Work Text:
Breakfast in Bed
Mia woke up, rubbing the sleep from her eyes. It was still early but she wasn’t going to be able to get back to sleep. Not today. She knew what today was and she was planning something special for her mother.
It was Mother’s Day.
The card Mia had made in school for Dani was safely hidden away in her dresser under her trousers. Getting out of bed, Mia went to her dresser and pulled out the card. Holding it carefully in her hand, Mia made her way out of her room and down the stairs. She was the only one up in the house. Standing in the kitchen, she looked at the clock and sighed. Her teacher had said that it was always nice to let your mother sleep in on Mother’s Day.
Not even Gracie was up yet. Mia decided to get herself some cereal and juice to watch some cartoons on television until it was time to start making her mother breakfast.
An hour later, Malcolm lifted his head sleepily. There was the sound of a soft thump.. Thump.. Thump noise coming from the hall. He got out of bed and looked out the room to see Gracie making her way down the stairs on her bottom. Malcolm silently laughed, shook his head and went back to bed. Dani had slept through the movement of him getting out of bed. Getting back into bed, Dani roused only enough to re-establish contact with Malcolm by winding her arms around him, resting her head on his shoulder.
‘Mi mi.’ Gracie made it to the bottom of the stairs, slippers on the wrong feet again, and toddled into the front room.
‘Want some breakfast, Gracie?’ Mia asked as her younger sister came to the large bean bag. ‘I can get you some cereal. Want juice?’
‘Ceweal!’ Gracie nodded.
‘Here, you sit and watch toons. I’ll get you cereal.’ Mia collected her empty bowl and went to the kitchen. There she got a bowl of cereal and juice for her sister before coming back to the front room. Gracie was sitting and watching television. With her bowl of cereal in her lap, Gracie got stuck in eating her breakfast. Mia sat on the floor beside the bean bag, watching toons with her sister.
‘It’s Mother’s Day, Gracie.’ Mia told her sister. ‘Did you do a card for mommy?’
‘Mommy sleeping.’
‘She is. When she gets up you have to make sure you hug her a lot. It’s her day today.’
‘Mommy day.’ Gracie smiled. ‘Hug mommy.’
‘And a card for her. I’ll get you stuff to make her a card.’ Mia ran upstairs and got some construction paper and markers for Gracie. She popped her head into her parents’ room and saw they were both sleeping soundly. Smiling, she went back downstairs. ‘All done your cereal, Gracie?’
‘All gone.’ Gracie held out her empty bowl and Mia took it from her sister. ‘Coloring?’
‘You have to make a card for mommy. Come on. Come sit in the kitchen.’
Gracie followed her older sister into the kitchen and was soon sitting on the floor with her markers and construction paper spread out in front of her. ‘Dwaw mommy?’
‘I made a card with hearts and flowers on it.’ Mia said to her sister. ‘What would you like to give mommy today.’
‘Want hug mommy.’ Gracie declared with a grin. ‘Dwaw hugs?’
‘Yeah, I like that. How would you draw a hug, Gracie?’ Mia asked, kneeling beside her sister.
‘Dwaw mommy hugging me.’
‘That’s a good idea. You draw and I’ll make breakfast for mommy.’
Gracie got serious about her drawing, lying on the floor on her stomach and began to draw on the paper with her markers. Mia began to get breakfast for their mother ready. First thing she did was get the dinner tray out of the cupboard. It wasn’t too big so she’d be able to handle it going up the stairs. Pulling out one of the chairs, Mia set it on the seat. It would make it easier for her to pick it up from there once the breakfast was laid out on it.
Singing softly as she worked, Mia pulled her little step stool out from under the table and stood on it to reach up into the cupboards. She managed to get the bag of oatmeal down, spilling only a little bit of the oats on the counter. Getting one of the smaller bowls that her parent’s used all the time for their breakfasts, she poured oatmeal into the bowl. That she had never really noticed that to make their breakfast oatmeal her father would boil the oatmeal in a pot on the stove didn’t matter. For Mia, cereal and oatmeal were the same thing. The bowl of dry oatmeal was placed on the tray and Mia got the milk from the fridge. She carefully poured milk onto the oatmeal and then mixed it together with a spoon. The dirty spoon was then placed on the counter by the sink.
Gracie occasionally added her own voice to the songs Mia sang when she knew the words or made happy singing noises along with it. ‘Mommy is pink.’
‘That’s pretty work, Gracie.’ Mia encouraged her sister. ‘What colour are you going to be.’
‘Puple.’ Gracie grabbed the purple marker. ‘See!’
‘That’ll be very pretty, Gracie.’
Mia went back to making breakfast. Again, stepping up on the stool, Mia got one of her mother’s tea mugs down, filled it with water and poured it in the kettle on the counter. It was a fancy new kettle that Malcolm had bought a few months ago that had all sorts of pre-set buttons. Mia paused and read the buttons as best she could. She picked one that sounded right but would really not be too hot. As the water boiled, Mia looked at all the teas they had. She knew her mother liked her fruit teas so she took a bag of berry tea, lemon tea and an orange flavoured tea. Unable to decide which she would want, Mia hit on the great idea of putting one of each bag in the mug. When the water finished hitting, Mia carefully poured the warm water into the mug. With just as much care, she took the ¾ full mug to the tray and set it there with the oatmeal.
‘Do you think mommy would like toast?’
‘Toast? Want toast.’ Gracie asked hopefully.
‘I can make you toast too.’ Mia moved her step stool over to the toaster and got out the loaf of bread. She managed to pop two pieces of bread down and waited, watching the little elements inside the toaster heat up. They popped up, a warm brown shade of toast. ‘Jammy toast, Gracie?’
‘Yeah!’ The drawing was abandoned for a bit as Gracie watched her sister spread a layer of jam on the toast, cut it in fours and set it on a plate. She brought it over to her sister, kept one quarter for herself and left Gracie to eat it on her own. Gracie happily ate a few bites from each quarter, getting jam all over her face and fingers. More toast was left on the plate than made it into her tummy but neither of the girls really thought about that.
Mia, eating the quarter of toast she had kept, had put down two more slices of bread in the toaster. They popped up but they were a slightly darker brown as Mia had no idea that the toaster would just get hotter after each set of toasting. ‘I’m going to make mommy a cake of toast! Jam and peanut butter and nutella!’
‘Cake! Mommy like cake!’
‘This will be so good for mommy!’ Mia, having come up with the idea, ran with it. She quickly layered on jam on the first set of toast, put them together and, hopping down from her stool went to set them on the plate on the tray. As the bread toasted darker and darker in the toaster, Mia went to the fridge and found the tub of whip cream that she knew was in there.
With a spoon, Mia dolloped some whip cream on the strawberry toast sandwich. The toaster popped and Mia was soon back on her stool and this time she was layering on peanut butter between the two very dark brown slices of toast. Pasting the slices together with peanut butter oozing out the side, Mia put down a third set of bread slices. With the peanut butter toast sandwich in her hands, Mia very carefully set it on top of the strawberry toast sandwich and whip cream layer. Another large dollop of whip cream went on top of that layer. The toaster popped again and this time, the toast that came up was on the verge of being black. Mia didn’t think anything of it. Instead, she was focussed on getting to the second shelf to get the jar of nutella.
The third toast sandwich formed. Again, a thick layer of nutella was spread on the blackened toast, stuck together and then carried over to the tray. Mia made sure it lined up and then used liberal amounts of the whip cream to cover the top. She tried to smear some on the sides but it failed to stick properly to the ‘cake’ of toast.
Gracie, watching her sister, was attracted to the whip cream and came over to stick her fingers in the puddle of whip cream at the base of the ‘cake’.
‘That’s for mommy, Gracie. Not you.’ Mia chided her younger sister but was happy to do the same on the other side to ‘taste’ the whip cream. She stood back. ‘It’s missing something.’
‘Mi mi?’ Gracie asked. ‘Bewwy good.’ She stuck a finger in the streak of jam that was dripping out.
‘Berry. That’s it!’ Mia went into the fridge and found a small container of fresh blueberries that her father had bought the day before. It took a bit of work for her to open it and a few blueberries flew out to roll away under the table. Too focussed on her task, Mia didn’t pay attention to the stray fruit. With a small handful of blueberries in hand, Mia sprinkled a few onto the oatmeal and then she placed the rest on the ‘cake’ in a heart shape.
Gracie looked at the finished ‘cake’ and smiled. ‘Pwetty cake. Eat now?’
‘No Gracie. This is special for mommy. Did you finish your card?’
‘Yeah.’ She went to the almost forgotten card and held it up. There were spots of jam on it but otherwise it was a picture of two people hugging.
‘You have to sign it, Gracie. Here, let me help.’ Mia took the card and was soon helping her sister sign her name on the corner. ‘There you go, Gracie. That looks perfect!’
‘Give mommy now?’
‘Yes, let’s go take mommy her special breakfast and cards.’ Mia went over to the tray and managed with some effort to pick it up. It was heavier than she thought it would be. ‘Go on ahead, Gracie. I’m following you.’ With her tongue stuck out in concentration, Mia struggled to hold the tray steady as she headed one step at a time to the stairs.
Gracie, carrying only the card she had made for her mother, toddled on ahead and began to head up the stairs. The youngster had no notion of ‘surprise’ or ‘staying quiet’ and was soon calling out to her parents. ‘Mommy! Daddy! Bweakfast time!’
Malcolm, waking up by cracking open one eye, turned in the bed to face Dani. She still appeared to be fast asleep but as soon as he leaned closer to her and kissed her on the lips, her eyes opened. ‘Morning, Malcolm. Are those the girls I hear?’
‘Morning, love. Yes, that would be our girls. I’ll go see what they're up to.’ Malcolm swung his legs out of bed, he didn’t bother with his slippers and headed to the top of the stairs. Gracie was halfway up, her hand gripping her card in her hand, wrinkling it. ‘Good morning my little ladies. What have you got there?’ His eyes widened as he saw Mia round the corner from the kitchen, clearly having trouble with a tray of food. ‘Careful there, lass. Let me help you.’ He headed down the stairs, grabbing Gracie in his hands and lifting her to the top of the stairs to get her out of the way. Gracie squealed happily at the unannounced flight.
‘I wanted to bring it up to mommy,’ Mia pouted a little as her father made it to the bottom of the stairs.
‘You did quite well already, lass. Did you make all this yourself?’ Malcolm took the tray from his daughter, the look of relief on her face blatant.
‘Gracie helped.’ Mia stated.
‘Well, it looks like you put a lot of effort in it. I’m sure your mommy is going to be very pleased and surprised. Up you go, I’ll follow you.’
Mia, free of her burden, took her card off the tray and raced up the stairs. Gracie was already in their parent’s bedroom, lifted onto the bed by Dani.
‘Card, mommy.’ Gracie presented her work to her mother. ‘Mommy’s day!’
‘Why yes, it is Mother’s Day. Thank you for the card, Gracie.’ Dani settled her daughter on her lap, careful to hold the card without getting jam on her hands or bedding. ‘Is that you hugging me?’
‘Yes, mommy. Hugs!’ Gracie threw her arms around her mother, hugging her and leaving sticky fingerprints on her nightshirt.
Mia was racing in a moment later, scrambling onto the bed herself. She was hugging Dani too, kneeling on the edge of the bed. ‘Happy Mother’s Day!’
‘Oh, you two girls. I love you both. Is that your card, Mia?’
‘It is! Did you like Gracie’s? She made it this morning while I made you breakfast.’
Malcolm appeared in the doorway, tray in hand. ‘Speaking of breakfast, here it is, love. Courtesy of your girls.’
‘Oh my! Did you two make me breakfast in bed?’ Dani smiled at her girls, kissing them each and hugging them tight.
‘We did, mommy. I hope you like it!’
Dani had Gracie move off her lap to sit on the bed at her side as Malcolm brought the tray over to set it on her lap. He caught Dani’s eye and gave her a wink, holding back a laugh that only showed as a held back quirk of a smile on his lips.
‘What do we have then?’ Dani asked, stalling on having to eat what was before her. Her first glance was at the tea which looked almost like an oddly purple coloured liquid.
Mia eagerly talked about what she had made for her mother. ‘I made you your favourite teas.’
‘All of them?’ Dani asked.
‘Yeah!’ Mia nodded and beamed as her mother lifted the mug of cold tea and sipped it.
It took all of Dani’s self-control to smile back at her daughter. ‘That is definitely all of them.’
‘And that’s your oatmeal. I was going to get you a bowl of our cereal but you like the oatmeal more.’
‘I do,’ Dani took up the spoon beside the bowl of oatmeal. She sunk the spoon into the cold, congealed mass of oatmeal. A solid lump came free and she ate it slowly, forcing herself to swallow it. ‘Thank you, I do like oatmeal more than that cereal you and Gracie like.’ Dani pointed at the stack of whip cream covered toast. ‘This looks different. What’s this?’
‘We made you a cake! Didn’t we, Gracie.’
‘Cake! Whip cweam, mommy. See!’ Gracie shot a finger out and scooped up some whip cream to offer it to her mother. ‘See?’
‘I see.’ Dani stuck her tongue out and licked the whip cream off Gracie’s finger, smiling at her daughter’s laughter. ‘So, what is this cake made of?’
‘Toast!’ Mia said, her chest puffing out proudly. ‘A layer toast cake.’
‘That looks big.’ Malcolm sat down on the bed, holding Mia close. He reached a hand out and scooped up some of the whip cream himself, licking it off his finger. ‘Do I taste nutella?’
‘Yeah!’ Mia pointed to the different layers. ‘There’s a strawberry jam layer. Then there’s a peanut butter layer. Then the top is nutella.’
‘I can see I’m going to have to put the nutella up on a higher shelf now.’ Malcolm teased his daughter, knowing full well her love of nutella at any time of day.
‘Awww, don’t do that, daddy. I promise I won’t sneak it.’ Mia pouted.
‘We’ll see, lass.’
Dani studied the stacks of toast, the whip cream and streaks of jam, peanut butter and nutella. Wiping off some of the whipcream from the top and licking it from her finger, she noticed how dark the toast was on the top layer. After another finger of whip cream, Dani realized that the least burnt toast was the bottom layer. ‘I think I’m going to start with the strawberry layer.’
‘Stawbewwy good.’ Gracie agreed, her sticky finger reaching out to the whip cream covered toast.
‘No, Gracie. This is mommy’s. You had your toast before.’
Dani took a deep breath and began to eat the toast layer sandwich, strawberry jam dripping onto the plate along with some of the whip cream. She had to quickly lean forward to avoid some of it getting on the bedding.
‘You got some cream on your chin there, love.’ Malcolm was smiling but working very hard to not laugh.
‘Is it good, mommy?’ Mia asked, eager to hear the verdict from her mother.
‘It’s very good, Mia. This is the best Mother’s Day ever.’ Dani set the messy toast back on the plate. Her eyes pleaded with Malcolm to rescue her.
‘Girls, how about we go downstairs and leave your mommy to enjoy her breakfast in peace and quiet. Maybe you can help me make her Mother’s Day cake for tonight?’
Mia’s eyes went wide. ‘Are we getting cake for dinner?’
‘Of course we’re having cake for dinner. It is Mother’s Day after all.’
‘Can I help decorate?’ Mia begged.
‘If you behave you can.’
‘And Gracie will help?’
‘Of course your sister will help.’ Malcolm assured her. ‘Come on, let’s go.’
‘Come on, Gracie!’ Mia helped her sister down off the bed, took hold of her hand and headed out of the bedroom.
‘Thank you, Malcolm.’ Dani whispered.
‘That bad, huh?’
‘You have no idea.’
Malcolm dug the spoon into the oatmeal, watching it stand up straight in the mess. ‘I think I do. I’ll get the girls out of the house in a bit, we’ll go to the shops to get ‘cake making’ things. Give you a chance for some proper tea and toast?’
‘That would be wonderful, darling.’ Dani smiled and hugged him, almost knocking the tea sludge over.
‘Happy Mother’s Day, Dani.’
‘I’ll never forget this one, that’s for sure.’ Dani smiled.