Blue Stars by Emily Gray Tedrowe

came out bunchy and weird. She gave his head a kiss and made a mental note to check Marshalls for shirts with the right proportions.
    Her car stalled twice before they could pull up the ramp leading out of the apartment’s garage. Lacey’s face grew hot as she motioned people behind her to go around. She jammed the clutch, pumped the gas, and cursed a lot.
    “Is it the battery again?” Next to her Otis was flipping through a Legos catalog. He didn’t sound all that concerned.
    “I think it’s the hoses or something,” Lacey said. “Better be.” Last time, though, the mechanic had murmured something ominous about the carburetor before she shut him up. She did not have an extra seven hundred bucks lying around. Finally they were out, on a cloudy warm spring day, windows down and Z100 on the radio. Mother and son both sang along to “Hollaback Girl” with Gwen Stefani. Otis had a little thing for Gwen Stefani, and Lacey couldn’t deny she was cute. And extremely athletic: what was up with all those push-ups during her shows? They took the Hutch South through Pelham, crossed the New England Thruway, and went around a series of clover turns as they entered Pelham Bay Park, a confusing mix of parkland and public beach. Lacey missed the first turnoff so they went around again, finally pulling onto the dinky little two-lane that led over a bridge into City Island.
    “The Seaport of the Bronx,” Otis intoned. The sign made them crack up every time.
    “We’re late.” Lacey sighed. She hated to give Lolo anything else on her. It was still weird to her that Eddie had grown up here, on this seedy spit of land in the Eastchester Bay. While she had spent her teenage years strolling every mall in Yonkers, he’d worked in the fading boatyards in the putt-putt, driving weekenders out and back from their docked fourteen-footers. You’d think he would have joined the navy. And it was white, white, white here—Irish, Italian, a little Greek. Eddie claimed he hadn’t been the only Puerto Rican kid at P.S. 175, but as far as Lacey could tell, his mother Lolo cornered the market on color.
    When they pulled to a stop in front of her two-story A-frame on Carroll Street—you could always find parking out here—Otis said, “Yeah. She’s sitting in the window. You’re screwed.”
    “Look, no more with the screwing, all right?” Otis snickered. “You know what I mean.”
    He jogged up the steps and the front door opened instantly. “Hi, Lolo!” “Hi, baby. Finally .” Lacey got the grocery bags from the trunk. Lolo hadn’t e-mailed her list until yesterday at 6:00 p.m., which meant then she and Otis had been out at Wesselman’s and the discount grocery place until ten. She shouldered open the door and carried bags right into the kitchen. “Hi, Mom.”
    Lolo came in the doorway, one arm tightly wrapped around Otis; they were about the same height. Petite, fully made up, hair done … it was clear that the visit wasn’t a casual one for her mother-in-law. Lacey put away the milk and eggs, lugged the cat litter under the bathroom sink. She felt scrubby and huge, as usual, whenever she was out here. “They didn’t have Genoa salami. This is the same thing, right?”
    Lolo barely glanced at the package she held up. “It is what it is. Let me get my checkbook.”
    “Forget it, Ma.” Otis grinned. They went through this each time.
    “I’m not a charity case. Now tell me the total.”
    Lacey put the soda liters on the lower shelf of the pantry. “Zero dollars, and zero cents. Today’s bargain only.”
    “Well…” Lolo shook her head at the ceiling, what can I do , deeply disappointed yet again.
    “Otis? You waiting for an invitation?” Lacey pointed to full grocery bags on the floor.
    “No, no, he has to come tell me every single thing about school. Get a glass of milk first, sugar.”
    Otis shrugged happily. “I have to go tell her every single thing about school.”
    As he reached into the fridge, Lacey gave