budged.

The wall phone worked perfectly well, so why buy a new one?

But I knew that was a little white lie of theirs. They’d liked seeing me on the floor of the hallway or curled up on the chair of the kitchen table, talking to my friends, rather than hiding in my bedroom. It’d kept them close to me during my teen years, and I guessed, in return, I’d stayed close to them.

“It went as good as could be expected. I think I might be a little in over my head.”

“Why do you say that?” she asked.