My mother walked out of a grocery store. She wore a red dress, her hair permed the way it looks in the photo albums. My father drove up in a car, a fast car, silver, a car that goes vroom vroom. He did not know her yet. She looked pretty in that red dress with ruffles at the hem. He rolled down the window, leaned out, and smiled. “Hubba, hubba!”
They fell in love and lived happily ever after.
•••••••
My mother walked out of a grocery store. She carried a plastic bag, handles stretched taut in her thin fingers. Eggs, milk, strawberries. My father drove up in a car, vroom vroom. He liked my mother’s red dress and her mess of dark-brown hair. He rolled down the window and said, “Hubba, hubba!”
My mother was so startled she dropped her groceries. The milk was okay, but the eggs cracked, oozing yolks onto the sidewalk. My father crouched down and helped clean up the mess. He wore dress pants and a tie, like the photos in his college yearbook.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“It’s okay,” she said. “It’s not your fault, really.”
They smiled at each other. He bought her a new carton of eggs.
They fell in love and lived happily ever after.
•••••••
My mother walked out of the Student Union. She wore a red dress and carried a canvas book bag. My father rode up on a bicycle, glints of silver showing through the chipped paint. He wore a plain T-shirt and his hair hung down over his eyes. My mother, in a rush, distracted, digging through her bag like the nearby beach gulls dug for crabs in the sand, accidentally dropped her coin purse on the sidewalk steps. It snapped open, spilling across the cement.
My father stopped his bike with a screeeeech. He crouched and helped my mother collect her coins. Their skin touched as he placed pennies in her palm one by one. She smiled at him. Hubba, hubba, he thought.
They fell in love and lived happily ever after.
•••••••
My mother walked out of the rain and into the crowded apartment. She wore a red dress and her silver necklace with the star clasp. A Christmas tree beamed in the corner. People danced, laughed, tilted plastic cups against their lips.
My father noticed my mother as soon as she stepped through the doorway. Her dark hair looked darker from the rain, and beads of water trickled down her legs. He didn’t know what to say, what he could ever say to her that would be enough.
So, instead, he waited. He stood by the bathroom, under the mistletoe, watching my mother and willing her to notice him.
Finally, she did, but only because she had to use the bathroom. It was occupied, so she stood in line beside my father. She, slightly drunk, spilled a bit of red wine on his shoe. He didn’t mind.
“Hi,” he said, glancing up at the mistletoe above them.
“Hello,” my mother said. When she leaned forward to shake his hand, her necklace slipped off into a small silver puddle on the floor.
My father crouched and picked it up. Their skin touched as he placed it carefully in her palm. She smiled at him.
“Put it on for me?” she asked, pulling up her dark permed hair to reveal the back of her neck. His fingers trembled with the clasp.
“Hubba, hubba,” my father found himself saying. My mother laughed.
“Look!” someone shouted. “You’re under the mistletoe!”
Later, my father walked my mother back to her dormitory. They fell in love and lived happily ever after.
•••••••
My mother was invited to a Christmas party by a girl in her psychology class. She didn’t know the girl very well, but it was a Friday night, and she had no other plans, so she went. Her dangling silver earrings flashed against her dark hair. She carried a grocery bag, handles stretched taut with the weight of the chocolate cake she had baked that morning and carefully iced with a frosting Christmas tree.
The kitchen was empty, save for three frat guys refilling their cups of eggnog, a girl arranging sugar cookies on a plate, and my father, who stood at the sink struggling in vain to wash a red wine stain from his shirt. It was hot in the kitchen, and my mother noticed a bead of sweat trickling down the back of his neck.
Suddenly, she found herself stumbling forward, tripping over something in her red high heels—a case of beer, a sack of flour, an empty cartoon of eggs? The plastic bag lurched from her grasp, and she watched the cake smash sadly against the kitchen floor.
My father turned from the sink. To him, she was just a pretty woman in a red dress.
And yet.
He hurried over and crouched to help my mother clean up the mess.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
“I’m fine,” she sighed. “Just clumsy. I spent all afternoon making this cake, and now it’s ruined.”
“I’m sure it’s still delicious,” my father said, digging his hand into the dark moist cake and bringing it to his mouth. He loudly smacked his lips and grinned.
My mother laughed. My father stood, then reached down to help her up. Their skin touched. They washed cake and frosting off their hands at the sink. My father poured my mother a cup of eggnog. Their hands found each other again.
Later that night, they kissed under the mistletoe.
They fell in love.
And they lived, happily. Also angrily, naughtily, hopelessly, hungrily. Messily. Ever after. Like saints and martyrs and lovers and children. They lived, and they live. Together still.