Before the children could go to the movies they needed their lunch.
They were not going to eat in the living room, Emily decided, that much was certain. Somehow they would crowd onto the porch.
Soup would be too much, and messy, though it was cold enough, sweater weather. She had water on for tea. She thought the children could all have cold cuts, but Sam didn’t like cold cuts, or any kind of sandwich for that matter, because she tried to offer him a PB & J and was summarily rejected. The hot dogs were for dinner, she explained. Then they ran out of potato chips. There was leftover chicken, which was fine for her, but Kenneth didn’t like leftovers, and she could tell Arlene wasn’t thrilled with the idea. Margaret and Lisa were hiding somewhere upstairs. None of the children touched the coleslaw or the sliced tomatoes except Ella. Emily really did see so much of herself in her—the willowy arms, the restless intelligence. Then Justin knocked the fork for the pickles onto the floor and she got cross with him and he stood there terrified with his plate clutched in both hands until she told him to go. She wiped up the green juice with a paper towel and went to the silverware drawer. Kenneth and Arlene were milling around, waiting for the kids to finish.
She had the glasses out for milk when Sam asked if they could have their plastic bottles of Kool-Aid that were taking up the bottom shelf, and Kenneth said yes. They all wanted the pink, and then they had trouble twisting the plastic tops off. The bottoms of the bottles were rounded so they couldn’t set them down, meaning in essence that they had to guzzle them or hold on to them the entire meal. She was sure she would find some of them half full on their sides and seeping sticky pink fluid.
Arlene fixed a meager plate.
“There’s enough for everyone,” Emily urged her.
“This is more than enough for me,” Arlene said.
“It’s a regular smorgasbord, isn’t it?” she asked Kenneth, who waited, plate in hand.
“It looks great,” he said, “thanks,” and pleased her by taking some of everything, even the tomatoes, which she knew he didn’t like.
That left Margaret and Lisa.
She walked through the living room—a mess, the boys’ Star Wars toys strewn across the carpet like a plane crash—and called up the stairs, “Lunch is ready.”
“Okay,” Margaret hollered back.
Emily waited for her footsteps but heard nothing.
“I’m afraid it’s buffet-style,” she called. “It’s all laid out in the kitchen.”
“I heard you the first time,” Margaret shouted.
“Fine,” Emily said, walking away.
She fitted her paper plate into a holder and forked up a morsel of dark meat, a slice of salami, a spoonful of coleslaw. Her plate looked suspiciously like Arlene’s, but she had reason. Making lunch—handling the food, selecting and then arranging it for everyone—had naturally ruined her appetite. It would be nice, she thought, if for once someone else served her.