It’s Sunday morning again. I take the eggs out of the icebox, along with a slab of bacon and a loaf of sweetbread to make breakfast for Koji and Daniel. The rain suddenly splatters against the kitchen window and I hope it passes quickly so that we can work outside later. We often spend the morning after breakfast cutting branches and pulling weeds, taming the wildness that’s my yard. I smile at the thought. I slice the bacon and lay the strips down sizzling across the hot cast iron skillet. A moment later, the savory aroma of frying bacon fills the kitchen. For years now, ever since Nori found out Koji came down from Puli on Sunday mornings, she insists on giving me more bacon than I need. “Fair trade for the mangoes, yeah,” she says.

Nori’s generosity is boundless. I know a basket or two of mangoes isn’t a fair exchange, since I give her mangoes from the tree every year, anyway. Little has changed between us since we were young girls. And maybe that’s what she means, we give and take, finding balance through the years. We’ve always taken care of each other, from her stormy childhood through Franklin’s disappearance to raising our boys together. We’re closer than sisters. Not born to be, yeah, Nori likes to say, but chosen to be.

* * *

The kitchen hums with activity, the crackling and sizzling, percolating sounds of breakfast being made. It’s something I’ve done a thousand times, but this morning it feels new. I wipe my hands on my apron and begin slicing a papaya. Daniel sleeps through it all, the hard sleep of a growing boy. He’s almost eleven and already tall and thin like his father. The table is set, three plates, and a bowl for Daniel’s cereal. I lay the crisp strips of bacon on a plate and crack the eggs into a bowl. As soon as Koji arrives, I’ll scramble them the way he likes, thickened but still runny.

I don’t hear a sound from Daniel’s room so I take a moment to sit down and savor a cup of coffee. Not long after that I hear Koji’s truck pull into the driveway. I immediately stand, smoothing my apron. It’s become a habit for me to walk out to the front porch to meet him. When I open the door, I’m greeted by a gust of fresh air smelling of wet earth, ginger, and plumeria now that the rain has stopped. In a few hours it’ll be hot and muggy again.