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Five weeks later, Roni was walking into the office with Eli who had his bookbag on his arm.
“Just do your homework, please,” she said. “I only have a few things to take care of and then we can leave.”
“I don’t have a lot of homework,” Eli said.
“Do what you’ve got and then I’ll give you something else to do,” she said.
She hated that she got a call that the after-school program wouldn’t run fully today. That they had too many staff out.
Could she have argued and left Eli there? Sure, she could have. Jeff probably would have.
But she couldn’t in good conscience when she could go get Eli and bring him back to sit with her here. Why make him stay there and not be watched as carefully? It made no sense and her bosses wouldn’t care.
She had a call to make at three thirty. She could have done it from home, but it was better here in case they had a question and she could find the answer easier.
Eli sat down in one of the chairs in front of her desk and pulled out a book from his bag. “Can I get a drink?”
“I’ve got bottles of water and tea in the fridge here if you want one.”
“How about a snack?” Eli asked.
She knew this game. It was the same as always when he was here.
“You know what I’ve got and you can help yourself,” she said.
Her son got up and went to her drawer, pulled it open and then took her purse out. “I want a chocolate chip cookie from the vending machine. Can you give me money for it?”
She rolled her eyes. Normally she’d say no, but she needed him quiet for this call. “Three minutes to get there and back.”
He giggled and she handed him over three singles. He was lucky; she didn’t usually have cash on her. No way she’d give him her credit card.
He ran out of her office and she got to work before he could return, but she was watching the clock just the same.
After a minute, she got up to go to the door where she’d wait in the hallway for him.
“Roni, what are you doing?”
She hadn’t expected Trent to come in the front door of the building. “Waiting for Eli.”
“He’s here?” he asked.
It’d been five weeks since the two of them said they loved each other and she knew the next logical step would be to let Eli know, but she was just struggling with how to approach this.
She was happy that Trent wasn’t putting any pressure on her about it.
“He is,” she said. “The after-school program was short staffed so I went and got him. I’ve got a call to make in twenty minutes and when I’m done, we’ll probably leave.”
“Oh,” he said.
He didn’t get a chance to say anything else with Eli running around the corner. “Less than three minutes,” Eli said. “Hi, Trent. Do you remember me?”
She looked at Trent and saw the softness come into his eyes. “Of course I do. I could never forget you. And you got the same cookie. E6 right?”
“He remembered, Mom,” Eli said, laughing.
She took the cookie out of his hand and opened it for him before he sent crumbs flying everywhere in his haste to get to it.
“I think Trent has a good memory,” she said.
