The Way Things Change

Puck’s day began with a bit of an incident. Collette was in the kitchen, Puck was in the living room alone for maybe 30 seconds, and then she heard the crash. Puck was sitting triumphantly on his grandma’s coffee table, staring at the catastrophe below him. Mom’s carefully arranged autumn centerpiece had been smashed to bits on the floor. Mixed with the potting soil and the glass from the planter, were handfuls of glass decorator beads and what was left of the poor little green plant. Collette had little hope of its survival. So Carrie-Bri distracted the little squishy with a keyboard session in her room while Collette cleaned up the mess.
As usual during the school year, everyone had somewhere to be. Mom was finishing school with Francis and Linnea for the week before meeting with the Englishs at the park, Joe spent his entire day at school and at work, Carrie was expecting company later in the morning, and Rose was off for a second day of training at Olga’s Kitchen. She had several days to study the menu, which included special wraps, something called an orange creme cooler, which looked very good, zucchini fries, and another smoothie blended with raspberries, lime sherbet, and apple juice.
Collette had been impressed with Rose the past couple of months. She was growing up. Not only was she a few exams away from completing her bachelor’s degree, she was preparing to earn her master’s in archaeology, willing to study Italian and Greek before applying to Mizzou, and her general attitude and behavior had become officially adult. She was still the same Rose at heart, but she was older, and proving that she could handle things that came her way from the rest of the world.
Meanwhile, Francis was fully distracted with his new go-carts, the first official team meeting for air-softing (which included a field at a park and pizza), and a hot buttered English muffin and Calvin and Hobbes for breakfast.
Around studying for everything that morning, Carrie spent several hours with Eve, first a bike ride, and then the coffee house. Colette hadn’t seen Eve since May, when Kitts had been in town. Her hair was full of bleached highlights, and she talked of looking forward to finishing nursing school in April, graduating in June after boards, and preparing to meet any number of possibilities in the world using her new skills.
Whenever Collette saw one of the kids from the old days, mostly one of the Englishs or someone from the early days, she was immediately brought back to reminiscing. It was interesting to see how everyone changed, what paths they took, who remained close to one another, and who disappeared for at least a time. And it made her feel old again, which hadn’t been a very new feeling in the past couple of years for her.
Collette noticed that the candy corn was down in the pantry again. Sunday, she learned that Linnea had already hidden the giant tin of German rock sugar from dad.
“He won’t stop eating it,” Mom said. “We have to hide everything.”
And, indeed, almost immediately after coming home from church, Dad began rooting through the bowl of candy corn and peanuts.
“You can’t buy this stuff, Adel” he said, munching away. “You know I’ll eat it.”
After the usual algebra and Portuguese, Collette helped Francis shovel the driveway free of rock, which had washed downhill in the last rains, before leaving for the day.
And so things continue to change.