That night, I couldn’t get to sleep. A volatile mix of emotion from thinking of Beatrice’s mockery and excitement from being able to have a real husband like all the women I know usually do. Even if all my emotions weren’t negative, the immediate method that I used to deal with them was the same as always…

Like I had done a few times before, I tiptoed into the kitchen and looked around for food. Max and Reginald always kept the pantry stocked, and my usual victims of nightly binging would be the bread and leftovers. Of course, that was on top of any food that I had hidden in my room.

I don’t think I need to share the details of what happened. It wasn’t any different than how I’ve done it before, and it ended the same way. Just me in my room, food strewn around, sobbing my eyes out and wishing I could’ve been born right or not at all. I would’ve given anything…

“Aven…?”

I hadn’t even heard my door open, but there Max was in her nightgown, holding a candle in her hand and watching me in disbelief. I just shamefully turned away and curled up to try and look smaller. Here it came. The moment where I’d get kicked out of another home.

“What’s… What’s going on here…?” Max asked, speaking like she was talking to a wounded dog.

“I’m sorry…” I said with heavy breathing. I was honestly feeling so sick to my stomach and just wanted Max out of my room before I hurled the remnants of my night binge on her.

“Aven, what is this? What’re you-”

I was about to ask her to get out and we could talk about it in the morning, but when I opened my mouth, bile started rushing up my throat. In a split second, I leaned my head out of the window and vomited onto the side of the house. Every second of it burned, and something inside me broke. I just wanted it all to stop. My binging, problems, life, everything. In a fit of frustration I hit my head against the window, and Max yanked me back in. To my surprise, she didn’t immediately yell at or slap me. Instead, she put me into… a hug?

“Aven, talk to me!” she asked, her voice pleading with me while she looked at the mess around my room. “What is this? Please, I’m not angry, but I am upset that my friend is hurting. That’s she’s… I don’t know what’s going on, but I just want to understand. So please, let me in.”

This is where I had my big choice. I could actually open up to the woman who decided to not kick me out at the sight of disassembling her pantry in my room. I hadn’t even opened up to Mum when I lived with her, but maybe… Maybe this time could be different…

“O-Ok…” I nodded, trying to steady my breathing and figure out how to explain. “I’m… I go on these large… eating sprees…”

“Eating… sprees…?” Max asked curiously. “You told me your mother was giving you money on the streets, but I never asked how you lost it all… Did you spend it all on food so you could…?”

“Mhm,” I sniffled. Those sure weren’t very fond memories.

“And when I brought you here and you saw we had such a full pantry…”

“I’m sorry,” I sobbed, crying into my arms. I probably looked like a pathetic emotional mess from her point of view. “I shouldn’t have… I didn’t want to… You’ve been so nice, and-”

“What makes you do this?” Max asked gently, putting an arm around me. “Why food, and why do it?”

“Food is just so comfortable…” I mumbled. “It makes me feel better…”

“This makes you feel better?” she asked, pointing to the mess everywhere. I felt silly just listening to her say it out loud. “Come on Aven, does it really?”

“I don’t know… It numbs the pain at least…” I feebly shrugged. “Makes me feel not so bad about my body and situation and stuff…”

“Oh sweetie… What did it tonight then?”

“Beatrice…” I admitted, shuddering from just saying the woman’s name. “All those words she said and…”

“We’ll make this right, ok?” she optimistically smiled. The way she looked so hopeful made me feel just a bit much better about the situation. “Let’s get this all cleaned up and send you back to sleep, alright?”

“O-Ok…” I nodded, letting Max help me up.

As quietly as possible, we both swept and scrubbed my room to try and make it look good as new. She got down on her hands and knees with me to show the best way to get stains off the floor, and said that she’d clean my dirty night clothes in the morning. When we were all done, I tiredly collapsed into bed while Max draped a blanket over me like she was my mother or something.

“Sleep well, ok?” she smiled.

“Ok,” I nodded, still not quite sure what to say. “And Max… thank you.”

“Of course,” she winked, moving over to the door and blowing out the candle on the side table. “See you in the morning.”

Max finally left me alone, and my entire body felt like it unwound all at once. Opening up about my relationship with food was probably one of the hardest things I’ve had to do. (Only second to opening up about being transgender, but I wouldn’t be able to give a name to that until later, so shhhh.)

*   *   *   *   *

The next morning, I woke up with a little bit of a smile on my face. I had a pretty good dream about soaring through the sky with these beautiful sets of multicolored wings on my back. Oh what I would’ve given to be able to fly away like that… I rolled out of bed and didn’t take more than a step out of my room before seeing Max again. In fact, she actually made me jump. The woman had dragged a chair in front of my door in the middle of the night and fell asleep sitting there. Just me opening the door made her jump awake.

“Oh, good morning, Aven,” Max yawned. “Did you sleep well?”

“I slept just fine. Did, uh, you?”

“Don’t worry, I’m used to falling asleep in a chair,” she giggled. “Before I married Reginald, I had to paint all night to stay afloat.”

“So it’s not uncomfortable?”

“Oh, no, I probably have some irreversible back issues from it, but it doesn’t bother me as much anymore,” she clarified. “Anyway, do you want to help cook some breakfast?”

“Sure!” I smiled eagerly.

That morning, we cooked a delicious batch of scrambled eggs with bell peppers and potatoes. Mum taught me a bunch of traditional family recipes that I learned to follow to the T, but Max always seemed a bit unsure about what and how she was cooking.

“I view cooking like I do art,” she explained while I diced the potatoes. “Sure, you can just do the regular thing and people will like it just fine, but you’ve got to experiment around to improve and grow.”

“I guess I was also raised being scolded to not waste any ingredients,” I remarked. “Experimentation wasn’t exactly encouraged when I’d be punished if I ruined the soup.”

“Well, you can do some experimenting when we’re cooking,” Max chuckled. “That’s how we make some real flavor dynamite.”

“Have you considered writing down your recipes?”

“Oh, um, no,” she admitted. “I guess that if I needed to cook something I’ve already made before, I’d either just know it or figure it out again.”

“You should write them down somewhere,” I suggested. “Families love passing down these things. Does Reginald have any blank books to write in?”

“Hm… I can go check in his study. I’ll be right back.”

Max hurried off to Reginald’s study while I finished the peppers and put them into the scrambled eggs. Soon enough, Max came back with a pen and a pretty fancy leatherbound book that had a little strap to hold it closed. She held it up with a victorious smile.

“Reginald said he had this old thing laying around that he wasn’t going to use.”

“Funny how he agreed to give it to you when he’s upstairs,” I pointed out with a returned smile, listening to the creaking of floorboards above us. “But that’ll do just nice.”

When I finished the eggs and potatoes, Max and I sat down with the book and started writing down as many recipes as we could remember. By the time we had written down our recipes along with who made them, the book was a new half-filled mix of Murphy and Hawthorne family recipes. We were so engrossed that we didn’t even realize when Reginald walked out of his study, eager for breakfast and ready for work.

“Well, looks like you’ve been busy,” he noted. “Is that my new notebook?”

“I don’t think so,” Max denied, shaking her head.

“Oh… What’re you going to do with all those recipes anyway?”

“Maybe we can get a publisher to sell them,” Max said jokingly.

“I don’t think we’re hurting for money,” Reginald laughed, taking a plate and fork. “I’m going to eat this on my way to work. I’m already late.”

“Maybe one day you’ll be on time,” his wife slyly smirked.

“Oh! Wait, maybe when it’s done, it can go in that big library in your family’s mansion,” I proposed. “I’m sure there’s room in there for it.”

“That does sound like something Mom would keep,” Reginald admitted with a sheepish smile. “She loves sentimental little things like that. You should talk to her about it later. She would probably love to help add to it.”

“That’s a great idea, actually!” Max exclaimed, turning to me. “If you want to get familiar with everyone and integrate into the family, that’ll be your ticket.”

“Make sure you tell me how that goes over dinner tonight,” he winked, giving Max a kiss and ruffling his hands through my hair. “Have a lively day, you two!”

Reginald rushed out of the house, leaving Max and I giggling and making sly jokes at the kitchen table.

“When should we go over to your parent-in-law’s house?” I asked. “I’m kind of excited to talk some more with your family. Well, minus Beatrice. I pray she’s not there.”

“I’ll be out doing my errands, but I’m sure you’ll be fine going on your own,” Max said casually. “These days, Beatrice hardly comes out of her house unless one of her siblings forces her to go somewhere anyway.”

“Oh, um, are you sure you can’t come?” I asked nervously. “I think I’d just be more confident if you were there with me…”

“Hey, listen,” Max said with a confident smirk. “You’ve got this, alright? They’re going to love you, and you’ve got nothing to be afraid of.”

“O-Ok…” I stammered.

“You’ll do just fine.”

*   *   *   *   *

“I should just go back home…” I mumbled, clutching the homemade cookbook to my chest and looking around. I was on the literal doorsteps of the Hawthorne family mansion, but too scared to actually knock. Right when I was about to turn away and walk back to Max and Reginald’s house, the creaky wooden doors opened behind me.

“Oh hello there,” answered a young woman with brown hair, a plump figure, and a wide smile. Unmistakably the one and only Angel Hawthorne. “Oh, I remember you! You’re that woman living with Maxine and Reginald… Aven, right?”

“Y-Yeah. Um, is your mother home?”

“Unfortunately not, but she’ll be back soon,” she winked. “So what brings you here?”

“Oh, uh, Max and I were making a little cookbook and Reginald suggested I come here to talk to Mrs. Hawthorne about some recipes and maybe even keeping the book in your library in there.”

“Mum would absolutely love that idea!” Angel exclaimed, motioning me closer. “She’s out right now, but come on in and we can wait for her together.”

“S-Sure…” I said, letting my body move on its own.

I felt so mentally paralyzed; I just still couldn’t believe I was walking into the house of the richest people in New York. As she led me to the living room, I just kind of nodded and agreed with whatever she said. Once Angel sat me down, I got a bit more engaged with the small talk.

“You said you were from Canada last night, right?” she asked.

“Oh, yes I am,” I nodded. “I was far, far too young to remember much of anything from living there, but I’ve visited a couple times.”

“Between you and me, hun, I don’t plan on staying in the country forever. I love my family to pieces, but if I’m being honest, the experience of growing up in this country has taken its toll on me,” Angel admitted. “The scenery here is great, but I would love to move somewhere a bit… different, with a new set of people. Europe is much too far in case I wanted to come visit family, and… well, people who come from down south don’t say the best things about what goes on down there.”

“Where are you planning on going then?” I asked.

“Well… you have said Canada isn’t terrible, right?”

“Wait, seriously?! You’re considering going there?”

“I’ll stick around the south part close enough to be able to come to see my family whenever I want,” Angel reassured. “But I’m craving a life somewhere else. Somewhere quiet, but not downright oppressive.”

“I wouldn’t say Canada is the perfect place-”

“No, but it’s better than here,” she decided. “Plus, Carson can hardly say no when I use my secret technique.”

“Secret… technique…?”

“Mhm. Clinging to his side and begging until he can’t stand it any longer. Just a little woman’s secret, but it’s quite an effective strategy to use on your man.”

“I see…”

“Angel! Who's your guest?”

A little girl ran into the room who looked a striking amount like Angel, but much smaller. I didn’t get to interact much with the youngest Hawthorne last night, but I remembered her as the only one who actually wanted Beatrice to stay for dinner.

“Elizabeth, you remember Aven from last night, right? She was with Max and Reginald.”

“Oh, the odd woman!”

“Yeah, the odd woman…” I mumbled. Nothing like some brutal honesty from a kid to lower your ego.

“Elizabeth, you shouldn’t call people odd,” Angel scolded. “She’s as much part of the family as you or I.”

“Oh… I’m sorry,” she apologized, looking back at me. “You look very nice, Aven.”

“That’s a better way to greet people,” her sister smiled. “By the way, have you seen Mum anywhere?”

“You know, I think she just got back from the market,” chuckled a woman from down the hall.

We all turned to see an extravagant and beautiful woman, decorated with jewelry and a gorgeous dress, looking effortlessly enchanting. Mrs. Hawthorne looked at me with her daughters like I was just one of the family, and her soft smile was enough to put me at ease. If there were supermodels back then, I think Mrs. Hawthorne could’ve been one for sure, even at her age.

“Now then, who’s looking for me and why?” she asked. “Don’t tell me we have to hire a lawyer for something Beatrice did again.”

“Oh, no, no, nothing like that. Not this time,” Angel reassured, patting a hand on my leg. “You remember Aven from last night’s dinner, right?”

“Oh of course! I’m so sorry about what Beatrice said, darling. She’s a bit… troubled. We’re working on it.”

“Oh… I’m alright now,” I told her, holding up the notebook I had. “Actually, I’m here because Max and I were writing some personal and family cooking recipes in a book here. I was wondering if you had the time to sit down and give some Hawthorne family recipes, and then maybe put it in the family library-”

“Oh, say less, darling,” Mrs. Hawthorne exclaimed, holding out a hand. “Come, I’ve got plenty of time for a project like this!”

With a small smile, I took her hand and the mother led me away, guiding me to this room with walls lined with shelves and shelves of books. Shapes, sizes, colors, and materials were so varied that the sheer volume of them overwhelmed me. Suffice to say, I was starstruck…

“Now then,” the excited woman chuckled, handing me a pen and motioning for me to sit. “What recipe should we start with first…”