My father, Annabelle, and I were sitting around the kitchen table for supper in silence. William had left home years ago, enlisting in the Navy, and hadn’t been back since. My mother had been absent for a month without a word. I was weeks away from graduating, and had been accepted to university in the city. I was counting the days until I would be gone, too.
We were having meatloaf, green peas, and carrots for dinner. My father wasn’t much of a cook, and the meatloaf was dry and chewy. I poked at it with my fork. I couldn’t eat green peas without gagging. I would place them in my mouth one at a time and swallow without chewing, hoping to avoid the burst of putrid juices.
My father would insist I eat my green peas, despite my obvious distaste for them. When my mother was around, she would say, “It’s fine, she doesn’t have to eat them.”
The phone began to ring.
My father never let us answer the phone during dinner. He said it was rude for someone to call at that hour and interrupt our precious family time. Whatever they wanted could wait until after we ate.
Each shrill ring pierced me. I counted the rings, rubbing my palms together in circles under the table, knowing the answering machine picked up on the fifth.
“It could be Mother,” I snapped.
The phone was about to ring for the fifth time when my father crossed the kitchen to pick up the receiver, pressing it against his ear and turning his back to us.
He muttered a few unintelligible words, sighed, and called me over, passing me the receiver.
“Hi, doll.” It was my mother.
“Hi.”
“Oh, Grace,” she continued, “it’s so good to hear your voice. How are you?”
“Fine.”
“I’m glad. I wanted to ask you something. Will you and Annabelle come and stay with me this weekend?” Her voice at the other end sounded unfamiliar: timid yet liberated.
“Where are you?” I wrapped and unwrapped the phone cord around my finger. I was angry, but I could never admit that to her. She knew I was the weakest child; that’s why she had asked to speak to me. I always gave in so easily.
“I’m in the city.”
I remained silent. Why didn’t she call, or come back, if she was only in the city, an hour away? How could she leave us here, with him, alone?
“What do you say? Will you girls come stay with me?”
“Sure,” I replied. “I have to go, we’re eating dinner.”
I placed the receiver back on the hook, returned to the table to retrieve my plate, and walked to the garbage can. I turned to look at my father as I pressed my foot onto the mechanism that opened the top, maintaining eye contact as I scraped the remainder of my peas into the trash.
“What are you doing?” my father demanded.
“I hate green peas,” I announced. “And I won’t be eating them anymore.”