The Midnight Phone Call from My Son

My son is a freshman in college, three states away. At 11:47 p.m. on a Tuesday in October, my phone rang. I sat straight up in bed, heart pounding.

"Mom," he said. "How do I make your soup?"

His roommate had a bad cold, and he wanted to make him the chicken soup I used to make him when he was sick. He was in the dorm kitchen with a pot, a chicken from the grocery store and no idea what to do.

For the next hour I talked him through every step. Carrots, celery, onions, a bay leaf, a little lemon at the end. He put me on speaker while he chopped. His roommate, coughing in the background, said, "Thank you, Mrs. Ruiz."

He texted me a photo at one a.m. of two bowls of soup. "It's good," he wrote. "Not as good as yours." I didn't sleep much that night. I didn't mind.