Every time I came home

someone I didn’t know, or knew a little, or perhaps quite well, was getting married. Even the couples my parents didn’t know were enough for endless musings over tea: how they met, what she might wear, whether the height difference mattered (less than living together, more than baldness). Soon, every time I came home someone was having a baby, a crop of grinning children on the fridge. I had nothing to bring to that table. I pushed their questions around my plate, going to bed hungry, dreaming of other women’s kitchens.