had never quite been able to meet. Expectations her younger brother Brad didn’t seem to have. While Stacy’s father had disappeared, unapologetically, into his career in the city, her mother had raised two children essentially on her own. She’d found time to look after her family, volunteer at their school, entertain her husband’s clients, help out in the community, and had made it all appear effortless. Stacy, on the other hand, had always felt as if she was running three hours behind. Since she could never meet her mother’s expectations, eventually she stopped trying.
“‘The General?’” Ryan reached for an orange section and popped it into his mouth. “You sure you’re not exaggerating? I think your mother is delightful.”
It was one of the things that had attracted Stacy to Ryan in the first place: his inability to believe anyone had ulterior motives. His family, a rowdy Irish Catholic bunch from south Boston, was the same way. Seven brothers and sisters, every one of them loud and straight-talking. Ryan’s family, and the way they interacted, was what made Stacy want to have a big brood of her own. She imagined chaotic Christmases like the ones at his parents’ house, everyone teasing and talking over each other. It took some convincing, but Ryan finally agreed when Stacy offered to quit her job to stay at home with their children.
“First of all”—she frowned at him—“no one under sixty years old says ‘delightful,’ so I don’t know who you’ve been hanging out with.” She returned to her task of slicing oranges.
“And second?”
“‘Second’ what?” Stacy glanced up.
“You said ‘first of all.’ That implies a second thing. What’s the second thing?”
“No idea.” Stacy shrugged. At almost four months pregnant with their third child, she’d grown used to forgetting just about everything. For her, the first trimester was nausea and the second was senility.
Stacy glanced at the clock, then out the window at the gathering rainclouds. The last game of the regular season before school let out for the summer. She’d hoped for better weather. Blue skies and summer sunshine were late coming this year; most of May had been dreary and spattered with rain.
She laid her knife on the cutting board, then called down the hallway to her son’s room. “Connor, let’s get going. Archie and his mom will be here any minute to drive you to the game.”
Turning her attention back to the task at hand, she surveyed the contents of her kitchen and mentally ran through the list she’d been given. Three oversized plastic containers packed with freshly sliced oranges, zipped plastic bags stuffed with string cheese, two cases of juice pouches—all of it covered every available inch of counterspace. Near the front door was a case of bottled water for the players and a tub of oatmeal cookies for after the game. As she arranged the snacks inside the team’s logoed insulated bags, she felt a bit wistful for a simpler time, when packing a snack for her son’s activities meant throwing some apple slices and graham crackers into a pocket of his diaper bag. This required planning, shopping, and prep.
She crossed the living room with the first of the bags, pausing to look out the big picture windows that overlooked the arboretum. She and Ryan had chosen this apartment specifically for the view of the canopy in the arboretum as the seasons changed: branches tipped with snow in the winter, bright-green leaves emerging in the spring, and a blanket of vibrant oranges and yellows in the fall.
“You need me to pack anything?” Ryan offered as he followed her to the kitchen.
“No, it’s all done.” She nudged the bag with her foot. “Can you bring this to the front door with the rest of the stuff please? Melissa will be here any minute to take the boys to the game. This is the last thing to go.”
Ryan walked over and surveyed the pile by the front door with a critical eye. “You have food enough here to supply a military campaign. How many days are the kids playing for?”
“Same as usual. About an hour.”
“Big production for an hour.” Ryan lifted the bag and carried it to the front door. “I can’t believe I’m going to say this, but when I was a kid, playing soccer meant bringing a ball to a vacant lot and kicking it around with a bunch of kids until a fight broke out. Then we went home.”
“When you were a kid, Lynn and Denise weren’t in charge of the snack