Chapter Seven

 

As far back as Trixie could remember, her family ate whatever had been the special at the restaurant that day. Hardly ever were both parents present for the meal. The normal routine was for Magda to awake very early, prepare the restaurant for the day, and return to the house in time to see the girls off to practice. All this occurred by six a.m. She worked the restaurant until any time between two and four in the afternoon, depending on the size of the lunch crowd, and came home for a nap before the girls returned from school and training.

Tavian joined his wife at the restaurant around noon and stayed through dinner, sometimes as late as eleven at night in the tourist season. The Dalca women were always asleep when he returned, and he often unwound after difficult shifts by sitting in a rocking chair between the two rooms in which his daughters slept and listening to their deep breathing, their undisturbed and peaceful slumber, as he sipped his favorite beer.

Many fathers, particularly in Romania, were aloof and reserved in the affection they bestowed upon their children. Not Tavian. He hugged his daughters when they entered and left a room, calling Trixie meu frumos fată and Ileana meu precious unul.

My beautiful girl. My precious one.

Trixie knew she and Ileana had wished to have more time to spend with both their parents, and most especially their father. He was asleep when they left in the morning and working when they went to bed. If there was time between school and gymnastics, they would run to the restaurant and sit at a small table for three on the veranda. He would give them each a small chocolate and a glass of socată.

The entire family had been distressed when Ileana made the decision a little over a year ago to train in Deva. They were close-knit and loving, and one of the many reasons why Trixie chose to train at a sub par gym in her hometown of Constanţa was to stay near her family. But Ileana was thrilled to further her gymnastics career with girls her age who were closer to her skill level. She had never been as self-motivated as her older sister, nor as secure in her identity, and Deva was a perfect fit. They were all thankful for her happiness when she left, but they still missed her.

For the past fourteen months since Ileana left for Deva, Trixie and her mother had been eating dinner alone. Like most gymnasts, Trixie was naturally small and thin, but she also stuck to a strict diet in order to maintain a svelte physique. Though she loved the food at the restaurant, she had long ago stopped accepting everything put on her plate. From the age of ten, she stuck mostly to fruits, vegetables, and small portions of grilled protein, chicken, or fish. She was lucky. Because her parents owned a restaurant, she had access to a greater variety of fresh and healthy food than most other Romanian athletes. It was a treat when she decided to partake in what her mother, father, and the two other cooks at the restaurant decided to prepare.

Tonight, the special at the restaurant was ardei umpluţi, peppers stuffed with seasoned and grilled pork, onions, tomatoes, sprouts, and various spices. Technically, it wasn’t fat free, but it was healthy enough that Trixie decided to break her normally inflexible diet for a tiny bit of joy.

Since Ileana died, Magda was disconsolate. Thank God for Belu, one of the cooks who had worked at the restaurant since it opened. He and his wife took over the duties Magda had assumed for the past fourteen years. The woman was utterly incapable of returning to work. She spent her days and nights alternating between sobbing uncontrollably and staring blankly out at the Black Sea.

Shaye told her the experts in America said everyone grieves in their own way, but this did not seem normal to Trixie. Magda didn’t eat. She didn’t sleep. In the gorgeous spring, when the rest of the world was being reborn, Magda Dalca was wasting away, more wraith than woman, pleading for death if it would end the unbearable torment of living without one of her daughters.

At least they were used to Ileana not being at the dinner table. If that weren’t the case, Trixie was convinced her mother would pick up a knife over a bowl of chiftele and stab herself in the heart.

Trixie was worried about her mother. In the past week, she couldn’t have slept more than twelve hours total. If she were ever going to recover, she needed rest.

She knew why her mother didn’t want to sleep, or at least, she understood one of the reasons. Nightmares. Trixie herself had been terrified that her resting hours, where consolation was expected and vivacity was restored, would be tormented by images of her treasured sister, Daddy’s precious one, dying in a hospital bed, alone with the phantoms of death, in pain, howling for release.

For all her fear, Trixie found sleep to be the only place where she found respite from the indescribable anguish of life without her sister. She dreamed of them happy together, playing in the sea, laughing with their father at the restaurant, being enveloped in a warm embrace by their mother in the kitchen, cheering each other in the gym.

Maybe her mother would have nightmares. Then again, maybe not. The nighttime escapes kept Trixie from succumbing to the darkness altogether.

At practice, she told her coach she hadn’t been sleeping at night. One of the trainers gave her a packet of sleeping pills with instructions on how to use them.

Instead, she ground them up in the stuffed pepper, the rice on the side, and the shot glass of apricot pălincă Trixie added to the meal. It was more than the recommended dosage, but she didn’t figure it was enough to do serious harm. The woman genuinely needed to sleep.

She set the plates on the table. Hers was devoid of rice, the side dish replaced with plain celery, and she was drinking water instead of soda and brandy.

As Trixie began to slice her stuffed pepper, Magda did not make a move for her silverware.

“You should eat,” Trixie said as she nudged the plate slightly in her mother’s direction. “It’s good. Belu’s wife added tiny pieces of oysters.”

Magda only blinked, the black circles under her eyes becoming more profound. Their gazes locked, and Magda immediately looked away. Trixie knew why. Though she had grown a couple of inches and her face had changed from cute and chubby to structured and stunning, she still looked very much like she had when she was eleven-years-old, and comparing pictures of her and her sister at the same age was like looking at twins. For her mother, she was staring across the table at a ghost.

Trixie put down her fork and reached across the table, resting her hand atop her mother’s bony knuckles. She whispered softly, kindly, “At least drink your pălincă, Mom. It will make you feel better.”

Without a word, she reached out and grabbed the small glass, tipping it to her pale lips and downing it in one open swallow. “Happy?”

She honestly didn’t know if she’d ever be happy again, but for the moment, she was satisfied. Magda even managed six bites of rice and a quarter of the stuffed pepper before she left the table.

It was enough. Twenty minutes later, she was asleep on the couch in the living room. Trixie wanted to move her to the bed so she’d be more comfortable, but the last thing she wanted to do was wake her up. So she sat with her mother, in the pitch black house, looking out over the street, to the water beyond.

A few hours later, her father arrived home. He placed his light jacket over the table and entered the living room. From her perch in the window seat, Trixie put her index finger over her lips and pointed to her mother. Tavian nodded and motioned for her to join him in the kitchen.

“How’d you get her to sleep?” he asked as he pulled a bottle of Azuga beer out of the refrigerator. He poured his daughter a glass of water from the filtration pitcher and leaned against the counter.

“I ground up a few sleeping pills and put it in her dinner.”

“She ate her dinner?” Tavian asked with skeptically raised eyebrows.

“No. But she drank the pălincă.”

“I suppose I should be scolding you for drugging your mother.” They stared at each other for a moment then shared a chuckle. It wasn’t sustained, it wasn’t joyous, but it was the closest to comic relief either of them had come since hearing about Ileana’s accident. “Did you eat any of the peppers?” Though he obviously understood her need for a stringent diet, she knew he worried about her being too thin and hungry.

“I did. It was good. Don’t tell Mom, but Belu’s wife makes them much better than her.”

Tavian told her he agreed on both counts. “Belu agreed to take care of the restaurant this weekend so I can go to Bucharest with you.”

For a moment, she had no idea what he was talking about. Then she remembered that the Olympic trials were this weekend, but she would not be attending.

“I can’t believe I forgot to tell you. I petitioned to be named to the team without having to go to trials since I won at Nationals. Andrei Tatarescu said yes.”

“When was that?”

“Last week.”

“I’m surprised no one at the restaurant mentioned it to me.”

“No one knows. The news will probably break this weekend.”

Tavian agreed and closed his eyes, resting the back of his head against the cupboard. “It’s for the best. Your mother wouldn’t want to go, and I would feel terrible leaving her here alone.”

“I know.”

He opened his eyes and suddenly smiled. “Hey, this means you’re officially an Olympian.”

“I guess I am.” Strangely, that news had yet to sink in. Until her father said it aloud, it still seemed like a pipe dream, something she hoped for as a little girl but was now unbelievably within reach. In three months, she’d be representing her country in the sport she loved.

“Congratulations.” He hopped to his feet and wrapped his arms around her. He was over a foot taller than she was, and whenever he held her, she felt safe and protected, like a much younger child.

“Thanks.”

He kissed the top of her head and whispered very softly, “It’s okay to be happy about this, Bea. You don’t have to be sad forever.”

“Not forever. Just for now.”

Tavian sighed deeply, continuing to hold her like he never wanted to let go. “This should’ve been the happiest, most exciting time of your life. It’s not fair for you.”

It wasn’t fair to any of them, but Trixie would not allow self-pity because there was only one person who’d truly lost, and that was her poor little sister who was no longer on this earth. “I’ll be okay, Dad,” she said, as brave as ever. “It’ll get easier. I mean, it can’t get any harder. Can it?”

“I don’t see how.” He kissed her forehead and finally released her. “It’s late. Get to bed.”

For the first time since Ileana died, she felt a modicum of serenity. Tonight, she did not shed any tears before closing her eyes, and after a month of crying herself to sleep, her cheeks and pillow were dry.