“I told her it would grow out," Shelley said. "Worst thing I could have said. It meant I didn't understand. That I didn't care about her at all. That I was a terrible mother. I tell you, if every woman had to spend one week with a teenage girl at the beginning of her marriage, the birth rate would drop to zero."

“I've always felt that way about Cub Scout pack meetings.”

Shelley shuddered. "How are you and Katie doing on your own?" Jane's younger son, Todd, had gone on a trip with his paternal grandmother to Disney World, and her older son was on a tour of colleges with his best friend and the friend's father. She and her daughter were by themselves.

Jane sighed. "I was really looking forward to this time, thinking without the boys around, Katie and I could just be girly-girly together. We've never been alone together. But I've hardly seen her. She sleeps late, goes to her job at the pool all afternoon and early evening, then goes out with her friends until the last second before her deadline. All of those activities require that she talk on the phone half the night. I see less of her now than during the school year."

“Count your blessings," Shelley said, but with a smile to show she really didn't mean it.

“I wanted to be closer to my daughter than I was to my mother," Jane went on. "But maybe it's not possible. An innate hormonal disharmony or something."

“I thought you got along well with your mother," Shelley said.

“Oh, I get along with her. Nobody doesn't get along with my mother. I think it's a federal law. But—"

“It's just because she's coming to visit," Shelley said. "I get the same way when my mother's coming. It's that funny shift in roles. It's your house, where you're nominally in charge, but your mother is always your mother. Dads make great guests—I guess it's because men of that generation are used to being treated like guests in their own homes. But mothers are always noticing the way you're doing your job. Are your bathrooms clean? Are the kids well behaved? Are your dishes stacked where a good daughter should stack them? After all, we are a measure of how well they did their job. When does your mother get here?"