SINCE we had been starving all day (right!) my mom had made a feast for dinner. She had roasted a big turkey and fixed all the trimmings to go along with it: roasted winter squash, mashed potatoes, gravy, stuffing, cranberry sauce, several kinds of bread, peas, and more stuff that I’m probably forgetting at the moment.
We all sat down together and had a good time over the meal.
My mother, being my mother, apologized to Bill. “I know this probably isn’t as nice as what you usually have, but I thought turkey was a good meal for today. It sounded like you made some serious progress on your calculus issues, so that’s something to be thankful for.”
“This is way better than what I would ever get at home,” Bill said, although I could tell he regretted saying the words almost as soon as they were out of his mouth.
“What do you usually eat at home?” my mom asked, one because she didn’t entirely believe him, and two because she was curious about how other people lived.
“Most nights I make a sandwich if we’ve got anything in the house. Sometimes I bring home an apple from school lunch and eat that.”
“And that’s your dinner?” she asked incredulously.
“Why don’t you eat what your mom cooks?” She couldn’t imagine a scenario in which a mom didn’t cook or provide in some way for her family’s welfare.
“My mom doesn’t cook. I don’t think I’ve seen her do anything in the kitchen except heat up some water for instant coffee.”
“She doesn’t cook dinner? What do you eat for breakfast? What about cookies? Snacks? Cakes for parties?” Okay. She was on a roll now.
“She doesn’t cook anything. She never has. She doesn’t bake. I’ve never seen her bake anything and probably don’t want to.”
“So who makes your birthday cakes?” she asked, incredulous.
“No one,” he said, his eyes cast downward in obvious embarrassment. “I don’t think I’ve ever had one.”
I was as shocked as my mother. I couldn’t conceive of a family, even a screwed-up family, that didn’t at least try to celebrate their son’s birthday.
My mother was in shock. My father rescued the conversation by changing the subject. “The news said that this thing might finally blow itself out overnight tonight. The last of the roads should be opened up by tomorrow morning. Bill, since the school has probably plowed your car in by now, I was thinking that tomorrow morning the three of us could go and start to dig it out and see what’s going on with it. Would that be okay with you?”
“More than okay,” he said with a big smile. “But I can’t ask you to do that. That’s a lot of work, and you shouldn’t have to do that.”
“You didn’t ask. We volunteered. And if we didn’t want to do it we wouldn’t have volunteered. And we don’t have to do anything. We want to do it because it will help you. That’s what people do for friends—they help one another out. That’s just the way it works.”
Pretty much the same speech I had given him the other night when I rescued him from the school parking lot. I guess I realized now where I had picked up that speech. Hmmm. While no kid wants to grow up to be his parents, on this part I wasn’t unhappy—they really were good words, and I believed them as much as my dad did.
“You folks have been so good to me. I can’t believe all that you’ve done. Some total stranger waltzes into your house in the middle of a blizzard after keeping your son out on the roads for hours and you just opened your house to me. You’ve cooked some of the best food I’ve ever eaten in my life. You’ve helped me figure out a calculus concept. You’ve… you’ve just made me feel so welcome. I cannot begin to thank you enough.”
“No thanks required,” my mom said. “You’ll see—that’s just the way we are. We’re all connected in more ways than we realize. You help others because it’s the right thing to do, and sometime in the future it will all work around full circle and someone else will be there when you need help. And face it—we all need help at some point in our lives. That’s just the way it works. We take care of one another.”
“Nice,” he said. “Can you excuse me for a moment?” he asked as he rose from the table and disappeared around the corner out of our sight.
My mom and I started to clear the dishes off the table. When Bill returned a moment later he saw what we were doing and he said, “No. You cooked this feast. The very least I can do is clean up. You go sit down and relax. Watch some TV.”
She was pleased. She secretly believed that this is how things should work, but very, very rarely did others volunteer to help clean up. It was more than a year later that I learned that was why she didn’t want to invite people into her home.
Bill collected dirty dishes from the dining room table and moved them into the kitchen. I repacked things for the refrigerator or the freezer and got things ready to wash. Bill washed, I wiped, and my mother supervised. She did sit down, but she chose a seat at the counter so she could stay and talk with us while we worked—well, no, she stayed to talk with Bill while we worked.
It was a good thing she was there because there were a lot of things I didn’t know where to put. She had hauled out serving dishes I only saw a few times a year, so I didn’t have a clue where they lived between times. She of course knew and got them put away immediately.
The only thing we had left was the carcass of the turkey. When I started to move to throw it away, she stopped me and protested. “No! I’m gonna cook the carcass and make turkey noodle soup.” So, per her instructions, we left the carcass. Our work was done so we changed shifts. She moved back into the kitchen and started breaking up the carcass and getting it ready to cook for soup. I do have to say that there are few smells more heavenly than poultry cooking down to make soup. The wind might be howling outside, but it was warm and toasty inside.
Bill and I sat on the couch to let dinner settle a bit. He disappeared into the bathroom, which gave me a moment to look at his sketchpad again—it was sitting in his backpack, which was wide open. I simply pulled it back out and started flipping through the pages. And, oh my! There were sketches I hadn’t seen before. I gasped in surprise. I had found another male nude. No surprise there, but not only was this one naked, but the way Bill had drawn the guy with his eyes closed and his head thrown back was masterful. I felt as if I could feel what the guy in the drawing was feeling. His work was awesome. And inspirational too.
When Bill came back I was so engrossed that I didn’t notice him return. “Put that back!” he ordered. “Don’t look at that!”
“Sorry,” I said, immediately handing the sketchpad back to him. “You do really good work, Bill. You should be really proud of your work.”
“They’re just doodlings. Nothing special. And they’re private. If my dad saw them….”
“He’s not here, Bill. It’s just us. And I think your work is amazing. You’ve got extraordinary talent. Before last week I didn’t know you at all. Sure, I knew of you—everybody knows who you are. I’m glad to get to know you. You’re a pretty awesome guy.”
He eyed me suspiciously, finally breathing a sigh of relief. “They’re nothing special. Just some quick sketches I do when I’m alone. I don’t want anybody to see them. I’m not allowed to do them at home. I should just tear them up and throw them away.”
I didn’t want to continue this conversation so I suggested we watch some TV. Bill readily agreed. We spent a couple of hours watching some entertaining but mindless television. I should more accurately say that Bill watched television and I watched him. I was determined to gather some more data. I studied him discreetly to see who he paid more attention to on TV—women or men. One show featured a number of actors and actresses in beach attire. Some of the guys were just smoking hot, but of course the networks focused more on the women, even though I wanted to see more of the men. Bill’s eyes were glued to the TV when a shirtless guy was on screen, but his attention clearly wandered when a bikini-clad woman was on the screen. I was beginning to get a clear picture of Mr. William Cromwell, and I was surprised.