On the way home I stop at Harris Teeter for milk and eggs. “Never go grocery shopping when you’re hungry,” my mother has always said. By the time I make it to the checkout line my basket holds a tin of ginger cookies, a box of chocolate-covered cherries, an assortment of cheeses from the deli, a dozen tangerines, a precooked ham (for Mom and Delores), and a couple of white poinsettias in pots. Mom’s always insisted that you can’t have Christmas without poinsettias—“But not the red ones, they’re so ordinary!”
When I get back to the condo parking garage and open my trunk I realize it’s going to take me more than one trip to haul my purchases upstairs. “Damn!” I say out loud.
“That bad?” says a voice nearby. It’s the doctor, the stethoscope draped around his neck. “I can help you with your groceries.”
“Thanks, but I can—”
“You’re the lawyer, right?” He lifts the poinsettias out of the trunk. “I’m on the floor below you. Next door to Mrs. Furley.” The harsh light in the elevator accentuates the lines around his eyes, the shadows under them.
“Sally Baynard.”
“Minh Basilier.” He says his name slowly, as if to let me savor it: Bah-SILL-ee-ay. He sees me studying the name on the plastic ID card clipped to his white jacket. “I’m a New Orleans mongrel: Vietnamese and Cajun.”
It seems rude not to invite him in. “Minh, this is my friend Delores. Delores, this is Minh Basilier.” I’m pleased with myself for pronouncing it correctly.
“Nice to meet you,” she says, turning down the volume on the TV.
“And this is Beatrice,” I say, pointing to the cat, who’s beside her on the sofa. “She’s just here temporarily.”
“Sure made herself right at home, though,” says Delores. “Lucky for her I didn’t do her in, just so I could get her magic bone!”
“What?”
She laughs. “It’s a voodoo thing. If you carry the bone of a black cat, it gives you special powers. Like it can make you invisible, or help you bring back your lost lover.”
“Where’s Mom?” I ask.
“Back there with Mr. Shand and the dog, taking a nap.”
“In the bedroom?”
“Old as they are, nothing much else going to happen.”
I want to run back there, but now I have the doctor to deal with. “Would you like something to drink?” I ask him.
“Some other time,” he says on his way out. “Looks like you’ve got your hands full.”
When he’s gone I turn to Delores. “I thought I made it clear—”
“Before you get all mad, go see for yourself. I’ll put the groceries away.”
The door to my mother’s bedroom is open, the room dark except for the last of the daylight sifting through the curtains. Mom and Ed lie on their sides, fully clothed, his arm around her, his body spooning hers as if she were a child, her arm around Carmen, who hears my footsteps, looks up, then settles back on the pillow.
* * *
Delores’s vegetable soup is warming on the stove, corn bread in the oven. I toss a salad, set two places at the kitchen table. Ed Shand won’t get an invitation to dinner, and Delores has a date. I’m listening to NPR when Ed appears, amazingly unrumpled after his cuddle session. Ed is one of those never-a-stray-hair/always-good-posture men.
“That smells wonderful,” he says, as if he lives here.
“We need to talk, Ed.”
“It’s not what you think.”
“I’m not going to let you hurt her.”
“Hurt her?”
“She’s got Alzheimer’s, Ed. She can’t possibly understand your relationship, or whatever it is.”
“I’m the best friend your mother has, except for Delores.”
“Do you usually sleep with your best friends?”
“I haven’t done anything … inappropriate,” he says, turning red. “If you must know, I can’t do anything. And of course I realize how ill she is. For some reason—maybe it’s our … history together—I’m able to give her some comfort.”
I’d like to slap him. “Your ‘history’ together?”
“We were both unhappy in our marriages.”
“Did my father know about it?”
“I don’t think so. He never said anything. But your father wasn’t one to talk about his emotions.”
“That doesn’t mean he didn’t have any.”
“I know this is hard for you, but you must have known your parents’ marriage wasn’t a good one.”
“My mother had unreasonable expectations.”
“Is it unreasonable to expect a thoughtful Christmas present from your husband?” Ed asks.
“What are you talking about?”
“One year, shortly before your mother and I—before we fell in love—he gave her three handkerchiefs for Christmas. He’d picked them up at the dime store on his way home.”
“Daddy didn’t believe in expensive presents. We didn’t have the money.”
“But handkerchiefs? He didn’t even bother to wrap them.”
“So how long did the thing between you and Mom go on?”
“Two years, and then when he began to have the heart trouble, she ended it. But we remained friends.”
“Maybe you gave him heart trouble.”
He bristles. “That’s not fair.”
“It’s not just a coincidence that you ended up here in Charleston, is it? In the very same building where my mother lives?”
“As a matter of fact, it is a coincidence. Before my wife died, we spent a lot of time in Charleston. She loved the restaurants, the Spoleto Festival, the architecture. She convinced me to buy the condo here, but right after we’d signed the contract she became ill, so she never got to enjoy it. It was sitting empty for a couple of years. I almost sold it, but my daughters were urging me to sell the big house in Columbia, so I decided to move. The change has been good for me. And finding your mother here was a miracle.”
“I want you to stay away from her.”
He retrieves his jacket from the hall closet, throws it over his shoulder. “Since you’re such an expert on relationships, I’ll let you explain to her why I’ve disappeared.”
* * *
When Tony calls it’s close to midnight, but I haven’t slept. “Any news about the cat?” he asks.
“She’s right here. It’s a long story. I’ll tell you all about it when you get back.”
“So, what are you going to do with her?”
“I’ve almost made up my mind, but there are some logistics to work out. I’m leaning toward Gail, the caretaker, but she has a fiancé, and they don’t want to move into Mrs. Mackay’s house. Maybe I can change their minds. If not, does it really matter so much where the cat lives, as long as she’s with someone who’ll love her and take care of her? That’s what matters to a cat, right?”
“That’s what matters,” he says. “To cats, to dogs. To everybody.”
“But if Beatrice doesn’t end up at Oak Bluff, I’ll feel I’ve let her down.”
“The cat?”
“Yes, but also Lila Mackay. I feel like … it’s strange … like she’s almost become a friend. Anyway, how’s it going—with your son?”
“Better, I guess. We’ve been talking.”
“Good.”
“He might spend part of summer vacation with me. He can help out at the clinic—that way he won’t be just sitting around the house.”
“Good idea.”
“I feel like I’m starting from scratch with him, almost.”
“It’s hard when you go for so long between visits.”
“He won’t say so, but I can tell he feels like I just dropped out of his life.”
“You’re not the one who moved to California,” I say.
“But I haven’t been trying hard enough. I have to make him my priority now.”
There’s a long silence, the only sound our breathing, then he says: “You weren’t ever going to move in with me anyway, were you?”
“I’m trying to work it out, Tony.”
“You’ve been saying that for quite a while.”
“Didn’t you just say you have to make your son the priority now?”
“I didn’t mean it that way.”
“Let’s talk about it later. I hate the telephone.”
“How’s the beagle?” he asks.
“She’s sleeping with Mom. Seems right at home. She’s got this raw place on her leg, though. She keeps gnawing it.”
“Does it look infected?” he asks.
“No, it’s just kind of … a place where she’s rubbed the hair off.”
“It’s probably stress. She’s getting accustomed to her new surroundings.”
“She seemed really upset when the cat was missing. Like she knew something was wrong. Sometimes I think we don’t give animals enough credit. But she’s better now.”
“Okay, I’ll let you get back to sleep,” he says. “Take care.”
“You, too.”
After we hang up it feels like the silence is full of things unsaid, and it’s only the cat’s steady purring that eases me back into sleep.