Shine, Coconut Moon by Neesha Meminger

Author:Neesha Meminger
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Margaret K. McElderry Books
Published: 2009-07-14T16:00:00+00:00

Mike’s mom is home when I arrive for dinner on Sunday night. All the windows are open, and she’s fanning thick smoke out of the kitchen. “Hello, Sammy! Come on in, I’m burning dinner.”

“Hi, Mrs. Brezinsky.” I take off my coat and start fanning the fumes with her.

She laughs. “Looks like we’ll be ordering pizza!”

Mike stomps down the stairs. “Hey, Sam,” he says, bending down to brush my lips with his. “I’m calling Nonno Frankie’s. Any requests?”

“Mushrooms!” his mother shouts over the exhaust fan.

I shrug. “I’m easy.”

He gives me a “yeah, right” look and goes to the living room to order. I follow behind him and tuck my legs underneath me on one end of the big cream-colored leather sofa. Mrs. Brezinsky collapses next to me.

“It would’ve been a perfect soufflé,” she says, brushing mahogany strands out of her eyes.

I look at her hair, the color of rich earth with thick white roots tangled throughout, and how it bleeds into warm mahogany about half an inch up from her scalp. I give her a reassuring smile. “I’m sure it would have, Mrs. B.”

She sighs and nods, the slender fingers of one hand raking her hair back. Her face, which on a good night is as pale as the moon, is even paler tonight, making her Cindy Crawford mole rise like a little black hill at the corner of her mouth.

“Mmm,” she says, crossing her legs. “What’s on television tonight, anything good?”

Mike hangs up the phone and clicks the remote. He flips through until he lands on The Simpsons, one of his favorite shows.

His mother swings her top leg slightly. “How was your Thanksgiving, Sammy? What did you and your mother have?”

“My mom’s not big on Thanksgiving.” I say, smoothing my skirt down over my thighs. “She sometimes makes a small dinner for us, or we order in early before everything closes.”

“Oh,” she says. “Well, we went to visit one of Mike’s cousins in Pennsylvania for the day.”

“It sucked, as usual,” Mike mutters.

She gives him a look. “It wasn’t so bad, Michael.”

He keeps his eyes on the TV. “It was so bad. Every year’s the same—Judy gets pissed drunk and yells at Bob for cheating on her ten years ago, Laura cuts her kids down in front of everyone, and we all hate each other by the time it’s over.”

She purses her mouth. “There are good parts to it too.”

“Yeah, the booze.”

The doorbell rings. Mrs. B. gets up to answer it. “That’s not funny,” she says over her shoulder.

“That was fast!” she says flirtatiously to the delivery guy.

Mike rolls his eyes and says loudly, “They’re around the corner, Mom.”

“It was still fast,” she snaps.

I reach across to touch Mike’s arm. “How’s work?”

“It’s all right,” he says, pushing the recliner back. “They’re piling on the work before the holidays, so everyone’s doing twice their share, or more. But we don’t get paid overtime, we get to bank the time and take it off later, in order of seniority.”

His mother comes in with the pizza and some plates and napkins.

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