To help my mom and the rest of the family since the loss of my dad, a Triple F family member spends each night at her house. We call these slumber parties. We have a group chat called the Night Shift on which we go back and forth making the slumber party schedule for each coming week.

Most of us sleep in Mom's big king-sized bed on our designated nights with her and Thelma and Katie. Thelma is an energetic Boston terrier named after my granny, and Katie is a judgmental deer-head Chihuahua. They both boss my mom around.

After she puts them on the bed, Thelma wriggles under the covers for snuggling. She snores. Katie goes to the edge of the bed as if to be as far away from a human as possible and curls up in a minuscule ball of fluff. Mom says she does that because she's afraid we might mash her.. I think it could be out of disdain. For me. Never for my mom, whom Katie adores. She is what one might call a benevolent dictator. She rules over her kingdom in the night from her corner-of-the-bed outpost.

I like to get up slowly and have coffee with my mother when I spend the night. It's what she did every morning with my dad, and I know that time of day is especially lonely now for her. He was an early riser and had her coffee ready with the right amount of........

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