The Littlest Boss

“What’s so funny over there?” Vivian asked, moving bacon around with a fork.

“Nothing,” she replied as she stirred sugar and creamer into the coffee cup. “I remembered how shocked I was the first time I saw bacon in the college cafeteria. They cooked the whole strip.”

Her mother had her own style. She’d chop the rasher of bacon into three sections, dump the entire pile into her frying pan and just keep stirring until it was done. “Huh,” Vivian said with a slight snort. “That’s fine. If you got all day.”

Tiana went to the stove to check the heat under the grits. The burner was off and the pot was barely bubbling. They looked done to her, so she guessed Lily’s stirring was just to give her something to do. “Be careful with those grits, Lily. They are very hot.”

“I’m being careful, Mommy.”

“What church are we going to today?”

Vivian had been visiting churches every Sunday to find a good fit. This was the first Sunday Tiana either had off or hadn’t worked a late shift since before they’d moved in. It was on her list of things to do, just not quite as close to the top as her mother’s list.

“Emanuel.”

“The one downtown?”

“Yes.” Viv turned to look at her. “Why?”

Tiana looked at Lily, then back at her mother, eyebrows raised. The look she got back was pure steel. “No one’s going to say things in front of the children.”

“Say what?” Lily asked.

“Nothing, sweet girl,” Vivian cooed. “Keep stirring those grits. Your momma needs to drink her coffee and get in the shower.”

* * *

AFTER CHURCH, THEY walked the few blocks along Calhoun Street to have brunch at Saffron Restaurant Bakery. A nice cup of coffee and a trip through their divine brunch buffet was worth the early wake-up time.

“Can we go to the aquarium too?” Lily asked.

As they walked to the South Carolina Aquarium, Tiana wished once again that she could live downtown. It was such a walkable town, so utterly charming in its own way, but the real estate market was unreal. Once, while dining at Jestine’s Kitchen, she’d overheard someone quip that prices in the Historic District were on par with Manhattan. She didn’t doubt it. All those magazines talking Charleston up as the best travel destination in the country, as the best wedding destination, the most polite city... Well, maybe Charleston was polite when an elderly gentleman walking the family poodle tipped his hat to you on Chalmers Street, but it was considerably less polite on 526 during rush hour bumper to bumper traffic.

She smiled, shook her head. This place. What a beautiful mess of contradiction.

The day was perfect. Cool but sunny. The wind coming off of Charleston Harbor was redolent with the unique scent the locals called pluff mud. Thickly pungent, strong enough to tickle the insides of your nose. To a Charlestonian, it was a sweet perfume. But then, Charlestonians also thought that the tip of the peninsula was where the Ashley and Cooper Rivers merged to form the Atlantic Ocean, so there’s that. To Tiana it smelled like... Hmm. Funky oysters?

They made their way to the South Carolina Aquarium, which was one of Lily’s favorite things about her new hometown. From the giant shark tank to the smaller exhibits, Lily loved it all, everything in an around there. After her first visit to the aquarium, she’d decided she wanted to be a fish doctor when she grew up. As Lily skipped ahead of them, Tiana linked her arm with her mother’s.

“Any thoughts on going back home?”

Vivian swiveled her head and raised her eyebrows. “Are you trying to get rid of me?”

Yes. “No. I’m just starting to feel selfish, keeping you here so long.”

“You aren’t ready for me to leave yet.”

“We’ll be fine, Mom.”

“Who’s going to watch Lily when you work late? How are you going to get her to school when you have to be at work before her school even opens?”

Tiana watched as Lily leaned in to get almost nose to nose with one of the smaller sharks in the big tank. That was a problem. Her work schedule wasn’t compatible with school hours. “I’m working on that. A few of the other nurses have kids in the same school. They take turns getting the kids to school and watching them after.”

“So you’re going to let total strangers watch after your baby?”

“They aren’t total strangers, Mom. I work with them. And speaking of total strangers, what about all the kids you normally watch? Who’s taking care of them now?”

“They’re all in school now. I haven’t had little ones since Lily.”

Tiana’s heart sunk. There went her main leverage to get her mother moving. Her only hope was if one of her sisters got pregnant. That would be perfect. She considered just flat out lying and saying one of them was trying. But the retribution she’d get for that would make trying to get her mother to go home look like a day at the beach.

Vivian pulled her arm away and stopped walking. She turned to look Tiana in the eye. “Do you want me to leave?”

“I don’t want you to feel like you have to stay.”

“That’s not what I asked.”

Glancing at the shark tank, Tiana noted Lily was in deep conversation with a little boy about her age. They were pointing at various fish and nodding with great seriousness. She must have found another future fish doctor. “Let’s sit down,” she said, gesturing at the row of benches.

“I don’t want you to leave,” she said, feeling her way slowly along the words. “It’s just that Lily is so used to being with you, which isn’t your fault, it was my choice...”

“And she sees me more as a mother figure than you,” Viv finished.

Blinking against the sudden sting of tears, Tiana nodded. “I feel selfish about it, but yeah. She calls me Mom, but she still goes to you for everything. She bumps her knee, she goes to you. She wants a snack, she goes to you.”

“When she wanted a cuddle this morning, she went to you.”

Tiana dropped her head and stared at the floor. “Yeah. I guess. But that was for fun times. If she’s scared or hurt, she goes to you.”

“Don’t feel selfish. It’s normal. We both know it’s going to take some time. She knows you are her mother. She’s just used to coming to me.”

“Because I wasn’t there.”

She couldn’t look at her mother as she spoke the words. Instead she watched Lily, who was slowly pacing along the edge of the tank.

“I’m not fighting this same old battle with you, Tiana. If you want to beat yourself up about it, go ahead. You had a hard choice to make. It was a huge risk. You took it. Yes, you lost some of Lily’s childhood while you were gone. But you gave her a future.”

Vivian walked to Lily as Tiana leaned forward, staring at the floor and feeling pretty much like a six-year-old herself. Pouty and petulant. She hated it. Hated feeling at odds with her mother. But there it was. She was jealous. Of her own mother. She looked up as Lily scampered back with Vivian trailing behind.

“Did you have fun looking at the pretty fish?” Tiana asked.

“Yes. There’s a pink one today,” Lily answered.

“Pretty. I wonder if we could find you a pink fish for your pet.”

Lily’s eyebrows came together in an all too familiar frown. “I want a kitten.”

Tiana sighed. Mission not accomplished.