Cassie
Alaska, 2024
There was only one grocery store in Homer, a Safeway, with a big parking lot and the town’s only Starbucks inside.
Once a month, would have to brave the big market for staples, pet food, and cleaning supplies.
The Safeway stayed open until eleven o’clock, so ten thirty, give or take, was when Cass came in to do her monthly shopping.
She locked her car and hurried inside through the darkness, thinking that it was going to feel like winter for months longer, but at least the holidays were over.
She wouldn’t be confronted by Christmas trees in plastic netting, or Christmas music on the speakers.
She’d made it through that particular gauntlet of reminders of what she was missing.
The Grossberg home hadn’t always been filled with holiday cheer.
But her parents would try.
Janice would polish the brass menorah that she’d inherited from her mother, and for eight nights, they would light the candles and sing the blessings.
Once each Chanukah, they would join the extended family at Bess’s house for a feast of brisket and latkes with homemade applesauce, or sour cream and vivid orange curls of smoked salmon, with a teaspoonful of caviar on top.
Those were Janice’s sister Stephanie’s contribution.
“Fancy-schmancy!”
Bess would say.
On the way home, Janice would mutter to Sam about how pretentious her sister was, and Sam would remind her that Steffi and her husband might live in a brand-new five-bedroom mansion on the Main Line, and that their oldest son might have gotten into Penn (“Early decision!”
Steffi had crowed), but neither of their kids was a musical prodigy.
always wondered whether Zoe heard those whispered conversations, and how they made her sister feel.
In the parking lot, clenched her hands around the shopping cart’s handle.
She swallowed hard and squeezed her eyes shut.
Breathe, she thought ...but the memories kept coming.
The smells came first: Aunt Bess’s brisket, cooked for hours in a sweet-and-sour sauce of ketchup and cranberries and brown sugar.
Chanukah candles, burning in the menorah.
The smell of the bedroom she and her sister shared: Zoe’s hairspray and mousse and Opium perfume.
“You can borrow some if you want,”
Zoe would offer, but Cass never did.
She didn’t want to smell appealing, didn’t want guys inhaling some alluring, sexy fragrance, then turning to see the girl that alluring, sexy scent was attached to, and ending up disappointed.
It would be like the Goodyear Blimp trailing the scent of lilies and lilacs.
False advertising.
Asking for trouble.
Then there were tastes: the crisp fried latkes and sufganiyot, the creamy nutmeg smoothness of the eggnog Steffi’s husband, Frank, would bring to dinner.
Frank wasn’t Jewish, and eggnog wasn’t a traditional Chanukah libation, but the Grossberg clan adapted to it fast.
Janice would give each girl a teacup full, with nutmeg and cinnamon sprinkled on top, and sneak a shot of rum into her own cup when Sam wasn’t looking, to sip as the party went on.
Outside the Safeway, made herself get moving, pushing her cart through the automatic door.
Her boots squeaked on the linoleum floor.
The cart’s wheels rattled in counterpoint.
Squeak, squeak, rattle, F, F, D sharp, the noises resolving into notes without her having to give it any thought as she grabbed her staples: a bag of oranges, for the vitamin C; a gallon of skim milk, for the calcium.
Two pounds of carrots and five pounds of onions and three heads of romaine lettuce, because, after her time in the band, and the diets they’d had her on, couldn’t prepare herself a plate that wasn’t at least fifty percent filled with vegetables.
She grabbed a container of yogurt and a package of chicken breasts.
Kidney beans, black beans, a bag of rice, low-fat cheddar cheese.
Boxed chicken broth.
In the frozen foods section, she pulled out a box of turkey burgers and a single loaf of Ezekiel bread, which felt like an icy brick and tasted, she’d always thought, like tree bark and spite.
often wondered why she bothered to keep up the fight against a body that clearly wanted to be bigger.
Who cared anymore? Who was going to look, now that she lived so far away from family, from strangers, from everyone? There weren’t any classmates to make fun of her, no boys who’d moo or oink or call her names.
She wasn’t just fat; she was fat and middle-aged and, thus, doubly invisible.
Couldn’t she be a little kinder to herself?
Sometimes she tried.
She’d buy heavy cream and buttermilk, cocoa powder and Ghirardelli chocolate chips, and she’d bake carrot cakes with luscious cream-cheese frosting or make pot roast or eggs Benedict for Sunday brunch.
She’d think about her great-aunt Bess, who had always been big, and who had still done what she wanted, including taking a Caribbean cruise and posing for pictures in a polka-dotted bikini by the pool.
Janice had never put on a diet, although sometimes wondered if that had to do with her mother’s general lack of interest in her second daughter than a progressive, forward-thinking acceptance of ’s size.
Whatever the reason, between Aunt Bess’s example and her mother’s indifference, ’s real trouble with her body hadn’t started until the band.
The managers and the music video directors, the stylists and photographers—they’d all cared.
A lot.
To them, ’s body was a problem to be solved, a thing to be reduced or disguised or hidden.
By the time the band broke up, dieting had become a habit, one that was as hard to lose as the pounds had been.
You don’t need that, the voices in her head would whisper, if she reached for a cookie in the bakery or a container of ice cream when she was picking out her sprouted-wheat bread and frozen spinach.
A minute on the lips, a lifetime on the hips, she’d hear ...
or, That’s an hour on the treadmill right there, or, worst of all, Remember, you’re going to be standing next to your sister.
“Hello there!”
said the woman at the cash register as put the last of her items onto the belt.
“Hi,”
muttered.
The cashier’s name tag read “Marcia”
and she was tiny and frail.
She had an airy meringue of white hair and a tanned, wise, wrinkled face.
She looked like a kindly walnut.
A walnut with glasses, and a necklace made of miniature Valentine hearts, flashing red lights, blinking on and off on top of her pink sweater.
“Two hundred and eleven dollars is your damage!”
the woman said.
She was wearing bright pink lipstick, the same shade as her top.
saw that a little had smeared onto one of her front teeth.
“Would you like to round up? We’re raising money for cancer research.”
“Sure.”
handed the woman her credit card.
The woman handed it back, then hesitated.
’s entire body tensed.
But instead of Don’t I know you? or You look so familiar or Weren’t you in that band? the woman turned around at the sound of someone calling.
followed her gaze and saw a skinny, dark-haired girl approaching from the direction of the deli.
“Naomi and Pete both went home,”
the girl said.
“Oh Lord,”
the older woman replied.
“So that’s, what, three of us?”
“Four,”
said the girl, whose name tag read “Erica.”
“Including you.”
The woman clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth, then looked at Cass and said, “Are you in a hurry?”
Before could answer, the woman—Marcia—continued to talk.
“It’s just that we’re doing a little birthday party for Carl.”
The woman aimed her chin in the direction of a young man carefully wiping down a conveyer belt with paper towels.
had seen him.
He’d even bagged her groceries once.
He had a round face and was short and stocky, always smiling.
She’d heard him talking, in a slow, slightly thickened voice, greeting people, asking them how their day was.
She had always been careful to never stand in his line, so that he wouldn’t try talking to her.
The cashier leaned toward and lowered her voice to a whisper.
“Carl lives with his dad, who I doubt even remembered it’s his son’s birthday, so we’re going to have a cake and sing ‘Happy Birthday’ right after we close.”
nodded, because, clearly, some response was required.
“The trouble is,”
Marcia said, “there’s only going to be four of us.
It’s a pretty skimpy crowd!”
Looking around, realized that she was the only shopper left.
The cavernous store appeared to be entirely empty.
Normally, that would be a good thing; exactly what she wanted.
Not tonight.
“If you could just stay for a few minutes and sing, it’d mean the world to Carl,”
said Marcia, as she gave a twinkly grin.
“It can be your good deed for the day.”
opened her mouth to refuse. “I—”
she began.
I can’t.
I’m late.
I’m busy.
I have to get back home, to my dog.
I can’t sing, not ever.
I’m not allowed.
She swallowed hard.
Her eyes were stinging, and her throat felt tight and hot.
She started to shake her head, to open her mouth and croak out a refusal.
What came out, instead, was, “Okay.”
“Oh, thank you!”
The cashier clapped her hands in approval.
The hearts on her necklace bounced.
“Wonderful! Okay, so, we’re going to set up the cake in the back corner, by the bagel bins.
I’m Marcia, by the way.”
“Cass.”
cleared her throat and tried again.
“I’m Cass.”
“Nice to meet you, Cass.
Come with me.”
put her groceries into her cart and followed Marcia toward the back of the store.
She wished she’d thought quickly enough to give a fake name.
She braced herself for questions—Do you live here, or are you just visiting? How long have you lived in Alaska? Where do you live? and What do you do? She wondered if she could say she was a day-tripper from one of the cruise ships that stopped at Homer, letting the passengers off to spend the day hiking the Grace Ridge Summit, or taking a snowmobile tour of the glaciers and fjords, or kayaking in Kachemak Bay.
Only why would a day-tripper be shopping for groceries at eleven o’clock at night?
There was a table set up in the corner by the bakery, draped in a cheerful tablecloth with a pattern of dinosaurs in party hats blowing noisemakers and dancing around its borders.
A small, round cake with white frosting and the words “HAPPY BIRTHDAY CARL”
piped on top in green icing sat at its center, and two other people with name tags on their aprons stood around it.
Cass recognized a sullen-looking middle-aged white guy from the deli.
His name tag read “Sven,”
and he had lank, long hair and a thick beard.
A young woman with cropped dark hair whose name tag identified her as Louise was also familiar from the deli counter, even though Cass had never ordered anything from the deli.
She bought the prepackaged stuff from the refrigerated shelves, sparing herself a human interaction, even if she would have preferred a different kind of cheese or cold cut.
“Everyone, this is Cass.
She’s going to sing with us.
I’ll go get Carl!”
Marcia scampered off.
Cass felt, or imagined she could feel, everyone’s eyes turning toward her.
“Got roped into this, huh?”
said Louise.
She was petite and cute, with big, blue-gray eyes and a tiny jewel glittering in her right nostril.
Sven had a pockmarked face, a pug nose, broken blood vessels in his cheeks, and a Semper Fi tattoo crawling up his neck.
“Marcia asked every customer who came through her line,”
Sven said abruptly.
“You’re the only one who said yes.”
He had a nice, deep voice.
wondered if he could carry a tune.
“And here’s the birthday boy!”
Marcia said.
She was walking behind Carl, with one hand on his shoulder to guide him and the other hand covering his eyes.
When they were almost at the table, she let her hands drop and said, “Open up.”
Carl opened his eyes and stared at the cake.
His eyes went wide behind his glasses.
“For me?” he asked.
“That’s your name, isn’t it? Do you see any other Carls anywhere?”
Marcia asked.
She bent down, pulling a box of matches from her pocket, and lit the three candles that were sticking up from the icing.
She looked around at the group, nodded, and then, in a cracked, quavering voice, began to sing.
“Happy birthday to you . . .”
Sven took up the song in a low rumble.
“Happy birthday to you . . .”
Cass jammed her hands into her pockets.
Her plan had been to just stand there, adding her body to the crowd, singing only if she had to, and as quietly as possible.
But when the song began it was as if her voice, so long denied the pleasure of music, had made its own plans.
found that she’d opened her mouth and raised her head, that she’d drawn her spine straight and her shoulder blades down and had automatically pulled in the right amount of breath.
“Happy birthday to you,”
she sang.
She could hear herself, the words emerging clear and tuneful in the empty supermarket, echoing off the shelves and the high rafters.
“Happy birthday, dear Carl . . .”
hadn’t noticed how, by the song’s conclusion, she and Sven were the only ones still singing.
They did the last four words alone, in harmony, her voice rising, his going down.
“Happy birthday to you.”
Then it was over.
And everyone was looking at her.
Marcia’s mouth had dropped open, and Carl, the birthday boy, was so busy staring that he had neglected to blow out his candles.
“My God,”
Sven murmured.
“Who are you?”
“Nobody,”
said, low-voiced, hunching her shoulders.
She looked at Carl and nodded at the cake.
“Blow out your candles.”
“Oh!”
Carl bent down, took a deep breath, and blew out all three candles in one extravagant gust.
The little crowd applauded, calling, “Make a wish,”
and “Happy birthday!”
Carl looked at again.
He had his hands clasped against his chest, and his eyes, his whole face, were shining.
“You sing,”
he said, “like an angel.”
felt her eyes fill with tears.
She shook her head.
“Angels play harps,”
she said, and gave her drawstrings a tug, trying to hide as much of her face as possible behind her hood.
Weak, she thought scornfully, hating herself.
Oh, you’re so so weak.
“Do you know more songs?”
Carl asked.
“I love singing.
It’s my favorite thing.
Will you sing some more?”
She wanted to laugh.
She wanted to cry.
“I should go,” she said.
“Oh, please!”
said Carl, and then everyone was asking.
Carl was looking at her, his face open and expectant and hopeful, and it was his birthday, after all.
She didn’t have a present, but she could give him something.
“What’s your favorite song?”
She realized, as soon as she’d asked, that she might be setting herself up for trouble.
Carl might love some rap song or a new piece of Top 40 fluff that she hadn’t heard of.
But Marcia, thank goodness, jumped in to save her.
“How about a Christmas carol?”
Carl thought for a minute.
“‘Silent Night’?” he said.
Cass nodded. “Okay.”
She cleared her throat, took a few deep breaths, and began.
“Silent night, holy night / All is calm, all is bright / ’Round yon virgin, mother and child / holy infant, so tender and mild . . .”
She looked at Sven, who nodded, joining in, his voice an octave below hers.
“Sleep in heavenly peace ...
Sleep in heavenly peace.”
Cass should have been on guard.
She should have been paying attention, noticing what was going on.
But she was so intent on the music, the pleasure of singing, that wonderfully freeing sensation of being nothing but voice—no face, no body, no history, just song.
Carl was looking at her like she was an actual Christmas miracle.
You have a gift.
How many times in her life had she heard that, from how many different people? All of her piano teachers, the parents who came to her recitals.
The people at the record label.
Their manager.
Her sister.
You have a gift, they’d all said ..
. and when God had given you something that you hadn’t earned and might not deserve, it came with responsibilities. When you’d been given a gift, you had to use it. You had to share it.
“Thank you,”
Carl was saying, still clapping, long after the last note had faded.
“Thank you thank you thank you!”
He rushed forward and hugged her.
It was so unexpected that was rocked back on her heels.
She had to grab his shoulders and hug him back to keep from falling, trying not to think about how long it had been since anyone had hugged her.
“I—I have to go,”
stammered.
Her heart was beating too hard, and she felt dizzy, like there wasn’t enough oxygen getting to her lungs.
She turned, heading toward the front of the store, hurrying through the supermarket, toward the waiting dark, with Carl and Marcia and Sven and Erica and Louise calling “Thank you”
and “Take care”
as she went.
Forget it, she told herself as she unlocked her car and piled bags of groceries into the back seat.
Just forget it, she thought as she drove fifty miles through the darkness, carried her groceries inside, and put them away.
She gave Wesley his dinner, heated a can of soup for herself, took a longer-than-usual shower, pulled on her flannel pajamas, and got into bed, where she lay awake for what felt like hours, trying to calm her racing heart.
Eventually, she fell into a thin sleep, and in the morning she jolted awake in the darkness, remembering what had happened, what she’d done, scrambling out of bed and onto her feet as Wesley stared at her in alarm.
She splashed cold water on her face, got dressed, gathered her cleaning supplies, went out into the cold.
A few hours of scrubbing made the impromptu birthday party feel like a dream, and by the end of the day, she’d almost managed to put it completely out of her mind.
Back at home that afternoon, she found an app that would let her schedule grocery deliveries.
PLEASE LEAVE BAGS AT FRONT DOOR.
DO NOT KNOCK, she wrote, in the space left for “special instructions.”
There, she thought, shutting the laptop.
Problem solved.
She’d never go back to the Safeway, or see any of the five people in Homer who knew that she could sing, ever again.
That night, she fell asleep easily, convinced that she’d navigated a difficult situation to the best of her abilities and that there would be no lasting damage, no fallout, and certainly no requests for an encore.
was not on social media.
The World Wide Web had barely been a thing when the Griffin Sisters had launched.
They’d had a MySpace page, which the record label ran and, eventually, a Facebook page, where some intern posted clips from their video and their concerts.
Things like Snapchat and Twitter, Instagram and TikTok had all come along during her time in Alaska.
She knew that they existed, but she’d never downloaded any apps.
It was easier, that way, to avoid the temptation of looking up old classmates from Curtis, or checking in on her relatives or bandmates or her sister.
CJ had found her a person who could keep her name and her whereabouts out of the online world.
paid her, and hoped the young woman was as good as CJ had promised.
herself never went online to see what was out there.
Which meant she had no way of knowing that Louise from the deli counter had filmed Carl’s birthday party and sent the video to her coworkers.
Or that forty-two seconds of shaky footage of singing “Silent Night”
had gone live on Marcia’s Facebook account an hour after had left the store.
Marcia had only 87 friends, but one of them, a first cousin who lived in Tuscarora, reposted the video on his page, sharing it with his 357 friends.
One of those people, a former classmate who’d moved to West Hartford, Connecticut, reposted the video to her 1,267 followers, and one of her followers, a sorority sister turned makeup artist/influencer, had 10,000 friends.
After a few dozen likes became a few thousand, the platform’s algorithm began feeding the video to accounts far and wide.
Within forty-eight hours, the snippet of singing “Silent Night”
had been seen by close to a million people and reposted thousands of times.
From TikTok, the video moved on, to Twitter and Instagram, circling back to Facebook, finally jumping over to the Subreddit devoted to the Griffin Sisters.
All that had happened in the twelve hours it took Lior, ’s Internet scrubber, to discover the video, trace it back to its source, and get it taken down.
As it turned out, that was just long enough.