sauce, which Vivi had been thinking of taking over to Willa’s as a peace offering, ruined.
And what if Vivi hadn’t gotten out of bed? What if the kitchen had caught fire; what if flames had engulfed Money Pit while Vivi—and Leo—were sleeping? They would all be dead!
Back in the kitchen, Vivi caught sight of her bottle of Casa Dragones tequila on the side counter next to a shot glass. She felt a formidable strain of fury brewing inside her. That tequila was hers; she wouldn’t even let her (almost-ex-) boyfriend, Dennis, make margaritas with it. Carson had come home, put the pasta on a burner, done two—or three?—shots of Vivi’s tequila, which Carson knew was not for public consumption, and then left the pasta to burn on the stove.
Vivi marched back up the stairs and pounded on Carson’s locked door.
“You left the pan on an open flame!” Vivi said. Leo would definitely be awake now, which Vivi felt bad about because it was Saturday morning, but oh, well. “What is wrong with you, Carson? Do you honestly not think about anyone but yourself? Do you not think, period?” There was no response. Vivi kicked the door.
“Please go away” came the response from inside. “I’m trying to sleep.”
“And you drank my tequila!” Vivi said. “Which you know is off-limits.”
“I didn’t drink the tequila,” Carson said. “I haven’t had a drink since I left the Chicken Box and that was hours ago.”
Vivi blinked. Carson sounded like she was telling the truth and she had seemed sober. “Who drank it, then?”
There was a pause before Carson said, “Well, who else lives here?”
Leo? Vivi thought. She looked at Leo’s bedroom door, which was shut tight. Leo had been going to high-school parties since he was a sophomore, but a run-in with Jägermeister had propelled him away from the hard stuff. He drank Bud Light and the occasional White Claw.
Vivi turned back to Carson’s door. “You are scrubbing that pot, young lady,” she said. “Or buying me a new one.”
After Vivi poured herself some coffee, opened all the windows, turned both sailcloth ceiling fans to high, washed the shot glass, and hid what remained of the Casa Dragones in the laundry room (her kids would never find it there), she calmed down a bit. She was the mother of three very young adults and parenting very young adults required just as much patience as parenting very young children. No one ever talked about this; it felt like a dirty little secret. Vivi had always imagined that by the time her kids were twenty-four, twenty-one, and eighteen, they’d all be drinking wine together around the outdoor table by the pool, and the kids would be cooking, clearing, and giving Vivi sage investment advice. Ha.
Vivi ties up her running shoes and stretches her hamstrings, using the bumper of her Jeep—then she clicks on her iTunes on her phone and takes off.
Carson makes Vivi’s running playlists, which she has named Nine-Pound Hammer, Strawberry Cough, and White Fire OG. (It took Vivi a while to figure out that these were all strains of marijuana, probably the ones that Carson was smoking when she made the respective playlists.)
Today, Vivi listens to Nine-Pound Hammer. Shuffle.
The first song is “All That and More,” by Rainbow Kitten Surprise. The best thing about Carson as DJ is that Vivi is exposed to music she never would have heard otherwise. Over the past few months Vivi has become an avid fan of this song; it’s both folksy and bouncy. All I ever wanted was to make you happy…
Just as Vivi turns the volume up, her phone whistles with a text from Dennis, her (almost-ex-) boyfriend, who is out deep-sea fishing. The text is a picture of Dennis in his wraparound sunglasses smiling, revealing the gap between his two front teeth. He’s holding up a striped bass. The caption says Dinner!
Vivi doesn’t answer. A week or so earlier, she told Dennis that she needed some space, and she asked him not to spend the night at her house anymore. Predictably, this resulted in Dennis giving Vivi even less space than usual. He texts and calls and “checks in” and assumes Vivi will want to grill up the striped bass he’s caught. Poor Dennis. Vivi met him three years ago when he came to Money Pit to give her an estimate for central air. (Dennis owns a small HVAC company.) The AC was beyond Vivi’s budget, but there had been chemistry between them and they started dating.