Pancakes

BROOKE

I wake up to the sun beaming through the window. I hear light, muffled music and laughter coming from downstairs, and smell something delicious in the direction of the kitchen.

I look around and realize I’m in the same room where I brought Sydney last night, only her side of the bed is empty. But I fell asleep downstairs last night! In Colin’s arms! On Colin’s chest! So how did I get here?

I drag myself downstairs, and my mouth drops to the floor as I walk into the kitchen.

“You Ain’t Never Had a Friend Like Me” blares from the ceiling speakers, a song I know well from Syd’s obsession with all things Disney. Colin is lip-syncing along as he twirls Sydney in a gentle circle.

They’re both by the stove; Sydney stands on a chair with Colin holding onto her while he flips pancakes.

I slap myself so I can say something before they catch me looking like a statue again. “Well, good morning, you guys.”

“MOM!” Syd shouts, and Colin turns and helps her down from the chair so she can run over and give me a hug.

“Hey, baby! What are you doing?” I ask, giving her a squeeze.

“Come see this! We’re making special pancakes!” She drags me over to the stove, and I lock eyes with Colin.

“Good morning,” he says calmly. “Coffee?”

“Yes, please.”

He grabs a cup from the cabinet and pours me a glass. “Milk, cream, and sugar are on the counter behind you.”

“Thank you.”

“How did you sleep?” he asks when I turn back around to face them.

“Apparently like Aurora,” I say, trying to be witty, but I’m an idiot; Colin might know ~Aladdin~, but he doesn’t have an encyclopedic knowledge of Disney, judging by his face.

“~Sleeping Beauty~…” I point to the ceiling speakers, where the song has turned over to “Once Upon a Dream.” Colin nods, still looking a little confused, and I try to bury my face in my coffee cup.

“Colin! Time to flip!” Syd calls him back to the stove, saving me from further mortification.

I walk over and see what she meant by special pancakes. When Colin flips the pancake over and pulls it from the pan, it has a design imprinted on it: a slightly wobbly, five-pointed star.

“Wow!” I say. “How did you guys do that?”

“Show her, Syd,” Colin says, putting a piece of butter in the now-empty pan and handing her a squeeze bottle.

“Watch, Mom!” Syd says enthusiastically. Taking a bottle full of pancake batter, she squeezes a dot onto the pan, then another dot, and underneath a curvy line, creating a smiley face. “Okay, now we wait a little bit.”

“Ready?” Colin asks Syd.

“Ready!” she responds. He takes a ladle of batter and pours it on top of the design. Syd watches the batter intently. After a while, the pancakes start to form bubbles.

“Time to flip!” she says again, and Colin flips over the pancake. I see the smiley face Syd made, a slightly darker shade imprinted in the center of the round, golden-brown pancake.

“Wow! That’s pretty amazing, you guys!”

“It was Colin’s idea! He came and got me so I wouldn’t wake you up!” Syd admits, and I look over at Colin. I want to stay in this sweet, pancake-scented moment, but something obvious is occurring to me.

“How did I get to her room last night?” I ask. Colin’s face gives it away; he tries to find anything else in the room besides my eyes.

“You didn’t!” I point my finger at him, starting to get upset.

“I didn’t want to wake you,” he says. He looks like a dog in trouble. If he had a tail, it would be between his legs right now.

“COLIN! You’re not supposed to put that much weight on your foot!”

“You barely weigh anything! I lift weights at the gym heavier than you!” he says, trying to shrug it off.

“Not since you got injured! UGH! You don’t listen to me!” I storm out of the kitchen into the family room, infuriated.

A minute later I feel his arms wrapping around my waist, but I peel him off. I can’t let the warm, soothing feel of his touch sway my anger toward him.

“Look,” he says, “I’m sorry, okay? I really didn’t want to wake you. And you said you wanted to be with Sydney.”

I know what he did was sweet; I’m more angry with myself than with him. Angry for getting suckered into staying the night here, angry for falling asleep on his chest, angry for liking it, angry for liking him!

Oh God, it’s happening. The bricks in my wall are moving, and I don’t want them to. “You jeopardized your recovery for me! When I should be the one helping you recover!”

“You are!” He grabs my waist trying to pull me closer, but I push his hand away again.

“I only stayed here to work with you on your rehab. That’s it,” I huff at him. “So let’s get that done with so I can leave.”

“Breakfast first,” he says calmly.

Right now, I’m feeling anything but calm. “COLIN!”

“Sydney will be disappointed if you don’t eat your pancakes. She made them,” he says, and I have to admit he has a point.

“Fine!” I huff, storming back into the kitchen and taking a seat next to Sydney at the kitchen table. I try to put on a happy face for Syd as Colin hands us each a plate of specially made pancakes.

Did he intentionally hand me the plate of pancakes with giant heart designs on them? I won’t find out, since I won’t lift my head from my plate to look at him.

“Are you two in love?” Sydney asks, and I literally choke on the large bite now stuck halfway down my throat.

Oh my god! My child and her unfiltered mouth! Why now? Why me? Why? Just…why? I grab my coffee and take a huge gulp, flushing the piece of pancake down my throat, but now I’m coughing like a mortified, senseless idiot.

I can’t bear to look at Colin, but I can still feel his eyes on me. I’m just picturing the huge smirk on his face; he must be having a field day. “W-why, why would you say that?” I finally choke out.

“Well, Becky at school said her mom told her that even though Becky hears her mom and dad fighting, they love each other and once they kiss and make up, they feel better.”

I pretend I still have coffee in my cup so I can continue to hide my face.

“So, maybe you two will feel better if you kiss and make up,” Syd adds.

Lord have mercy on me! Please, get me out of here right now! Colin starts laughing his head off. He literally keels over, uncontrollably guffawing at this not very funny situation.

“Well, you heard her! Maybe we should kiss and make up,” he manages to mutter. But then Syd’s eyes bulge, thinking Colin just confirmed that he and I are in love.

“Colin and Mommy sitting in a tree! K-I-S-S-I-N-G,” she starts singing.

You’ve got to be kidding me! She didn’t understand his stupid, cocky, dumbass humor. I can’t think of a way out of this. All I can hear is Sydney, still singing, “First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes a baby in the baby carriage!”

Why couldn’t Colin have gone to a different physical therapist? Why couldn’t we have stayed angry at each other? Or at least been distant like all my other normal clients? Why?

LUNA! That’s why! Everything changed the day she ate his damn headphones! “Where’s Luna?” I stand up, planning my escape route.

“On the beach with my mom, getting trained,” Colin answers.

“We made bacon earlier for her reward treats,” Syd adds. Great! Luna might not be my best escape tactic after all.

On second thought, I don’t care. I race out of the house and head down to the beach, just as I hear Jacob, Sophie and the rest of Colin's family coming down the stairs.