5
Sadie
“Is that everybody?” I called to Josh, the elderly monitor, who was locking the doors to the dining hall.
“Everybody’s fed and heading to bed,” he confirmed. “Or whatever they do after dinner. You went here. You know.”
“Homework,” I said, wiping down the countertop in the kitchen and waving goodbye to my sous chef, Pat, as she slipped out the back door.
“I don’t believe that for a minute,” Josh said, double checking the lock before rolling the garbage cans toward the exit. “I’m sure they get into all kinds of trouble if how they behave during their meals is any indication.”
I smiled. “Just what are you insinuating about this storied institution, sir?”
Josh cackled, showing a few missing teeth at the back of his grin. “See? That right there — that’s somebody who knows how to tell a good fib. I don’t think I even want to know what it was you did back in your day.”
“I had my fair share of fun,” I said mildly. I put the last few pans away and locked the pantry and cold storage up, keeping myself busy and moving. It was way too easy to get lost in the memories here at Tides Academy. The table Josh was nudging back into formation was the one that Jonathan, Mikhail, and I had sat at during our time here. Since the entire academy took their meals together, it was the best time to plan the kind of shenanigans we were usually able to pull off after curfew.
Like the midnight soccer match.
Or, after Mikhail cajoled Jonathan into taking our trays up, the brushes of fingers we’d get away with. The whispered times and locations of where we would meet to steal kisses from each other.
I shook myself from the tendrils of those kinds of memories. I didn’t need that. Not when I was so close to clocking out and getting home to my babies — and relieving my mom from babysitting duty.
Bending down to buff off a smudge from an oven window, I couldn’t help but groan. My back was protesting this evening. I didn’t know if it was being on my feet all day at work or lifting my increasingly heavy children.
How were they already three-and-a-half years old? Time didn’t make sense to me. Not the way it worked with the triplets.
“Sadie, go home,” Josh said, leaning in through the window that opened up the kitchen to the dining hall. “And do something nice for yourself.”
“Going home is the nice thing.”
“You know what I mean. Take a long bubble bath. Read a magazine. Relax. What’s something good you’re going to do for yourself tonight?”
I snorted. “Go to bed at a decent hour, if I’m lucky.” I retrieved a to-go box from a microwave and slid it over to Josh. “Enjoy dinner — and see you tomorrow.”
“You’re going to burn out at this rate,” he warned me, but I just waved him off. I was more than capable of maintaining this schedule — mostly because I had to. Food service began with breakfast at 7:45 a.m., which mean I had to be here by 6:30 so I could prep. By the time I got the kitchen good and cleaned from that service, it was time to start lunch, which was more of an a la carte experience. Dinner was at 6 p.m., and I counted myself lucky if I left by eight. I was the head chef here at Tides, and I wanted to make sure every service went off without a hitch.
It wasn’t a glamorous gig. But it paid decently. And if I was the one here from sunup to sundown, it just meant that my mom didn’t have to be — and that I could pay the bills.
Well, most of them.
My mom filled in on weekends so I could have some time with the kids, but I was thinking about trying to convince her to stay home then too. She’d done this for her entire career, and now she was older, I worried about how hard it was on her.
If I had back problems, she had to have her share of aches and pains too.
Josh locked the back door behind me as I went, and I walked just a little more slowly than normal to my mom’s car, trying to savor the damp evening air. I hugged my coat around my food-splattered uniform and tested whether I could see my breath in the chilly air. As sad as it was, this was the time I savored. It was the only time I truly got to myself, and it was on my stupid commute. Ten whole minutes of bliss.
Did I sometimes drive a little under the speed limit? Yes. But I always felt guilty about it — especially when it robbed my mom of time to rest. She looked out for the triplets all day, after all. I took over as soon as I got home. Not even a stint on the toilet was considered alone time. Not with three curious children quizzing me about my stretch marks and pubes and caesarian scar and cellulite.
Motherhood. It was a joy.
When I pulled into the driveway, I honked the horn. The triplets were chasing a ball through the gravel, which was sprouting grass and all kinds of greenery. That was the thing about the Pacific Northwest. Nature was always trying to take back anything we humans tried to make permanent.
My dilapidated childhood home included, its shingles green with moss and gigantic pines towering above. One bad windstorm and the whole place might be leveled — and us along with it.
One thing at a time, though. Spend time with the kids, then put them to bed. Clean the house. Pay the bills. Put any stragglers back to bed. Do a quick job search to see if there’s anything with better hours and pay. Spend time with my mom. Review tomorrow’s menu. Take a shower. Check on the kids. Collapse into my own bed.
Rinse and repeat.