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When we reached the doorstep of my house, I fiddled with the collar of Justin’s jacket.
“Any chance you don’t want this back?” I asked.
“Bring your own, cheapskate,” he laughed, pulling me close to unzip it. I shrugged it off, and even though he was depriving me of what was rightfully mine, I took the opportunity to kiss his cheek.
He flushed — and he runs hot, so he couldn’t blame the cold.
“I had fun today,” he said, scratching the back of his neck, smile small but making those brown eyes of his so soft that my chest felt tight.
“Me too. Feel free to lend me your jacket again sometime.” He rolled his eyes and opened his mouth, but I added, “Hey, I’ve got date privileges, you can’t back out now.”
“The date’s over,” he said, tilting his head. “But I’d be alright giving you my jacket if you wanted to do it again.”
“Sounds perfect.”
He squeezed my hand as he started down the street, and whatever it looked like, I was very glad Sophie couldn’t see my face right then.
“See you on Monday, Kai,” he called.
“Yeah, I’ll call you tonight.”
It wasn’t as if he needed to be cooler, but the white bomber jacket emphasized every sharp thing — the floppy haircut, the just-baggy-enough black jeans, the almost-too-tight shirt in a tan shade that also complemented his hair — that most teenagers could only sell on Halloween. Justin, on the other hand, looked like he could pull off a rose between his teeth and probably turn anyone’s head in the process. Even without the jacket, though, I was too busy having my own head turned the entire time, so I couldn’t be sure. All in all, I thought I might let him keep it the next time so I could enjoy the view.
I got my keys from my pocket and unlocked the door, pausing with one foot in the house when the first thing I saw was Mom marching down the hall.
The next things were Dad shaking his head and the bright In-n-Out logos flashing from the mostly empty wrappers and boxes scattered on the table. Our marble countertops were as tidy as usual, with not a toaster out of place, but Mom had left her chair so far out I could’ve tripped over it, and the tiniest parts of both of their burgers lay uneaten.
“Hey, Dad,” I said, and it sounded more like a question. “What’s up with Mom?”
“Your father and I are having an argument,” she yelled from another room.
“I wouldn’t call it an argument,” said Dad. “More of a debate, really.”
“Either way, you started it,” Mom replied, returning with her laptop. She paused her tirade to hug me. “How was your date?”
I smiled, twisting the cuff of my sleeve. “It was…really nice.”
“That’s it?” Dad said after a beat.
“I…yeah? I don’t…”
He just passed me his milkshake and smirked.
“What?”
“Absolutely nothing,” Mom said, bumping her shoulder into mine.
I quickly took a drink of the milkshake and asked, “So what’s going on with your argument?”
“We were having lunch after your siblings left the table, and I pointed out that French fries aren’t actually from France.” Mom sat down next to me, raising an eyebrow at Dad.
“Then Dad said that most foods with places in their names probably didn’t come from those places.”
“Which Mom thinks is wrong, so now she has a point to prove,” Dad finished.
I blinked at them, but eventually popped a guilty fry in my mouth. “Okay then.”
Mom opened the laptop and, after a few seconds of searching, announced, “Kentucky Fried Chicken is very much from Kentucky.”
“Point for you,” coughed Dad, lips twitching. “If you want to talk fast food, how about hamburgers?”
She turned it so he could see the screen. It took us all a second to read it, but Dad was the first to finish.
“‘While the inspiration for the hamburger did come from Hamburg, the sandwich concept was invented much later,’” he read. “‘During the Industrial Revolution, factory workers were served Hamburg steak from food carts. They proved difficult to eat while standing, so one creative cook sandwiched the meat patty between two slices of bread.’”
He grinned at Mom, who rolled her eyes.
“You can’t let him win on technicalities,” I whispered loudly, returning the face Dad made.
Mom, on the other hand, chewed a fry thoughtfully. “Any ideas?”
I thought about what we’d eaten in the past few weeks. Unless there was a place called “blue” somewhere, most of our diet didn’t fit the bill. Near the beach, though, we had a handful of restaurants in circulation. One of the only places we’d never eaten at was the sushi place at the end of the pier, given that Dad had cut out seafood when he found out about good old Grandpa. Still, I knew enough about sushi rolls to remember the alternatives.
“California rolls,” I said. “I don’t think they’d be from the US.”
Mom obliged, but shook her head. “When I said ‘ideas,’ sweetheart, I meant ideas that would help.”
“Hey, it might.”
“He’s just here to cause chaos,” said Dad. I blinked as innocently as possible, but that had never worked before and it didn’t start then.
Mom scoffed at the results and turned the screen again.
“It’s from California and Canada,” she said. “Still doesn’t help either of us.”
“Well, we can’t end in a tie,” he replied.
“It’s not a tie, I got KFC.”
“And I got French fries.”
“Are we counting that?”
“It is a tie,” I interrupted, “and you’re right, we need to fix that. Mom should pick.”
“You’re just as generous as your father, aren’t you,” she said dryly.
Dad exaggerated a bow as he stood and went to open the fridge.
“I’ve taught him well.” He gestured at Mom to join him. “See if you can find any ideas in here.”
They (meaning mostly Mom) looked around for a minute or two, shoving with their elbows and snickering and probably heckling each other. I occupied myself with the milkshake and wondered if I should grab Ollie — he’s always better at subtly driving them insane. Not that I had any complaints about the entertainment, but I also needed something to drown out the painfully sappy mid-show commercial behind me.
By the time I was slurping the last of the milkshake so I could listen to literally anything else, they closed the doors and Mom triumphantly smacked my waffles onto the table.
“Hey, what’d they ever do to you?” I protested.
“Please, they basically screamed at me.” She tapped the box where it labeled them as Belgian waffles.
“Got it. Does that mean you checked it already?”
“No, not yet,” she replied, pushing the laptop toward me. “You want to do the honors?”
“Please.”
I searched “where are belgian waffles from” as Dad stuck his tongue out at Mom and she pushed him back to sit properly.
“I wouldn’t do that, Dad,” I said. “They’re from Belgium.”
“And now you’re losing.”
“Yeah, well, you owe me that idea, Wise Girl. And besides, I was also looking in the fridge.”
He held up a pouch of Hawaiian Punch, and Mom laughed.
“You probably got that one, but I don’t know if it was worth the risk,” she said.
I nodded gravely. “Hell hath no fury like a blonde teenager without her sugar water.”
“You are very lucky Sophie’s on the phone right now,” said Dad, eyebrows raised.
“She was going to grill you about the date regardless,” Mom agreed. “You’d probably be waterboarded if she heard you.”
“And you wouldn’t stop her?!”
Dad shrugged. “It would be interesting to watch.”
“I swear, the things I do for you people.”
The laptop said what we expected it to, and I rested my chin on my hand.
“Two to two,” I said. “Any big ideas might as well come out now.”
“We’ll call it after this one?” Dad asked.
Mom nodded. “I have the perfect winner.”
“Oh, thanks, babe, you didn’t need to do that,” Dad said, and she ignored him.
“Do you remember when I spent Christmas morning at Sally and Paul’s while we were still moving in together?”
“Of course. It’s hard to forget — we’d never really made a big deal of Christmas, first because we needed to save and then, when that wasn’t a worry anymore, I was a little busy. But Mom went all out that year. I don’t think I’ve ever seen the table so full.”
“Right, and what exactly did she make?”
“Blueberry muffins, hash browns, probably a lot of sausage, and I think we had some leftover cookies…” He snapped his fingers. “And a Dutch baby. That's a good one.”
“I know it is. That’s why I said it.”
I choked on a French fry, and Dad clapped me on the back through his own laughter.
“I thought you’d leave the attempted murder to Sophie,” I wheezed.
“Like mother, like daughter,” said Mom, patting my hand.
Once I’d unstuck the fry, I washed it down with another because I have no survival instincts. “So what exactly is a Dutch baby?”
“I think it’s just a thicker kind of pancake,” Mom supplied. “I also remember Grandma using the oven instead of the stove.”
“And she used a lot of eggs,” added Dad.
“Was it good?”
“Yeah, it was really fluffy,” he said. “Aunt Estelle had a lot of fun watching the pan.”
“We’ll have to ask her and Grandma about it, then.” I pulled the laptop closer so they couldn’t see the screen and grinned at the results. “Are you ready?”
“Yes,” they said at the same time.
“According to allrecipes.com, in a post from November twentieth, twenty twenty-thr—”
“Kai Grace Jackson, I raised you better than this.”
“All of our ADHD raised you better than this.”
“Okay, okay!”
Mom was leaning forward with her hand on her forehead while Dad sat back, crossed his arms, and glared at me.
“‘Despite its name, the Dutch baby is technically an American invention — though it is derived from a traditional German recipe.’”
You’d think Dad had sunk Mom’s battleship from the way he shot up and she groaned out a lap. He even did a victory lap around the table to shake my shoulders and say “best searcher ever” before dancing over to her. She muttered something to him, but the fireworks he’d set off won out when he pulled her up to dance with him.
“You win, I guess,” she said, spinning herself under his arm.
He kissed her cheek. “Am I forgiven?”
“I haven’t decided. Keep gloating and you sleep on the couch tonight.”
“Gloating?” he said. “Who’s gloating? If anyone’s gloating, it’s Kai.”
“Wonder who he learned that from.”
“Yes, how could you teach him such a—"
She cut him off with a kiss.
“Bye,” I said, and got out of there like Kronos was back from the void.
Of course, I inherited my dad’s wonderful luck, so Sophie saw me and I got grabbed by the shoulder for the second time in five minutes.
“So?” she asked, almost dragging me back to her room and nudging a pile of New Rome University merch out of the way so she could sit me on her bed. The only things our spaces had in common were the blue and gray sheets.
“So you can let go of me,” I said. “I can walk.”
But I also inherited Dad’s inability to shut up, especially about the people we like.
Fine, really like.
“I wore his jacket.”
“Oh my gods, he’s stuck with you. Tell me everything.”
“Excuse me?” Ollie said from the doorway, brown eyes narrowed.
“Sorry, tell us everything,” Sophie amended, and he grinned as he stepped over bags and binders and a barely sheathed sword to sit next to me.
“I have to see you two every day,” he said. “I deserve to understand all that grossness you’ve got going on.”
“We’re not gross!”
“Kai, with all due respect—”
“Which is none—”
“—you and Justin can be just as disgusting as Mom and Dad, and it’s sweet but horrifying and also frickin’ weird because you’re my baby brother, and this guy is head over heels for you, so tell us what we want to know.”
“I would if you’d let me talk,” I forced out. My face was hotter than oil meant for French fries.
Sophie held up her hands in surrender. “You have the floor.”
I took a deep breath, but I’m pretty sure I tripped over half of my words anyway.
“You know, I can think of at least one food that definitely comes from the place in its name.”
“What?”
“Milky Ways.”
“Oh, shut up, Seaweed Brain.”