Missing Pieces (41 page)

The front door opened as I approached the house. Michelle stepped outside, a veritable poster girl for The Gap, in light khaki pants and cropped moss-green sweater. She closed the door behind her, met me halfway down the front walk. “I thought I better warn you,” she said.

“What’s going on?”

“Jo Lynn’s here.”

“I can see that. Where’s Grandma?”

“She’s asleep.”

“What’s Jo Lynn doing?”

“She’s cooking dinner.”

“She’s cooking dinner?”

Michelle shrugged. She’s
your
sister, the shrug said.

“When did she get here?”

“About an hour ago.”

I checked my watch. It was almost seven o’clock. “Is Sara home?”

“She’s helping Jo Lynn.”

“She’s helping?”

“I’ll taste your food first,” Michelle said.

I laughed, though the laugh was bittersweet. “I don’t think that will be necessary.” I leaned over, kissed her on the cheek. “But thanks for the offer.”

“I think that whatever happens,” Michelle advised as we approached the front door, “the important thing is for you to stay calm.”

“Nothing’s going to happen,” I said. Was I seeking to reassure my daughter or myself?

“Well, you know what Jo Lynn is like. For sure she’ll say something to upset you. Just don’t let yourself get sucked in.”

I stared at my younger daughter in absolute wonderment. Where had this wise little creature come from? At the same time, I felt ineffably sad. My fourteen-year-old child was trying to protect me. Protecting me wasn’t her job. It was
my
job to protect
her.
“I’ll be fine, doll,” I said.

Michelle smiled. “Chin up,” she said as I pushed open the door.

“Jo Lynn?” I stepped into the foyer. Honey, I’m home, I thought, but didn’t say.

“I’m making stir-fry,” she called from the kitchen. Her voice resonated warmth, intimacy. What are families for? it said.

“Smells good.” I forced my shoulders back, my feet forward. Michelle was right behind me.

Jo Lynn stood in front of the stovetop, stirring a large pan filled with vegetables and small pieces of chicken. She was wearing white jeans and a loose-fitting black V-necked sweater. Sara was standing beside her in blue jeans and a skimpy denim shirt, tending to a steaming pot of white rice. As soon as Sara saw me, she dropped the cover on the pot, spun on her heels, and left the room. “You didn’t set the table for dinner,” Jo Lynn called after her.

“I’ll do it later.”

“Now, please,” Jo Lynn said.

Amazingly, Sara turned around and came back. Jo Lynn gave me an easy smile. See how simple that was, the smile said, as Sara quickly set the table for five.

“Larry’s out of town, right?” Jo Lynn asked.

“Till Monday.” Was that why she was here—to check up on my story?

“Anything else you want me to do?” Sara asked her aunt, as if I weren’t there, as if I didn’t exist.

“Not at the moment.”

“Then I can go?”

“Sure. I’ll call you when dinner’s ready. And thanks.”

Sara nodded, refusing to look my way as she walked from the room.

“Why’d you kick Sara out of her room?” Jo Lynn asked immediately. “You could have given our mother the den.”

The muscles in my stomach tensed. I looked over at Michelle, who was leaning against the family-room sofa, carefully monitoring the scene. “Smile,” she mouthed silently, pushing her lips up with her fingers, as if to underline the word.

“It won’t be for much longer,” I said.

“A girl’s room is pretty sacred ground,” Jo Lynn continued, speaking to me as if I’d never been a teenage girl. “You have to learn to respect a kid’s privacy, you know, if you want the kid to have any respect for you.”

“Is that so?”

Michelle cleared her throat, the forced smile tightening on her lips, her eyes bulging with the effort.

“I just remember how I hated for anyone to go into my room, that’s all,” Jo Lynn said, then: “Wait until you taste this stir-fry. It’s the best. I’ve become quite the cook, you know.”

“Great.”

“It’s practice more than anything else. I mean, anybody who can read, can cook. At least that’s what Mom used to say.”

“Since when did you listen to anything Mom had to say?”

“I’ve been trying out all these recipes lately,” she continued, as if I hadn’t spoken, “for when Colin gets out.”

“Great,” I said again. It seemed like the only thing I could say that wouldn’t get me into trouble. I was wrong.

“Why do you keep saying ‘great’? You know you don’t mean it. You know that the last thing you want is for Colin to get out of jail.”

“It’s great that you’re enjoying cooking so much,” I said.

“I didn’t say I was enjoying it.”

Again, I glanced over at Michelle. She lifted her chin with the back of her hand. I followed her silent instructions and pushed my chin up.

“Something wrong with your neck?” Jo Lynn asked.

“It’s a bit stiff,” I said quickly.

“That’s because you don’t know how to relax. You’ve never learned to roll with the punches. Stop trying to be so perfect all the time.”

“I’m not trying to be perfect.”

“You know what your problem is?” Jo Lynn laid down the fork she was using to stir the vegetables. “You bring your work home with you.”

“That’s probably true,” I agreed.

“You’re so used to telling people how to run their lives, and I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with that, don’t get me wrong, it’s part of your job, but it’s easy to forget that not everybody back home is interested in your opinion.

I pulled a large platter out of the cupboard and handed it to my sister. What I really wanted to do was break it over her head. “What are you doing here, Jo Lynn?”

“Cooking you dinner.”

“Why?”

“I guess it’s my way of saying ‘I’m sorry.’”

I almost laughed. My sister had a unique way of apologizing. “That’s the only reason you’re here?”

She shrugged, as if what was about to follow was incidental, unimportant. “I need to talk to Mom.”

“About what?”

“Dinner’s ready,” Jo Lynn called out, transferring the stir-fry and the rice from the stove to the platter, depositing the steaming platter on the table in the breakfast nook. “Come and get it.”

“I just don’t think you should say anything to upset her,” I said before anyone came back.

“This is really none of your business.” Jo Lynn punctuated her rebuke with a sweet smile.

Sara was the first one at the table. She filled her plate and was already eating before anyone else had a chance to sit down.

“Don’t you think you should wait till everybody gets here?” I asked.

“Go ahead—eat,” Jo Lynn said, pouring water into everyone’s glass. “Since when do we stand on ceremony here? You too, Kate—help yourself.”

“I’ll wait for the others.”

“Suit yourself. But it tastes better hot.” Jo Lynn began heaping the stir-fry chicken and vegetables onto her plate.

“What’s this?” my mother asked, Michelle guiding her into the room. “A party?”

She was wearing a pale pink shirtdress, her gray curls slightly flattened from sleep. She looks just like my mother, I thought.

“Yes, Mom,” Jo Lynn answered. “It’s your party, you can cry if you want to.”

“Cry?” my mother asked, oblivious to the reference to the old Lesley Gore hit.

“Eat,” my sister said.

“Something smells wonderful.”

“It tastes even better,” Sara offered, as Michelle helped my mother into a chair.

“Yes, Kate is a wonderful cook,” my mother said.

Jo Lynn scooped up an enormous helping of chicken and vegetables and dumped them onto our mother’s plate. “
I
made the dinner,” she said.

“Did you, dear? Good for you.”

Jo Lynn lifted her water glass into the air. “I’d like to propose a toast.” She waited, a smile forming, then freezing on her lips, while we raised our glasses. “To new beginnings.” We clicked glasses.

“Is this a party?” my mother asked.

“Yes, Grandma,” Michelle answered.

My mother took a few tentative bites of her food. “You don’t have to be afraid of it,” Jo Lynn said. “It’s not going to bite back.”

“It’s delicious,” our mother pronounced. “Kate is a wonderful cook.”

“Jo Lynn made the dinner, Grandma,” Sara said.

“Of course, dear.”

The rest of the meal passed in merciful silence. When it was over, my mother complimented me on the delicious dinner. “It was a lovely party.”

“Party’s not over yet,” Jo Lynn said as Sara and Michelle cleared the table and stacked the dishes in the dishwasher. “We have a little business to discuss.”

“Business, dear?”

“Jo Lynn, please …”

“Kate, butt out. This doesn’t concern you.”

“Would you like to watch some TV, Grandma?” Michelle asked from the kitchen.

Jo Lynn’s eyes flashed daggers toward my younger child. “Call off the dogs, Kate.”

“You know she’s not going to understand anything you say,” I said.

“So, what else is new?”

“And even if she does understand, she won’t remember it.”

“She doesn’t have to remember it. And you don’t have to stay.”

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“Suit yourself. But stay out of it.” Jo Lynn twisted our mother’s chair around so that it faced hers. “Mom, listen to me. This is no big deal. I just need some money.”

“Money?”

“Yeah, you know, that evil green stuff you’ve been hoarding away for years.”

“Jo Lynn, please …”

“Shut up, Kate.”

“She doesn’t have any money.”

Our mother glanced warily toward me. “That was a lovely dinner, Kate.”

“
I
made the dinner,” Jo Lynn said, her hands on the sides of our mother’s chair, her face mere inches from our mother’s. “Thank me, not Kate.”

“Kate is a wonderful cook.”

Angry tears filled Jo Lynn’s eyes. “Kate is wonderful at everything she does. We all know that. But Kate is not part of this discussion. Now, do you remember what I just said?”

“Of course, dear.”

“Good. Because this is very important to me. I’ve decided to go back to college, to become a lawyer. What do you think about that?”

“I think that’s wonderful, dear.”

“And in order to do that, I’d need money. Money that I don’t have. So I’m asking you to lend me some.”

Our mother smiled.

“It’s not a lot of money. A few thousand dollars is all I need right now.”

“Right now?” My voice was sharp, like the crack of a whip.

“I asked you to stay out of it, Kate,” Jo Lynn warned.

“But why do you need a few thousand dollars right now? You haven’t been accepted anywhere yet. You haven’t even applied.”

“You have to send in a check with your application.”

“Not for a few thousand dollars, you don’t.”

“Times have changed since you went to school, Kate,” she reminded me.

“Not that much, they haven’t. Why do you need two thousand dollars?”

“Correct me if I’m wrong,” Jo Lynn said, “but isn’t this conversation between Mom and me? Didn’t you already renege on your promise to loan me the money?”

“What’s really going on here, Jo Lynn?” I demanded.

“That was a lovely dinner, Kate,” our mother said, eyes flitting nervously between her two daughters. “I think I’d like to go to my room now.”

“Sure, Mom,” I said quickly. “Michelle, why don’t you help Grandma … ?”

“Michelle, stay right where you are,” Jo Lynn said. “Grandma isn’t going anywhere until this is settled.”

“For God’s sake, what’s the point?” I asked, “You can see you’re just upsetting her.”

“You’re
the one who’s upsetting her. I was doing fine.”

“She doesn’t understand what’s going on.”

“She understands plenty. Don’t you, Mom?”

“Of course, dear.” Our mother shifted uneasily in her chair.

“You heard her.”

“That’s her answer for everything,” I tried to explain.

“What’s the matter, Kate?” Jo Lynn snapped. “Afraid there won’t be as much left for you to inherit?”

“Inherit? What are you talking about? There’s not going to be any money to inherit.”

“All I need is two thousand dollars, Mom. Surely you can spare that much. It’s not like I’ve asked you for anything before.”

“That was a delicious dinner,” our mother said, her voice thin, her hands flitting nervously about her lap.

“You’re scaring her,” I said.

“Is Kate right?” Jo Lynn asked. “Am I scaring you?”

“I think I’d like to go to my room now.”

“You can go anywhere you like as soon as we get this settled.”

“For God’s sake, Jo Lynn, enough is enough. I think it’s time you went home.”

“Is the party over?” our mother asked.

“Yes, Mom, the party’s over.”

“The party’s still going strong,” Jo Lynn stated, her voice harsh, strangely desperate. “Look, I don’t think that any of you realize how important this is to me. It could be my last chance. You wouldn’t want to deprive me of that, would you? I mean, think how proud you’d be, Mom. You could tell all your friends about your daughter the lawyer.”

“Of course, dear.”

“If you tell me where you’ve hidden your checkbook, I can get it for you.”

“My checkbook,” our mother repeated, looking at me.

“Don’t look at her. Look at me. Just tell me where it is, and I’ll get it for you. I’ll fill it all out. All you have to do is sign it.”

“Of course, dear.”

“Where is it? Is it in your purse?” Jo Lynn was on her feet, hurrying toward Sara’s bedroom.

“What’s all this about?” Sara asked warily, the first words she’d said to me since our altercation.

“I’m not sure,” I answered truthfully.

Jo Lynn returned with our mother’s purse. “I can’t find your checkbook. Where do you keep it?”

“I have her checkbook,” I said, preparing myself for the fireworks that were sure to follow.

“What do you mean, you have it? What are you doing with it?”

“There’s no money, Jo Lynn. And there’s no point in arguing about it.”

“Goddamnit, who put you in charge?”

“Why don’t we all calm down,” Michelle ventured.

“Shut up, Michelle. This is none of your business.”