Week 1: Tuesday

Tuesday morning. Lindsay was up at the same time she was always up, because the body doesn't know the difference between a weekday and a day when no one needs you. She made eggs and toast. She told herself she wasn't establishing a pattern. She was up anyway. It took five minutes. She was feeding someone who happened to live in her house, the way she'd feed Naomi if Naomi were still here. That was all.

She sat down with her coffee and rehearsed her language. Today she was going to be direct. Damian, I want you to have looked at job listings online by the end of the day. Not a suggestion. An expectation. She'd say it calmly. She'd say it kindly. But she'd say it.

Damian came down around 9:30. Same look — t-shirt, sweatpants, messy hair. He moved through the doorway with the same tentative pause, as if he were still asking permission to enter. Lindsay gestured at the chair. He sat. She put the plate in front of him.

"Thank you, Lindsay."

He picked up his fork. He ate with the same careful attention — small bites, steady pace, clean motions. He finished everything on his plate, the way he had yesterday. Lindsay watched him for a moment, noting again how he handled the fork like something breakable, how he seemed to treat the meal as if it might be taken away at any moment. She filed the observation next to the others and didn't know what to do with it.

She opened her mouth to begin the speech she'd rehearsed.

"Lindsay?"

He was looking at her with a curious expression, his fork paused over the last bite of toast.

"Can I ask you something?"

"Of course."

"Do you ever make waffles?"

Lindsay blinked. "Waffles?"

"Yeah. Like, real ones. Not from a box. I had the frozen kind once at a group home — the ones you put in the toaster — and they were OK, I guess. Kind of soggy. But one of the other kids told me that real waffles are way better. Like, crispy on the outside and soft on the inside, with butter and stuff. He said his grandma used to make them." He paused, looking down at his plate. "I always wondered what that was like."

Lindsay felt her rehearsed speech slide sideways. She grabbed at it. "Damian, I'm not going to be making you breakfast every morning. You're nineteen — you're perfectly capable of feeding yourself. We talked about this. The point is independence, not—"

"Oh no, I know," he said quickly, holding up one hand as if to ward off a lecture. "I'm not asking for every morning. I know you're busy and everything. I was just wondering if maybe you could make them once? Just one time? Tomorrow, maybe?" He looked at her with that earnest, slightly hopeful expression that made him look younger than nineteen. "I've never had a real waffle."

Lindsay opened her mouth to say no. She was going to say no, I'm not going to be your personal chef, we need to talk about your job search. She was going to say it.

"Sure," she said. "I can do that."

The word came out of her mouth before her brain had signed off on it. She heard herself say it and felt a small, distant flicker of something — surprise, maybe, or the beginning of an objection — but then Damian smiled, that genuine brightening that transformed his whole face, and the flicker went out.

"Really? Thank you. That's so nice of you." He said it the way he'd said thank you for the eggs — as if the eggs and the waffles and the orange juice were not things he was owed but gifts he'd been given by someone who didn't have to give them. "Tomorrow morning?"

"Tomorrow morning."

"Awesome." He finished his toast, chewed the last bite with obvious satisfaction, and pushed his chair back. He picked up his plate.

He rinsed it. He put it in the dishwasher. He did not need to be reminded. Lindsay watched him do it — the careful placement, the glance back at her for approval — and felt a small pulse of something warm and undeserved. Pride, maybe. As if she'd taught him something.

He paused in the doorway. "Thanks again, Lindsay. For the waffles. And for... you know. Everything."

"Of course."

He went upstairs. His footsteps faded. The house went quiet.

Lindsay sat at the table with her coffee. She replayed the conversation. She had meant to talk about job listings. She had been ready. The words had been arranged in her head in the right order. And instead she had agreed to make waffles.

One time, she reminded herself. She'd said just one time. That was reasonable. The boy had spent his whole childhood in group homes and foster care. He'd never had a homemade waffle. She was his foster mother. It was the decent thing to do. One waffle breakfast wasn't going to turn her into a short-order cook. It wasn't going to undermine her authority. It was a kindness. A small one. Tomorrow she'd make the waffles and she'd have the job conversation at the same time. Two birds, one stone.

She cleared her mug. She wiped down the table. She went to the back of the pantry cabinet and dug out the waffle iron — the one she'd received as a wedding gift and used maybe six times in two decades. It was dusty. She wiped it down and set it on the counter so she wouldn't have to look for it in the morning.

One time, she thought. That's all.