This time she shook her head. "No occasion," she said looking at me. "Just wanted to do something nice." She smiled, though I couldn't tell if it was sincere. Regardless, I returned the grin.

"Well it was," I said then felt the immediate need to change the subject. "Kelly tell you the good new yet?"

Mom laughed then rolled her eyes; this was genuine. "About the shoot? That's all I've been hearing about for the last week."

"Uh-uh. We've talked about other things," Kelly defended, though she began to grow uncertain. "I'm sure we have. We've talked about Jason a bunch."

"What?" I asked, mouth full of food once more....