I put my dishes in the sink, told Rex to be a good hamster, and I set off for my parents’ house with my garbage bag of stink-bomb clothes. There are washers and dryers in the basement of my building, but I’m pretty sure trolls live there.

My grandmother was sitting with her foot up on a kitchen chair when I walked in.

“How’s the foot?” I asked.

“It’s a pain in the keister. I’m tired of hearing clomp, clomp, clomp. And it takes me a half hour to go up the stairs. And it hurts if I walk on it too much, so I’m sitting around going nuts. I’m not used to sitting around.” She leaned forward and wrinkled her nose. “Holy cow, who let one go? What’s that smell?”

I held up the garbage bag. “My clothes were in the wrong place at the wrong time. They need washing.”

“Leave them on the back porch,” my mother said. “I’ll do them later.”

“We got coffee cake,” Grandma said to me. “And there’s some breakfast sausages in the refrigerator.”

“Thanks,” I said, “but I just ate breakfast.”

My mother and grandmother looked at me.

“You ate breakfast?” my mother asked. “I thought you broke up with Joseph.”

Morelli isn’t Martha Stewart, but it’s a known fact he’s more organized than I am. Morelli almost always has food in his house. When we’re a couple, and I spend the night, I eat breakfast at his little wooden kitchen table. Sometimes it’s leftover pizza and sometimes it’s a frozen toaster waffle. And Morelli is always the one to start coffee brewing, because Morelli is always the first one up. His kitchen is almost identical to my mom’s, but it feels entirely different. He’s refinished the wood floor and put in new cabinets. The lighting is pleasant, and the counters are for the most part uncluttered in Morelli’s house. My mom’s kitchen hasn’t changed much since I was a kid. Some new appliances, and new curtains on the back window. The floor is vinyl tile. The counters are Formica. The cabinets are maple. And the kitchen smells like coffee, apple pie, and bacon even when my mother isn’t cooking.

“I ate breakfast at home,” I said.

“Are you pregnant?” Grandma asked. “Sometimes women do strange things when they’re pregnant.”

“I’m not pregnant! I went shopping and got orange juice and Rice Krispies, and I ate breakfast at home. Jeez. It’s not like I never eat at home.”

“You only got one pot,” Grandma said.

“I had more pots, but they got wrecked when my stove caught fire.” I put the garbage bag on the back porch and took a seat at the table with Grandma. “Maybe just one piece of coffee cake,” I said.

Two pieces of cake and two cups of coffee later, I pushed back and stood.

“I need Lula to help me decorate this big black boot,” Grandma said. “I think it needs some of that glitter, or some rhinestones. Lula has a real flare for fashion.”