SATURDAY MORNING BROUGHT US A CAT IN THE HAT moment. Kate and Danny drooped like Sally and her brother looking out at the rain, waiting for something to happen.
“Okay, you two, into the kitchen.”
“Why?” Danny and his one-word questions.
“I promised you a breakfast surprise and I got distracted. Today’s the day.”
I reached into the freezer and pulled out a glass container.
“Wha—”
“No questions. Sit at the table.”
Both sat silent and wide-eyed as I scooped out breakfast and poured maple syrup on top.
“No way!” Danny cried as I placed the bowls in front of them.
Kate didn’t say a word, just dug in.
“What’s going on?” Jane called from the stairs.
“Breakfast,” we all shouted.
Jane headed straight for the table and leaned over Kate. “Ice cream? Seriously, Lizzy?”
“Bacon ice cream, Mom, with maple syrup.”
Jane raised her eyebrows. I almost laughed at her obvious struggle: Do I yell? Or do I grab a spoon? Yell? Spoon?
I waited.
She reached for a bowl. “This sugar high’s all on you.” Right on the fence. But her compressed smile soothed the sting from her words.
“I’ll take them to Pike Place Market until they crash.”
“Can I come?”
“Of course.” I smiled, feeling a layer of ice thaw in the midst of our frozen breakfast.
Pike Place Market is a Seattle favorite, a national favorite, and cited in plenty of cooking magazines as the oldest continuous farmers’ market in the country. And it lived up to the hype—packed with produce, meats, fish, flowers, handmade goods, and people. The guys at the fish market, who called out a chant before hurling large fish at each other, held us mesmerized. The ones working the crowd seemed oblivious to the shouts of their colleagues behind the counter, then reached out at the last second to catch a soaring twenty-plus-pound salmon or halibut or something else large and slippery right before it smacked a spellbound tourist in the face. There was even a monkfish sitting in the ice and tied to a string, which they pulled from behind the counter whenever anyone touched it. Danny screamed and jumped a foot off the ground.
And the flowers! Huge bouquets bursting with variety and color that would cost well over a hundred dollars in New York cost fifteen here. I bought two enormous ones and handed them to the kids to carry. Danny got completely lost behind his. And the honey! My knees almost buckled as I tasted blueberry honey, raspberry honey, wildflower honey, sunflower honey—I bought six jars without even thinking.
“What are you going to do with all that?” Jane asked.
“I have no idea, but I sense lots of baking, even some infusions. I can take what we don’t use back to New York. Honey carries such local flavor; they’ll be so fresh at Feast.”
While we scoured the market the sun came out, hot and bright. The ground was drying, and I remembered Jane’s list.
“Come on.” I pulled her arm and called to the kids, leading them outside.
“What are you—” Jane stepped onto the pavement and smiled. “Oh . . . this is so odd for April. It feels wonderful.” She took a deep breath and glanced at me, pulling in the corner of her lip as she lifted her face to the sun.
My mind flashed back to a Christmas break when I was about twelve. Jane had come home from college and done something wrong, broken something, I couldn’t recall what, but I remembered that Mom had launched into me. Mid-diatribe I had looked over to Jane and found her pulling in that same corner of her lip—trying to say sorry, but lacking the courage to do it or to take the blame. I smiled as I now began to understand my sister, and I, too, soaked in the sun.
After a moment I opened my eyes and glanced at her. She looked pale. “How are you doing? Time to head home?”
“Can we go to the park?” Danny called.
Jane brightened and turned to me. “They can play, and I’ll show you Madison Park’s cooking store. It’s a good one. You’ll love it.”
When we finally returned home, with honey and flowers from the market and a new silicone whisk from the cooking store, Jane and the kids drifted down to the basement to watch a movie. I wanted to give them some time alone, so I curled up in the living room with a copy of Sense and Sensibility. I felt nervous about opening it, but I couldn’t deny that simply holding the book felt like coming home—and it didn’t hurt.
I had pulled it from Jane’s shelf because I loved the sisters, Elinor and Marianne. The two most famous Austen sisters, after whom we were named, portrayed too intimidating a relationship for me—always had. Lizzy and Jane Bennet understood each other, championed each other without fail, and possessed an unbreakable bond. Even Darcy could not find fault in their relationship or conduct—and he could find fault in most things. But Elinor and Marianne? They had more conflict, rubbed more, barked more . . . They felt more real, more flawed, and yet their bond was as strong, as enduring, and as beautiful.
My thoughts drifted. I had told Jane that I changed my name from Lizzy to Elizabeth in college—as if it was simply the time to grow up. That was a lie. I changed it the moment Mom died. I stood in our kitchen that very evening yelling at my dad about my nickname, my real name, and that it was ridiculous to have ever named us after Jane and Elizabeth Bennet in the first place. I yelled that we were merely derivative characters who were now left with nothing. I yelled that he was nothing. I wanted him to attack; I wanted a fight; I wanted a feeling. He had simply replied, “It was important to your mom.” As if that was a good enough reason . . . for anything, for everything.
But to him it always was, and that commitment had enveloped our family. But when the object of his, and our, devotion was gone, so were the magic, the books, and “Lizzy”—all in a single black moment. I put it all away . . . until now.
The family of Dashwood had been long settled in Sussex. Their estate was large, and their residence was at Norland Park, in the centre . . .
I got lost in the story until I heard a soft tapping on the door. I glanced out the window to find my dad’s truck parked out front.
I hopped up and pulled open the front door. “Welcome back.”
“How are my girls? I’ve worried about you two.”
“You don’t need to worry about us. We’re both still standing.” I reached out to hug him.
He pulled me tight, then released me. “That’s ’cause you’re strong.”
I pulled him out of the swing of the door. “Come in. Come in. Jane’s in the basement with the kids watching a movie. Do you want to head down there?”
“I’d rather sit with you a moment.”
“Sure, I was just in here reading.”
I led him back into the living room and curled up in the chair. He looked at me, around me, then at the book. I felt as lost as he looked.
After a moment he found his voice. “Is she doing well?”
“She’s been pretty wiped. Is that normal?”
“Your mom was during chemo. Do you remember that?”
“Not as well as I thought I did. I seem to remember her pretty upbeat.”
“She was. She changed a lot during that time. She found peace, but she was tired. She didn’t cook like she loved. You did. We used to sit in the family room and read at night. Life got quieter.” Dad pointed to my book.
“When you say it like that, I see it. I don’t know how I didn’t then.”
“You were young, and perhaps we didn’t share as much as we should have.”
Dad had never talked this openly. Perhaps I’d not given him a chance. “Did you know right away? That she wouldn’t make it?”
“The doctors weren’t optimistic from the beginning. The cancer was aggressive, and treatments weren’t what they are now. So, yes, we basically knew.” He found a spot on the wall on which to focus—some things were too difficult for direct eye contact.
But I needed it. I waited until Dad shifted his gaze back to me before speaking. “Watching Jane, I feel like I missed a lot . . . I feel I misread or misjudged things.”
“What you caught was enough.”
“But I placed blame . . . I didn’t know . . .”
Dad shook his head as if trying to stop my sentence, my sideways apology, so I let it fade away. He picked up the pause. “How’s your cooking?”
“She’s eaten the past couple days.”
“I meant how it’s going for you. Is it what you wanted it to be?”
I considered. I hadn’t said much to him about Feast, but I suspected he’d seen more than I intended. “It’s better. That’s part of why I came home—I don’t cook the same right now. It’s a problem, but there have been moments this week when it’s felt alive and I’ve felt like me.” I closed my eyes, remembering. “I love those feelings.”
“I felt that way at the fire station. It’s powerful.” Dad smiled, remembering as well.
I cringed as I recalled a phone conversation from four months earlier. He’d called to tell me the date of his retirement party, after thirty years on the force, and I had made excuses as to why I couldn’t come. I claimed stress, busyness, the flu ravaging the staff, commitments with Paul . . .
I also remembered his reply: “Don’t feel bad you can’t come; it’s not that big a deal. Folks retire every day.”
Until now he’d never mentioned it again. Jane hadn’t let it go, of course, and for a couple weeks I got lovely e-mails from her—cool and precise, the perfect layering of guilt and indignation. So I’d skipped my Christmas visit completely—petty, emotional payback maybe—but still Dad had not said anything or even given me guilt about missing Christmas.
“I’m sorry, Dad.”
“About what?”
“I should’ve been at your party. I should’ve come home then.” I fidgeted, passing the book from one hand to the other.
“It’s okay, sweetheart.” He gripped the armchair, leaning forward and pressing his assurance.
I smiled and I knew; it wasn’t.