Cinnamon (Shooting Stars 1)

She had taken all of the dishes out of the kitchen cabinets, and the pots and pans as well, and was reorganizing everything.

"This kitchen was never set up intelligently." she replied. "Cups and dishes and soup bowls all scattered about in different cabinets, and the pots and pans... why are they under the salad sink? They should be nearer the stove. You know how hard it was to find a can opener in this kitchen? Just ridiculous to have all this chaos."

"Mammy never has any trouble finding what she wants. She's going to be very upset when she nets home." I said.

"She'll get over it quickly, especially when she realizes how well organized it is now. If she gets home," she added in a mutter so low, I barely heard it.

"You can't do this," I insisted. "Put it all back where it was."

"Don't be silly, Cinnamon. Now eat some decent breakfast in you and go to school," she ordered. "What do you have, eggs, cold cereal?"

"Does Daddy know you've done this?" She turned and raised her eyebrows.

"You think I need my son to tell me what's right and what isn't? But to answer you, yes, he does," she continued and turned back to the cabinets. "Not only are things in the wrong places, but these cabinets need to be relined with cabinet paper. What good is it to wash your dishes and then put them on a dirty shelf?"

"They aren't dirty."

"Oh, you know? When was the last time you did any real housework here? When I was your age, I had to make all the beds and dust the furniture in the living room before I could go to school, even if it meant I'd be late."

"Brilliant," I said.

I turned and marched out of the house.

"Cinnamon!" she called after me. "Where are you going without your breakfast?"

I didn't answer. What she heard instead was the door slamming behind me.

Now, two days later, she had completed her revamping of the kitchen and was working on the living room and preparing our dinners. However, up until now, she had been left to eat them by herself. Daddy was working late and I didn't come home for dinner either night, going directly to the hospital to sit with Mommy. She slept most of the time I was there, and when she awoke, she was full of questions about Sacha and plans for what she would be doing when Sacha was released from the prenatal intensive care unit.

"I just know we'll both be better about the same time," she told me.

I wondered what she thought was supposedly wrong with her, but I was afraid to ask. I was actually afraid to ask her any questions. She would cry often and then say, "It's all right. I'll be fine."

I tried talking about the house, tried to get her interested in coming home quickly.

"Grandmother Beverly is changing things," I said. "You need to get better and come home quickly.'

"Is she? That's all right. We'll just change it all back," she told me.

For a moment I thought she was returning to her old self, but then she added. "I just can't wait to show her Sacha, to show her what a beautiful new granddaughter she has, a granddaughter she never wanted. How sorry she will be for the things she's said. Won't she be, Cinnamon?"

"Yes," I said weakly.

As long as Mommy was like this. Grandmother Beverly felt the power that comes with being right, predicting accurately and then never letting us forget it. She was practically beating Daddy over the head with this tragedy daily, shoving his face in the reality. washing out his mouth with her soap of truth.

The first two nights, he came to the hospital directly from work, looking fatigued, defeated. The market happened to be down, too, and that was depressing him. Some of his best clients were blaming him for his recommendations, he said.

"When they make money. I'm a hero. When they lost. I'm an idiot."

"Why did you ever want to be a broker. Daddy?" I asked while he and I sat at Mommy's bedside watching her drift in and out of sleep.

He shrugged.

"Money always excited me. There's nothing more beautiful than watching a small investment become bigger and bigger and then knowing when to sell. There's all that suspense. Right there in front of me events are transpiring that will affect people's lives, lose or make their jobs, destroy their retirement pensions or turn them into wealthy people. I Eke being part of that. I feel... plugged into the current that runs the country. Does that make sense?" he asked almost wistfully.

"I guess so," I said.

Actually. I had never heard him speak so passionately about his work before and for a few moments. I was actually mesmerized. Most of the time, he moved about so methodically, thinking and acting with a surgeon's care-- analyzing, scrutinizing every little thing, right down to the portion of soap powder it took to wash floors. I was beginning to wonder if he was emotionally dead, if he cried or laughed or cared warmly about anything, especially Mommy and me.