Stranger, Father, Beloved by Taylor Larsen Page B

although in slight disrepair from age, was larger than many in the neighborhood. In Ryan’s opinion, the kitchen was by far the best place in the house. Jill had added midnight-blue tiles a few years back, one of her many solo projects, producing a fresh, comfortable space. Large windows lined the two walls and afforded a niceview of the small yard. Jill said she used the extra bedroom as a study, although she didn’t have much to do there except pay the bills.
    Carol had already gone to bed, tired from a lacrosse game she had played that evening. Right on schedule, she had come down to the kitchen to take her plate of food up to her room. As she hauled it away, she turned and gave the two of them a little salute before going back up to bed. Carol’s conduct was getting stranger by the day as she became more stoic, more robotic in her routines; eating and sleeping were carried out on a tight schedule.
    Blueberries and raspberries, freshly washed and shining with little beads of water, waited in green baskets next to the piecrust. Ryan’s homework was finished, and the next day was a Saturday. Jill rolled out the crusts, swaying her body back and forth to the music. The night seemed endless, free from pressures. Heat seeping from the oven warmed Ryan’s feet as she stood by Jill.
    â€œI don’t know what to do about Carol. She seems so unhappy, doesn’t she?” Jill asked as she pressed her fingers into some of the knots in the dough. She tore off a little edge of the dough and put it into her mouth.
    â€œYeah.”
    â€œShe won’t talk to me.”
    â€œGo to more of her games. That would make her happy.” Ryan reached out, separated a corner from the dough, and, like Jill, popped it into her mouth. The flavor, yeast with a sweetness to it, dissolved onto her tongue once it was moistened by the saliva.
    â€œAm I an embarrassing mother, Ryan?” Jill turned to face her.
    â€œYou’re better than my parents. I wish I lived here with you. Let’s swap. We can put Carol at my place, and I can stay here.”
    â€œShhh . . . not so loud, she could hear you,” Jill said, attempting sternness, but as she said it she was smiling. It was clear that the thoughthad crossed her mind. There was something about the way Jill treated her daughter, and she Jill, that gave Ryan the creeps. There was a lack of warmth to their exchanges and an overall coldness in Jill that Ryan found entirely unnatural. Jill seemed to come fully alive only with Ryan, as if she were capable of giving her love to only one person at a time. At times it angered Ryan, the subtle way Jill ignored her daughter.
    â€œMaybe I could move into the third bedroom—you know, the one you use as a study?” She said it in a lighthearted manner but watched Jill for traces of possibility. Jill smiled, and it did seem to Ryan that it might be an idea that could take form.
    Lately, at night, it was getting harder and harder to leave Jill’s and return home. Ryan now had her own small domain around the large sand-colored basement couch, an area exclusively hers. Carol never came down there, Jill slept on the second floor, and after hours of company, Ryan was allowed to lie down there alone and read or drift into a nap before going home. A white flannel blanket was always folded neatly over the back of the couch, waiting for her. A large glass coffee table sat next to the couch, and gray wall-to-wall carpeting covered the floor. The basement had a bathroom adjacent to the main room, and it was equipped with a clean bathtub. More and more, as she lay on the couch, sinking into the soft cushions, covered by her blanket, leaving seemed inconceivable. Out of the corner of her eye, she would see a full glass of ice water on the coffee table beside her. If she fell asleep and woke up thirsty, it would be there for her.
    Ryan went over and took the bottle of vodka from the cabinet next to the