“Mom, have you talked to Uncle Gil yet?”

Catherine looked up as Lindsey shut the front door behind her. “I’ve talked to Gil. I did see him at work while you were away at camp.”

“Mom, you know that’s not what I meant. Have you interrogated him?”

She turned on the couch, letting her feet slide to the floor as she made room for Lindsey. “I’d hardly think I’d need to interrogate him.”

“But you found out the answers we need?”

“Enough.”

“Excellent.” Lindsey jumped up and ran down the hallway, returning moments later with the small notebook she had been using to jot down all of their plans. She sat back down on the couch, opening the notebook and clicking the pen open. “So, what do we know?”

“Lindsey, don’t you want to talk a little? I haven’t seen you in two weeks.”

“We are talking. About the party. I came up with some pretty good ideas while I was gone. But we lost a lot of time. Cake?”

“What?”

Lindsey rolled her eyes, looking up from her notebook towards her mom. “Did you find out what kind of cake Gil likes?”

“Chocolate is fine. He’s not picky.”

“You didn’t ask!”

“It’s not exactly something that comes up in our normal conversation, Lindsey. I can’t just…”

“Yes you can. Go to dinner, order dessert then ask him what kind of cake he likes. It’s not hard.”

“And it’s not that easy.”

“Did you at least find out if he likes any kind of music besides classical?” Lindsey held the pen over the notebook, waiting for Catherine’s answer.

“Classic rock. But Lindsey, the classical will be better for the party. People will be able to talk over it.”

“But they wont be able to dance.”

“Who needs…”

“I know,” Lindsey interrupted. “Why don’t we just have the classical for the beginning part when people are eating and talking, then we’ll move to the rock.”

“Classic rock. There is a difference.”

“Whatever. I guess I’ll trust you to find the CDs. Oh! We could get a DJ. Can we get a DJ mom? That would be so cool.”

“I am not hiring a DJ. Do you have any idea how much that costs?”

“But Mom… it’s a special occasion. And…”

“And I am not hiring a DJ. Everything will be perfectly fine if we just use CDs.”

Lindsey backed down, knowing now was not the time to push her mother any more on the DJ idea. “Did you at lest find out anything about his family? Or other friends?”

“I’m working on it.”

“You’ve been working on it. You always tell me not to procrastinate on my homework, and here you are pushing everything off.”

“Why am I being lectured by my daughter?”

“Well, I learn from example, and you aren’t setting a very good example. I should invite Gil over for supper. Then we can both grill him for the answers we need.”

Catherine turned to look fully at Lindsey, her eyes widened in shock. “We are not going to grill Gil. I’ll ask him…”

“You’ve had over a month, Mom. We’re running out of time. Why don’t we just invite him over. It’s not going to hurt anything, and I’ll tell Gil I missed him. That can be the reason for calling. And…”

“Lindsey,” Catherine interrupted. “Just call him.” She sighed as Lindsey jumped off the couch, silently scolding herself for giving in to Lindsey’s pestering.

*~*~*~*~*

Catherine got up at the sound of the bell ringing, taking one last glance at the house before opening the front door.

“Hello, Catherine.”

Catherine smiled in return, taking the bottle from his hand. “You didn’t need to do this, I was just planning on ordering some delivery.”

“It’s just sparkling juice.”

“You still didn’t need to go to the trouble.” Catherine motioned for Gil to step into the house, then she shut the door behind him.

“Uncle Gil!”

They both looked up as Lindsey came barreling down the stairs, sliding to a stop in front of Gil.

“Hello Lindsey.”

The smile beamed across her face as Lindsey grabbed his hand and pulled him into the living room. Motioning towards the couch, she waited until Gil and her mother sat down before sitting on the floor. “How are you doing? I haven’t seen you in a long time.”

“I’m fine. How was camp?”

“It was great, but it’s nice to be home. Mom hasn’t been…” Lindsey paused, glancing towards Catherine before turning her attention fully towards Gil. “She’s been lonely. Without me here.”

“Lindsey!”

“It’s alright, Mom. Gil’s your friend. He’d want to know how you sit here alone on your days off. How you don’t have anyone to go to dinner with. You two should to out go dinner together. That way neither of you have to sit home alone.”

“Lindsey! Go and unpack, you’re making… just go.”

Lindsey frowned as she slowly rose to her feet. “I was only trying to help.”

“I know. Why don’t you call in something for supper and then unpack real quick. Once you’re finished, it should be about time to eat.”

“Okay.” Lindsey walked out of the room, pausing in the doorway and turning around. “I might order dessert too. What kind of cake do you want?”

“What ever you want to order is fine with me, Lindsey. I’m not picky.”

“But what kind do you like?”

“White or chocolate is good.”

Catherine watched in amusement as the conversation continued between Gil and Lindsey.

“But what’s your favorite?”

Gil thought for a minute before answering. “I’m not really sure I have a favorite. I guess I’ve never thought about it before.”

“Mom always gets me a marble cake for my birthday, that way you get chocolate and white all in one.”

“Mine was always white. My grandmother believed it was bad luck to have anything but white cake on your birthday and my parents didn’t want to disappoint her, so we always had white cakes.”

Lindsey was about to respond when she caught the look on her mother’s face. “Right… so, I’ll just go call in the pizza. Be right back.”

“Sorry about that.” Catherine whispered once Lindsey had left the room.

“Don’t apologize. She’s excited to see you.”

“I think it’s you she’s actually excited to see.”

Gil shook his head, shifting on the couch slightly to face Catherine. “That’s not true.”

“Sure it is. I’m okay with that though. She’s a teenager, she’s not supposed to like me. That wouldn’t be cool. I’m just glad she gets along with you.”

“You know this is just a phase, she’ll grow out of it.”

Catherine nodded, taking a moment before speaking. “Yeah, so… what’s this thing with your grandmother?”

“I have no idea where it started. And I’ve never heard it from anyone but her. But she said if you ate chocolate cake on your birthday you would die.”

“What?”

“I know. It’s silly. But it’s something we always followed in my family. And you know, to this day I still have white cake on my birthday, if I have cake.”

“That’s coming up soon, isn’t it?”

“A couple of weeks.”

“Do you have any plans?”

Gil shrugged his eyebrows raising in question. “Just work. Why?”

“No reason. How about if I take you out to dinner that night?”

“Sure. I’d….”

Lindsey came back into the room, leaving Gil’s unfinished sentence hanging in the air. “What did I miss?”

“Nothing.” Catherine quickly answered. “What did you order?”

“Pizza. They don’t have cake there, but the dessert pizza is pretty good. It should be here in about twenty minutes. I thought maybe we could have a salad with it. Do we have any lettuce?”

Catherine nodded and watched as Lindsey headed back out of the room. “She’s excited. The good thing is with the excitement of tonight and being away for a couple of weeks, she’ll tire pretty easily.”

“Are you sure? It doesn’t look like she’s going to slow down any time soon.”

“I’m sure.” Catherine pushed herself off the couch, turning to offer Gil a hand. “Let’s go help her with the salad. She likes to experiment.”

“Experiment?”

“Trust me, you don’t want to know. The salads usually aren’t too bad. But the casseroles… let’s just say there are some foods that should not be mixed together.”

*~*~*~*~*

“Do you have to go already?”

Catherine shook her head, smiling at Lindsey’s sleepy question. “It’s late Linds, and Gil has to go to work.. Besides you are about to fall asleep on the floor.”

“I’ll come over for dinner some other time. Maybe on my next night off.”

“That would be great.”

Catherine smiled as Lindsey shut her eyes, laying back on the floor.

“Do you need help getting her to bed?”

“I’ll be fine. I’ll wake her once you’ve left. Thanks for coming over. Lindsey wasn’t going to stop tonight until she invited you to dinner.”

“I’m glad for the invitation, this was definitely better then warming up the left over pasta I had in my refrigerator, and it was definitely better company.” Gil paused at the door, his hand on the handle as he turned back to look at Catherine. “Thanks for this. I mean it. You know, Lindsey is right, we should do things together more often….” Taking a deep breath, he quickly closed the distance between the two of them, placing a soft peck on her cheek before darting out the door.

Catherine stood in shock, staring at the door Gil had just departed through. A slight smile on her face, she turned and went back into the living room, kneeling before Lindsey. Before she could say a word, her daughter’s eyes opened.

“Mom? What’s with the smile?”

“Nothing.”

“That doesn’t look like a nothing smile… and you’re blushing.”

“And you are far to observant for having just woken up. Time for bed.”

Lindsey groaned and slowly rose from the floor. “You know I missed you too, don’t you?”

“I do.”

“Good.” Lindsey leaned forward, wrapping her arms around her mother. “This was a good night, we learned a lot.”

“We certainly did.”