there were plenty of things about Denise’s life that were disagreeable to Enid, too, so. “Well, this went on for years. Floyd was very smooth and charming, and he could afford to do things for Norma that a man closer to her own age couldn’t have. Norma developed a real taste for luxuries, and then, too, she’d met Floyd at an age when a girl falls head over heels in love, and Floyd had sworn up and down that he was going to divorce his wife and marry Norma. Well, by then Dad and I were married and had Gary. I remember Norma came over once when Gary was a baby, and she just wanted to hold him and hold him. She loved little children, oh, she just loved holding Gary, and I felt terrible for her, because by then she’d been seeing Floyd for years, and he was still not divorced. I said, Norma, you can’t wait forever. She said she’d tried to stop seeing Floyd. She’d gone on dates with other men, but they were younger and they didn’t seem matoor to her—Floyd was fifteen years older and very matoor, and I do understand how an older man has a matoority that can make him attractive to a younger woman—”
“Mother.”
“And, of course, these younger men couldn’t always afford to be taking Norma to fancy places or buying her flowers and gifts like Floyd did (because, see, he could really turn on the charm when she got impatient with him), and then, too, a lot of those younger men were interested in starting families, and Norma—”
“Wasn’t so young anymore,” Denise said. “I brought some dessert. Are you ready for dessert?”
“Well, you know what happened.”
“Yes.”
“It’s a heartbreaking story, because Norma—”
“Yes. I know the story.”
“Norma found herself—”
“Mother: I know the story. You seem to think it has some bearing on my own situation.”
“Denise, I don’t. You’ve never even told me what your ‘situation’ is.” “Then why do you keep telling me the story of Norma Greene?”
“I don’t see why it upsets you if it has nothing to do with your own situation.”
“What upsets me is that you seem to think it does. Are you under the impression that I’m involved with a married man?”
Enid was not only under this impression but was suddenly so angry about it, so clotted with disapproval, that she had difficulty breathing.
“Finally, finally, going to get rid of some of these magazines,” she said, snapping the glossy pages.
“Mother?”
“It’s better not to talk about this. Just like the Navy, don’t ask, don’t tell.”
Denise stood in the kitchen doorway with her arms crossed and a dish towel balled up in her hand. “Where did you get the idea that I’m involved with a married man?”
Enid snapped another page.
“Did Gary say something to give you that idea?”
Enid struggled to shake her head. Denise would be furious if she found out that Gary had betrayed a confidence, and though Enid spent much of her own life furious with Gary about one thing or another, she prided herself on keeping secrets, and she didn’t want to get him in trouble. It was true that she’d been brooding about Denise’s situation for many months and had accumulated large stores of anger. She’d ironed at the ironing board and raked the ivy beds and lain awake at night rehearsing the judgments—That is the kind of grossly selfish behavior that I will never understand and never forgive and I’m ashamed to be the parent of a person who would live like that and In a situation like this, Denise, my sympathies are one thousand percent with the wife, one thousand percent—that she yearned to pronounce on Denise’s immoral lifestyle. And now she had an opportunity to pronounce these judgments. And yet, if Denise denied the charges, then all of Enid’s anger, all of her refining and rehearsal of her judgments, would go wasted. And if, on the other hand, Denise admitted everything, it might still be wiser for Enid to swallow her pent-up judgments than to risk a fight. Enid needed Denise as an ally on the Christmas front, and she didn’t want to set off on a luxury cruise with one son having vanished inexplicably, another son blaming her for betraying his trust, and her daughter perhaps confirming her worst fears.
With great humbling effort she therefore shook her head. “No, no, no. Gary never said a thing.”
Denise narrowed her eyes. “Never said a thing about what.”
“Denise,” Alfred said. “Let her be.”
And Denise, who obeyed Enid in nothing, promptly turned and went back into the kitchen.
Enid found a coupon offering sixty cents off I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter! with any purchase of Thomas’ English muffins. Her scissors cut the paper and with it the silence that had fallen.
“If I do one thing on this cruise,” she said, “I’m going to get through all these magazines.”
“No sign of Chip,” Alfred said.
Denise brought slices of tart on dessert plates to the dining table. “I’m afraid we may have seen the last of Chip today.”
“It’s very peculiar,” Enid said. “I don’t understand why he doesn’t at least call.”
“I’ve endured worse,” Alfred said.
“Dad, there’s dessert. My pastry chef made a pear tart. Do you want to have it at the table?”
“Oh, that’s much too big a piece for me,” Enid said.
“Dad?”
Alfred didn’t answer. His mouth had gone slack and sour again in the way that made Enid feel that something terrible was going to happen. He turned to the darkening, rain-spotted windows and gazed at them dully, his head hanging low.
“Dad?”
“Al? There’s dessert.”
Something seemed to melt in him. Still looking at the window, he raised his head with a tentative joy, as if he thought he recognized someone outside, someone he loved.
“Al, what is it?”
“Dad?”
“There are children,” he said, sitting up straighter. “Do you see them?” He raised a trembling index finger. “There.” His finger moved laterally, following the motion of the children he saw. “And there. And there.”
He turned to Enid and Denise as if he expected them to be overjoyed to hear this news, but Enid was not the least bit overjoyed. She was about to embark on a very elegant fall color cruise on which it would be extremely important that Alfred not make mistakes like this.
“Al, those are sunflowers,” she said, half angry, half beseeching. “You’re seeing reflections in the window.”
“Well!” He shook his head bluffly. “I thought I saw children.”
“No, sunflowers,” Enid said. “You saw sunflowers.”
After
