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Bianca leaving for college was hard on both Will and Nico. Sure, they put on a brave face when they had to drop her off at Harvard, but as soon as they reached the highway some tears were shed.
They were positive from her calls that she was doing well and didn’t have any troubles which was good as they would be slightly less anxious about her. Not that they were ever not anxious about their kids. There were always the worries of whether they were eating or sleeping enough, are they happy or in need of anything, but it was just a part of being a parent. Imagine your kid moving 4 hours away from you in another state.
Before Thanksgiving, Bianca had come home only once for a weekend and that was just to get her car up to Cambridge with her. She couldn’t stop talking about her classes and her new friends and how cool Harvard was. Thankfully, she didn’t have any classes on Wednesday so after her last class on Tuesday she went home for the Thanksgiving weekend.
“Are you going to lay a red carpet, or you’ll leave the entrance empty?” Ryder joked as both his parents were excited to have Bianca back home.
“I’m the sarcastic member of the family,” Nico told him.
“So, you haven’t told me. Can I get a motorcycle?” He asked.
“And you might be the comedian for thinking that they’ll actually get you a death trap of a vehicle,” Bianca said as she got inside the house.
“Missed you too, Bee,” Ryder replied.
“Who told you I missed you?” She told and took her dog in her hands. “There’s my baby. I missed you.”
“She misses the dog and not me.”
“Ryder, stop complaining. Hi dad.” She greeted Nico before she went upstairs to her room.
It was after 12 when Nico opened the balcony door. Bianca was sitting on the couch outside with a blanket over her shoulders. He sat next to his daughter. He noticed that she was holding a lit cigarette.“You smoke now?”
“Yes,” Bianca said and doused the cigarette in the ashtray next to her. “But not in a trashy ruin your lungs kind of way.” She warned him.
“Let me guess. In a 1960s French film icon.” He replied as he knew his daughter a bit too well. And because when he was studying in Rome he was doing the exact same thing.
“Existentialist philosopher from the 1940s writing in a Parisienne café. But I’ll give you the point. You were close.” She smiled. “I missed being home.”
“We missed you too. It’s weird not having you around every day.” He confessed as he was staring at the ashtray. “You know your dad is going to freak out, right?”
“Why do you think that I’m doing it now that he is at the night shift and Ryder is upstairs and won’t snitch me.” She said. “It’s not like I’m a nicotine addict. It’s twice a month or something like that.”
“You don’t have to justify yourself. Cigarettes go well with humanities and social sciences. I know that from first hand.” He winked at her.
“So you won’t snitch me?” She said like she was telling herself the answer.
“Whether we like it or not you are legally an adult. I don’t think I have the power to punish you anymore. Not that we ever needed to ground you.”
“It’s because I had good parents.”