According to the airline’s website, their flight was on-time. Arlene ironed, he vacuumed and picked up poop. The house was ready, there was nothing left to do, yet he felt he could have used a few more hours—and today was the easy day. The one to three inches was just a dusting, and traffic was surprisingly light, no backup by the mall in Robinson, making him early. He stood at the foot of the escalators that led to baggage claim, witness to a cavalcade of happy reunions, but after a while his knees hurt and he had to sit down. He wished he’d brought his book, and killed the minutes watching the constant stream of people. He strained to hear the P.A., the voice from the ceiling dissipating in the noisy atrium. Twice he thought he heard Boston called and checked the big board. The third time, it said their flight had arrived five minutes ago. They were probably already on the tram.
He was used to Emily taking the lead with the children. Now, without her, he was unprepared. There was no reason for his trepidation. It wasn’t as if he was being asked to entertain strangers, so why did he fear he had nothing to say to them? He foresaw awkward stretches at the dinner table, Arlene gabbling on, trying to fill the silence. Just contemplating the energy required to make small talk tired him.
Finally they appeared on the right-hand escalator, Sam and Ella emerging first, waving as they descended. He crossed the floor and positioned himself to the side so they wouldn’t block the other passengers getting off.
Sam abandoned his carry-on and tackled him around the waist, knocking him back a step.
“Easy there, bud,” Henry said, tousling his hair.
Ella, in pigtails and smelling of strawberry bubble gum, rose on tiptoe to give him a kiss. “Hey, Grampa.”
“Hey, yourself.”
Kenny and Lisa straggled behind. To get the best fare they’d had to wake up at five and lay over in Philly, and they were dragging.
“How was your flight?”
“Long,” Lisa said.
Kenny shrugged. “It’s USAir.”
“Can I take your bag?”
“That would be wonderful,” she said. “Thank you.”
“Is this everything? We’re this way. I was early, so I was able to get a decent spot. We were supposed to get snow but we barely got anything. Emily’s not here, but her lasagna is. I hope you’re hungry.” As if to compensate for their exhaustion, he played the chipper host, broadcasting a nonstop enthusiasm. He popped the trunk and helped Kenny with the bags. “There you go, perfect fit.”
It wasn’t until they were on the parkway that Lisa asked after Margaret. He wondered how much Emily had told Kenny. Per the Geneva Convention, if captured, all you were required to give the enemy was your name, rank and serial number.
“She’s going to be fine,” he said, glancing at her in the rearview mirror, “it’s just going to take some time.”
“That’s good.”
“The doctors said she was very lucky.”
“It sounds like it could have been a lot worse,” said Kenny, sitting beside him.
“A lot worse. It’s a good thing she was wearing her seatbelt.”
That was as much as he wanted to say for now. He expected they’d revisit it later, after the children had gone to bed.
“How is Emily?” Lisa asked with exaggerated gravity, as if she’d been injured as well.
“Good. She’s sorry to miss you guys, but she’s glad she’s there. I am too.”
“I bet Jeff’s happy to have the help.”
“Oh yeah,” he said, though he and Emily hadn’t delved into that, and was relieved when Lisa sat back. It wasn’t quite the beginning of rush hour, and he was satisfied to concentrate on the road.
At home Arlene greeted them, and Rufus, wiggling and whining at the sight of the children, his tail whacking the front hall table. The timing was right. While they got settled, Henry put the lasagna in the oven and prepped the bread. Arlene was in charge of the salad, normally his job.
“What can I do?” Lisa asked.
“Nothing. You can have a glass of wine and relax.”
“That would be wonderful. I feel like I’m still moving.”
Kenny brought him a beer from downstairs, clinking it with his. “Thanks for having us. I know it’s a lot of work.”
“It’s our pleasure,” he said out of habit, belatedly nodding at Arlene. “At our age, we’ll take any excuse.”
If the logic of it wasn’t precisely true, the sentiment was. With night fallen outside and a fire on the hearth and Rufus sprawled with his head in Ella’s lap, the house felt full and warm, like a real holiday. When he put the bread in, the lasagna was bubbling, the smell drawing compliments from the living room. Arlene helped the children set the table while he opened a second bottle of red. The only thing he’d forgotten was to take out the grated parmesan so it wouldn’t be cold.
Arlene sat in Emily’s place at the head of the table.
“It looks really good,” Kenny said, and Henry was as proud as if he’d made it himself.
They held hands while Ella said the blessing, finishing, “And please help Aunt Margaret get better.”
“Very nice,” Arlene said.
The pan was hot, so Henry served everyone.
“Just a half for Sam, please,” Lisa said. He was finicky—he was spoiled, according to Emily—and regularly left his vegetables untouched. Rather than battle him at the table the way Emily or Henry’s own mother would have, Lisa let him skip the dishes he disliked, with the result that sometimes he ate nothing but bread. His salad plate was empty. Lasagna wasn’t a tough sell, Henry thought, but layer by layer, with the patience of a brain surgeon, Sam dissected his half piece, scraping off the sauce and ground beef and cheese, eating just the noodles.
“You’re missing the best part,” Henry said.
“It’s his loss,” Lisa said, a philosophy Henry disagreed with, but kept his objections to himself.
“Remember the time,” Arlene asked, “with you and Grandmother Chase and the liver?”
It was a story they’d all heard before, illustrating how stubborn the two of them could be. He was seven or eight, their parents away for some forgotten reason. Long after Arlene had eaten her dessert and run off to listen to Little Orphan Annie, he sat with his napkin in his lap, frowning at the cold gray meat on his plate, Grandmother Chase sitting across from him like a prison guard. He’d managed several bites by wrapping them in pieces of biscuit and washing them down with milk, but now the biscuit and the milk were gone, and she wouldn’t let him be excused until he’d finished everything. He still hated liver, as he hated the story. It had happened just the once, he might have said in his defense, but sat silent as if chastised, waiting for it to end with the final bites left untouched and him being sent to bed, the moral elusive, if there was any.
“And did it make you like liver?” Lisa asked.
“No. It’s liver. Nobody likes it.”
“Granny Chase was a tough nut,” Arlene said.
“She was,” he agreed. “I seem to remember someone else having a problem with lima beans.”
“That was different,” Arlene said.
“I remember having to eat aspic,” Kenny said, willing to tell one on himself.
“What’s aspic?” Sam asked, and then at Kenny’s description made a face that made them laugh.
“See?” Henry said. “Lasagna’s not so bad after all.”
“It’s delicious,” Lisa said.
As if to prove it, Kenny asked for seconds, Ella as well.
Henry passed the bread basket, encouraging them to finish it. “The goal is no leftovers.”
In the same spirit, they killed the second bottle and moved on to coffee with dessert, Arlene’s take on their mother’s Indian pudding with hard sauce, a favorite of the children, as it had been one of his as a child. As they sat around the table, sated, he recalled the house on Mellon Street, its ornate mantel and fireplace, and himself as a boy, dressed for company, waiting, like Sam, to be excused, and wondered how many times, in one form or another, he’d eaten this dinner. There was a mysterious continuity to life that was reassuring, if the true significance of it escaped him.
The children helped clear and disappeared upstairs with Rufus. Once Kenny finished the dishes, the adults retired to the living room, gathered around the fire, the lights dimmed for atmosphere. Henry raised his glass to admire the flames wavering in his scotch—the Glenfarclas Arlene had given him, nutty and then sherry-sweet. The talk, as expected, turned to Margaret.
“It’s been a rough year for her,” Lisa said.
“It’s a shame,” Arlene said, “because she’s been working really hard on herself. I think she’s figuring out what she needs to do.”
“You mean with Jeff,” Lisa said—fishing, Henry thought.
“With everything. It’s all connected.”
“I think it’s hard for her,” Kenny said, “because he’s always been there. What happens if things don’t go well and now there’s nobody there?”
“Is she afraid she’ll lose the kids?” Lisa asked.
“I’m sure that’s it. If she relapses, there’s no safety net.”
“Jeff wouldn’t do that,” Arlene said.
On that question Henry kept his opinion to himself. It was all speculation anyway. People were going to do what they were going to do. After a certain age he’d ceased to believe he might influence their lives.
“He wouldn’t have a choice,” Kenny said. “If she’s the way she was two years ago, he’d have to take them.”
“That was the worst,” Lisa said.
Had they come to Chautauqua? It was frustrating that he couldn’t recall.
“She doesn’t want to be by herself,” Kenny said. “I can’t blame her.”
“Nothing against Jeff,” Lisa said, “but she’ll never get better if she stays with him. He does everything for her.”
Wasn’t that what married people were supposed to do? He was tempted to break in and say it was none of their business. At the same time, he didn’t want to interrupt and risk missing something. As he did talking with Emily in the car, he felt privy to secrets he’d never find out otherwise, and sat sipping his scotch like a spy.
“How’s it going there?” Emily asked later, once she’d filled him in on Margaret’s progress. The knee surgery was routine. They’d asked the doctor to switch her to something non-narcotic.
“Okay,” he said. “Tonight was the easy one.”
“You’ll do fine. Just follow the instructions and don’t check on it every five seconds. You got the centerpiece.”
“I did.”
“I thought it looked festive.”
“It is.” It cost twenty-nine dollars and looked like a bunch of shellacked gourds left over from Halloween wired together so they spilled out of a miniature wicker cornucopia.
“The horn should face away from the host and toward the guests.”
“I would not have known.”
“I know you wouldn’t, that’s why I’m telling you. If it was up to you, we wouldn’t have a centerpiece at all.”
“No, it looks nice.”
“What about Christmas? Did you ask Lisa about Ella’s pearls?”
While he knew the necklace from Christmases past (Sarah had a matching one), he couldn’t recall Emily mentioning it recently, and rather than be accused of not listening, he played along, adding it to his list.
“I miss you,” he said.
“I miss you too. Now get some sleep. You’ve got a long day tomorrow.”
“You too,” he said, but when he’d finally hung up and turned out the light, he kept remembering details he knew he’d forget if he didn’t write them down, like putting the canned cranberries in the fridge, and had to roll over and grope for the pen and pad on his nightstand. In protest, Rufus moved to the other side of the bed, settling with a huff.
“You’re fine,” Henry said.
He dreamed of Duchess launching herself off the dock after a tennis ball, and woke at five, surprised to find Emily’s pillow empty. It was winter. She was in Michigan. Normally he was up at two or three to use the bathroom, and congratulated himself on getting in six unbroken hours, but then at eight, when his alarm went off, he smelled bacon—Lisa, he assumed, taking over the kitchen while he slept, except when he went down to check, it was Kenny making the children soft-boiled eggs.
Not an invasion but a tribute. A Grandma breakfast, they called it, yet another tradition that bound them together, like watching the Macy’s parade or taking the children for a walk around the reservoir at halftime of the early game. How empty the house would be without them, with her gone, and he realized—astonished by his own Scrooge-like obtuseness—that they’d come not to test his skills as a host but to save him from being alone.
He wasn’t making half the food Emily did, and still there was a fair amount of prep work. The plan was for Arlene to come over around eleven and help him get the appetizers going. He figured she’d be late, and she was. By the time she arrived, bringing pie, he had his chicken phyllo triangles and sausage pinwheels in and was chopping vegetables for the dip. Like the project manager he’d been, he’d built some fat into his schedule. Even before the first game started, it had evaporated, the clock becoming his enemy.
“How can I help?” Lisa asked from the doorway, Kenny right behind her.
“We’re good for now, thanks.”
“Let me know if you need another pair of hands.”
“We will.”
“Dad, beer?” Kenny asked.
“Sure, if you’re going down.”
“Arlene,” Lisa asked, “would you like some wine?”
No, Henry thought. It was sabotage. After two glasses she’d be useless.
“I’d love some, thank you.”
He couldn’t protest. Drinking all afternoon while they watched the games was a tradition they couldn’t indulge in when Margaret visited. By dinnertime they’d be tight, dropping their silverware and laughing at the silliest things. Like overeating, it was part of the holiday. He just hoped she didn’t cut herself.
Heeding Emily’s advice, he meant to get the turkey in early, but the stuffing took longer than expected. Rather than raise the temperature and risk drying the bird out, he pushed dinner back to six-thirty. They could wait. After the appetizers, no one would be hungry anyway.
There were too many dishes, too many ingredients, and the recipes Emily had left only distracted him. He needed to peel the potatoes and the yams, and get the pea casserole going, and the nippy onions no one liked. He swigged his beer and set to gutting a green pepper. As if he’d jinxed himself thinking of Arlene, he slipped and the blade caught his fingertip, leaving a flap.
“Mother,” he said, and sucked it, tasting blood. It stung.
“Are you okay?” Arlene asked.
“I’ll live.”
It wouldn’t stop bleeding, and he went downstairs and wrapped it with the Band-Aids he kept on his workbench. When he came back up, Lisa was crouched in front of the oven, peering in the window.
“How’s it look?” he asked.
“It looks good. Smells good too. Let me know if you need help. I’m not doing anything.”
“Want to peel some potatoes?” Arlene asked.
“I can do that,” Lisa said.
If Emily was bleeding out, she would have told her they had things in hand and shooed her from the room. Henry couldn’t, and deseeded his green pepper while she and Arlene worked side by side, whittling wet strips of skin into the sink.
“You’re fast,” Arlene said.
“Practice.”
The potatoes, the yams, the onions, the separately wrapped neck and heart and liver for Rufus. The stove had four burners, more than enough normally. Now it was crowded, the pots boiling away, steaming up the window over the sink. He imagined Emily, an hour behind him, making the same dishes, and his mother, years ago on Mellon Street.
“Crud.” He’d forgotten to take the bag of peas out to defrost.
“Use the microwave,” Lisa said. “That’s what it’s for.”
“Have you made this before?”
“Twice a year for twenty years.”
“Would you mind putting it together?”
“Mine’s a little different. Instead of onion rings, I make a crust like a pot pie. It takes the same amount of time and the kids like it better.”
“That’s fine,” he conceded, recalling what Emily had said. Lisa wasn’t insinuating herself, he was just being practical. A good manager knew how to use his talent.
The turkey was browning nicely, and he had a handle on the yams and mashed potatoes, but the cheese sauce for the onions was beyond him. Lisa took over, folding in handfuls of shredded white cheddar until it was the right consistency. Later, when everything else was ready, he needed her help with the gravy as well.
The turkey turned out perfect. The table was set, the wineglasses and water goblets filled. They joined hands and bowed their heads as Ella said grace.
“What is everyone thankful for?” Arlene asked, another tradition, and they went around the table, starting with the youngest.
Sam was thankful for the new Star Wars movie.
“As we all are, I’m sure,” Arlene said.
“I’m thankful Aunt Margaret’s going to be all right,” Ella said, and they agreed, nodding solemnly.
“I’m thankful for this delicious meal we’re about to eat,” Kenny said, “but I don’t see any cranberry sauce.”
“Oh no!” Arlene said.
With everything they’d had to make, he’d forgotten it. “It’s still in the fridge.”
“I’ll get it,” Kenny said, but Henry fended him off.
Emily would have pulled it out ahead of time to warm up and remembered to put their ceramic turkey salt and pepper shakers on the table.
“Sorry,” he said, “I’m new at this.”
“The turkey’s nice and juicy,” Lisa said.
“Mm,” Kenny seconded with his mouth full.
They didn’t have to say the stuffing was dry.
“I don’t know what happened. I followed the recipe.”
“It tastes fine,” Arlene said.
“That’s kind of you to say.”
“It’s true.”
Overall he’d acquitted himself well. The mashed potatoes were creamy, the yams sweet, and if everyone raved about Lisa’s gravy, he was glad for her help. He made coffee to go with Arlene’s pumpkin pie and lingered over his as the children cleared the table. The hard part was over. He and Kenny would have to hand-wash Grandmother Chase’s good china, but for now he could relax and look back on the day with pride.
Later, when the children were upstairs watching Home Alone, Emily called. He took the phone into his office and closed the door.
“So,” she asked, “how was your Thanksgiving there without me?”
While he’d missed her, it had been a good day. They’d all gotten along, but he couldn’t say that. At the same time there was no point lying. In the end, she’d get the truth out of him.
“Busy,” he said. “How was yours?”