Chapter 5
Previous Year
New Year’s Eve
That winter after Mom died, Ian and I made sure Dad wasn’t alone for the holidays. After Christmas, while my bachelor-brother
flew off to New York City with friends to guzzle champagne and watch the ball drop, I flew up to Indiana to be with Dad. Not
that I was complaining. For introvert-me, New York City at this time of year seems like a special kind of hell, and if I were
back in South Carolina, I’d be at Philip’s law firm’s party trying to keep a grip on my martini glass through satin opera
gloves.
Instead, Dad and I sit on the couch in flannel pajamas watching the Times Square crowd on television. We’re like Bridget and
her father in Bridget Jones’s Diary, except instead of paper crowns, we sport beanies and heavy sweaters.
The fire roars, but the 1915 farmhouse I grew up in still has its original windows.
Although a little drafty, the house is cozy.
Cedarwood paneling glows warm in the firelight while heavy pale green damask curtains help insulate against Midwest winds.
Earlier in the afternoon, I made rhubarb pies using Mom’s canned fruits in the pantry. It’s been years since I’ve had time
to make a pie, and I enjoyed slicing through the butter and flour with the pastry blender, rolling out the dough to an eighth-of-an-inch
thickness, and then pressing it carefully into one of Mom’s blue glass pie dishes. It was a labor of love, as I knew with
each step that nothing would reach her culinary perfection. My crust would be a little too thick or chewy and my fluting ruffles
uneven. By the time I opened the canned rhubarb and poured it into the pie crust, I had to wipe away a tear. Her garden lies
just beyond the window. There, dormant tomato, blueberry, and rhubarb bushes quiver, brown and stalky, under a dusting of
snow. I doubt Dad will know how to tend them come spring.
Thirty minutes before the ball drops, I go into the kitchen to cut pie slices, hopeful that after all these years sugar-free,
Dad might enjoy a piece. When I bring it back, he thanks me, but leaves his plate on the coffee table untouched.
“Still no sugar?” I ask, readjusting my beanie hat and reaching for my own piece. Dad has followed a strict no-sugar diet
for years.
He shakes his head. “She used to make a few jars just for me with no added sugar. I finished the last one last month.” He
stares ahead numbly at the television. “It was her canned blueberries.”
I wonder if he’ll ever loosen up with his diet. Then again, perhaps his discipline is paying off. He might be pushing seventy,
but his bloodwork always comes back excellent, and he takes a brisk five-mile walk outside every morning. Nothing stops him—even
this Jack London–novel weather.
I take a bite of pie, sweetened rhubarb stalk pieces crunching in my mouth. Mom’s filling is of course heavenly, and my from-scratch pie crust is, well . . . not bad. Still, I can almost hear Mary Berry’s voice in my head primly telling me my dough is a little too crisp.
“We used to dance,” Dad says suddenly.
“You and Mom?”
“Yes.”
I stare up at my parents’ framed wedding photo over the fireplace mantelpiece. Mom wears a simple white A-line dress with
bell sleeves, her hair neatly sprayed in a modest beehive under a fingertip veil. Dad stands beside her sporting a ’70s version
of his tortoiseshell glasses. His hair is darker and thicker.
“I can’t see Mom dancing.”
“She danced.”
I mute the television.
“You know that gala where we met back in college?”
I nod. I knew they met at a dance, but I’ve never heard the details.
“The school wasn’t comfortable with the disco moves everyone was doing at the time, but they agreed to allow salsa dancing
and hired a small conga band. She came up to me—I remember noticing her confidence, her perfectly smooth hair and her short
buttercream dress—she was so put together. ‘Hi, I’m Nora,’ she’d said, putting her hand out. I told her my name was Gaylord, and she didn’t laugh.”
His voice tapers off as he stares down at his uneaten pie slice.
“And then you danced?”
He shakes his head. “Not yet. She told me I had punch dribbled on my tie, and she dabbed it off with a napkin. Then she asked
me to dance. I told her I didn’t know how to. She said I’d be fine, just to follow her.”
I can see Mom taking charge, leading my awkward young father away from the sidelines of the university ballroom and showing him all the right steps.
“She taught me to dance that evening. And then after we were married the next year and had a little extra money from her nursing
job, we took some salsa dance lessons. She was as focused at the lessons as she was with everything else. She said the dancing
was good for our hearts and our joints and that it would keep us young. I remember how she smiled when we danced, how she
pressed her palms against mine during the lessons. She made it look like I led, but she did. She led all the steps and sent
me in the right directions.”
“Why’d you stop?”
He shrugs. “We had you and then Ian. Between my grad school and her hospital shifts, I think it just became too much. I have
few regrets with her. But I wish we’d kept that up.”
We sit there in silence, listening to the fire crackle and watching the muted partiers in Times Square. I try not to think
about Philip’s Christmas gift to me last week—a couple’s dance lesson package at a local studio. He was so proud, so excited
to give it to me. He had smiled like Heathcliff in a candy shop when I opened the envelope.
Well, what do you think? he’d asked.
Ummm . . . sure? I’d responded, clearly not as enthusiastic as he’d hoped. He still kissed me and then began to put batteries in Heathcliff’s
remote-controlled Batmobile.
Why am I so resistant? What am I afraid of? I think I’d just feel silly.
Philip would take lessons with me in a heartbeat. But then again—I’m pushing forty, on the wrong side of thirty-five. And
with The Heathcliff Saga movie just coming out . . .
I’m just too busy.