Lunch with a cousin

[sawyl]

My cousin J and her daughter, neither of whom I'd seen for 3-4 years, passed through on their way back to London after visiting friends in the north. I couldn't quite believe how grown up C looked — I couldn't quite remember how old she was and didn't want to expose my ignorance by asking — and I thought J seemed happier and more together than she'd been the last time I'd seen her. We got a few pieces of family gossip, but I got the feeling that J kept herself out of the worst of the elbowing and arguing that the older general, my parents included, seem so keen on.