Page 42 of Patchwork
Diva circles her bowl, chirping at me like she’s gone hungry for days, but from the looks of things, Onyx must have fed her before he left. I pick up the bowl and rattle the kibble around, so she’ll think I’m adding more, then set it back down for her. Knowing that he stopped to feed my cat on his way out the door this morning does something funny to the inside of my chest.
My eyes snag on a piece of paper tucked half under the coffee maker. I pick it up, but before I can unfold it to read it, I hear the front door opening and closing, followed by the sound of Milo’s footsteps echoing down the hallway. I stuff the note into my back pocket without reading it.
“Morning, Pops,” he calls out. “I didn’t know if I should bring anything, and it’s my week to grocery shop, except I keep forgetting to go, so all I really had in the house were a couple of bananas that are probably ready to be bread, and a box of baking soda in the fridge. I brought the bananas, just in case.”
I chuckle as he steps into the kitchen, rambling the whole way, and sets the pair of brown bananas on the counter.
“Thanks. If you’re not married to the idea of blueberry waffles, I could make banana bread waffles instead,” I offer.
Milo grins. “Why not both?”
“Always a good call.” I turn to the refrigerator to start pulling out what I’ll need while Milo takes it upon himself to start the coffee.
“Living with Piston has made me such a coffee snob.” He wrinkles his nose at the store-brand ground coffee I have.
“Well, excuse me for not having freshly picked coffee beans from the hillsides of Peru or whatever the fuck.”
“You’re not excused,” he teases, and we both laugh.
Milo flits around my kitchen for a few minutes, petting Diva and opening random cabinets while I mix the waffle batter. Eventually he ends up leaning on the counter right next to where I’m working.
“So, this was random this morning. Not that I’m complaining, I’ll always take a free breakfast.” He dips his finger into the batter to taste it, and I bat his hand away. “Where’s Onyx?” He glances around, like Onyx will suddenly appear out of thin air when his name is spoken out loud.I wish. “I didn’t see his car outside.”
“He went back to Seattle,” I say gruffly.
“Oh, bummer. I thought he was sticking around for a while.” Milo sounds genuinely let down that Onyx isn’t here. And just like with Diva’s food bowl, the fact that Onyx has been taking the time to get so tight with my kid does funny things to my insides.
I clear my throat. “He says he’s coming right back. He just had some stuff to take care of.”
I can feel Milo’s eyes on me. I look up from pouring the batter into the waffle iron and find him squinting at me, like he’s trying to see between all the words I’m saying and get to the meaning behind them.
“We had a fight,” I blurt. “But that’s not why he left. At least, I don’t think it’s why… I don’t know, he said he had to leave and that’s what started the fight, I think.” I shake my head, not quite remembering the exact order of events last night. He said he was leaving before I acted like an ass, didn’t he?
“What did you do?” Milo asks with a sigh.
“Me? Why do you assume I’m the one who fucked up?”
He raises his eyebrows and purses his lips in response.
“Fine, it was mostly my fault. I don’t want to talk about it though. I don’t need relationship advice from my kid.”
He sputters a laugh. “One of us is in a successful long-term relationship.” He points at himself. “And one of us is making grumpy waffles.” He points at me.
“The waffles aren’t grumpy,” I grumble.
“Your grumpy energy while making them is turning them grumpy.”
“Can we stop saying grumpy?”
“Canyouact like an adult and tell me what you did, so I can tell you how to fix it and get Onyx back here? Because he’s amazing and you smile a lot when he’s around, and I don’t think you should let a good thing walk out the door because you’re too proud to ask for relationship advice ‘from your kid.’” He puts air quotes around the last part.
“Fine. I don’t actually know what happened though. He was in a weird mood at the open mic night, and then watching him perform just reminded me of all the reasons I can’t keep him around like I want to. When we got home, I think he saidsomething about needing to go to Seattle for a couple of days, and we got into it. He said I don’t even know him, and I don’t have a clue what I said other than dumbass shit. Then we went to bed, and now he’s gone.”
I focus on pulling the first waffle out of the waffle iron and adding a second while Milo ponders everything I just said.
“He said you don’t even know him? Why would he say that? Haven’t you guys known each other for years?”
I fiddle needlessly with the knobs on the waffle iron and grumble under my breath. That night with the dishes springs immediately to the front of my mind. He said something about me only seeing him as a rockstar.
