Steamed

supposed to ignore the fact that Chloe has been through a traumatic event? She saw a dead body, for Pete’s sake. All bloody. And now she’s behaving irrationally, eating food cooked by a murder suspect!”
    “She looks fine to me. In fact,” Mom continued, smiling at me, “I think she looks happy and excited about this boy. And he sounds better than that Daniel. I didn’t like the sound of him when I thought he was a platonic friend of yours, Chloe, and then Heather called him your ‘fun buddy.’ Do I have that right? What a horrible expression.”
    Even though Daniel had refused to come to my aid by fooling around with me in front of my building during the Noah crisis, I felt some loyalty to him. Mostly, though, I was furious at Heather for passing on private information about me to our parents.
    I hoped to God that my mother was right about Josh and that Heather was wrong. “Finding Eric was upsetting,” I admitted. “So was his murder. It was awful, but I’m dealing with it. I don’t want to speak ill of the dead, but I’d just met Eric, so there’s a limit to how devastated I’m going to be, okay? But fortunately for me, Josh is alive and well, and I want to go out with him.”
    “Not alone, I hope,” Heather said. “I don’t think it’s one bit safe for you to be alone with him.“
    I sighed. “Adrianna and Owen are coming with me.” They hadn’t yet accepted the invitation I’d left on Adrianna’s voice mail, but I didn’t say so.
    “Why don’t we all go?” Dad piped in. “I’d love to eat at Magellan.”
    “Oh, wonderful!” Mom said, delighted. “The whole fam- a ily will go!”
    “No!” I said incredulously. “The whole family will not go. I’m not into sicko family group dates. I will be fine with Ade and Owen.”
    Looking hurt, Dad said, “If that’s what you want. But we expect a full report on your meal. Okay, now come help us taste-test the tomatoes.”
    It was that time of year again. When all my father’s tomato plants had produced their bounty, he whipped up a chart, and as a family, we meticulously rated each variety according to overall appearance, skin thickness, flavor, texture, color—a tomato beauty pageant, if you will, only without the obligatory swimsuit competition.
    Baby Lucy had the good sense to sleep through most of the tomato tasting, which lasted an hour. At the end, Dad’s chart was filled in, with a yellow pear variety deemed this year’s winner. Walker’s face and hands were stained with tomato juice, and Heather sent him off to play in the sprinkler while I told my parents about the exciting world of social work and workplace harassment.
    “Sounds boring,” Dad declared. “On a happier note, I’d like to announce the official end of this season’s Soft Shell Crabfest.” Each year my father set himself the goal of eating one hundred soft shell crabs during crab season, and Fresh Pond Seafood was so thrilled with his attempts that they created a chart for him, hung it on the store’s wall, and x-ed off one box for each of his purchases. They also gave him the last three crabs for free. Yesterday, when he’d bought his hundredth crab of the year, the shop’s owners had framed his crabfest chart and presented it to him.
    Dad proudly raised the trophy above his head, declaring, “I am the crab king!”
    “The fact that you’ve eaten a hundred crabs over the past few months is revolting. You should be embarrassed,” Heather scolded.
    “Heather, leave him alone,” I said. “I think it’s admirable. I love soft shell crabs, but I can only eat a few a season. But Dad has really proven himself.”
    “Yeah, proven himself to have a few loose screws,” Heather said, but went over and hugged Dad.
    “Okay, family,” I said. “I’m goin’ home. I’ve got about a zillion pages of reading for school.”
    “Lock your doors when you get home,” instructed Heather.
    I nodded in mock seriousness, kissed her kids, and headed home—with every intention of locking my doors.
     

ELEVEN
     
    I spent Monday and Tuesday incarcerated in the horrible Boston Organization Against Sexual and Other Harassment in the Workplace. Naomi had left me a note to remind me that she was attending a two-day rally for some worthy cause outside the State House and that I should familiarize myself with the monstrous folder she’d left out for me. I was welcome to come find her later that afternoon.
    If she thought I was going to sit in this room reading