“I invited Mr. Pickens to Thanksgiving,” Mom announced at breakfast. “He was going to spend Thanksgiving with his son, but now his son has to work. I couldn’t let him be alone.”

Mr. Pickens was a nice guy. He hosted a Fourth of July barbecue for the neighborhood, and he used to pay me to take in his mail and look after his dog, Rocky, when he went out of town. Based on how my grandmothers started acting, though, you’d have thought the president of the United States was coming. When Granny M told Lauren to start polishing the silver gravy boat, I decided that was my cue to get out before they recruited me.

Dad was hiding out in the family room, watching TV. Bao Bao was also in there, vigorously cleaning his butt. As soon as Dad saw me, he turned down the volume, but not before I heard a deep newscaster voice say, “… and the US is still reeling from the Soviet walkouts. More news at six. Now back to the game.”

“What was that?” I asked.

“Keep your voice down,” said Dad. “I’m not supposed to check on the scores before dinner.”

“No, but what did they say? Walk out from where? Geneva?” Now that the TV volume was off, Bao Bao’s licking was really loud. Glurp, glurp, glurp.

“It’s because the first parts of the cruise missiles just arrived in the UK,” explained Dad. “The Soviets didn’t want to have US missiles in Europe. They walked out of the disarmament talks.” He glanced at the TV. “C’mon, St. Louis!” Dad wasn’t really a Cardinals fan. He just wanted the Cowboys to lose.

Now we had all the elements of Thanksgiving: food, football … and imminent nuclear disaster.

“But is this it?” I thought I was going to be sick. Maybe the Soviets were walking out so they could go back to Russia and press the button. Just as Scott said, this would be a perfect day for them to attack, when everyone was fat and lazy from too much turkey.

“It’s not the end of the world,” said Dad. “C’mon, I could catch that!” He seemed more concerned about football than nuclear devastation. “They’ll work something out, David,” he added. “They always do.” He turned off the TV and put his arm around my shoulders. I wasn’t sure if he was talking about football or nuclear disarmament. “I think we’ve waited long enough. It’s a good time to offer to help.”

Bao Bao stood up and wagged his tail.

Lucky dog, I thought. He didn’t have anything to worry about.

By the time we got back into the kitchen, the table was set. And when I say set, I mean, set with two complete and separate dinners.

The left side of the table was clearly Granny M’s dinner: turkey, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, spiced apples, homemade bread, sweet potato soufflé, and green bean casserole. On the right side was Peking duck with plum sauce and handmade wrappers, egg rolls, a whole steamed fish, and a stir-fry of mixed vegetables. That was Wai Po’s.

Maybe this was going to be my last Thanksgiving dinner ever. Or anybody’s last Thanksgiving dinner. If it was in fact my last Thanksgiving, I supposed I wouldn’t want it any other way. I just hoped that they would get along, just this once, so I could have a happy memory.

Mr. Pickens smiled as he sat down and rubbed his hands together. “Well, look at that. It’s an East-meets-West Thanksgiving. I am a very fortunate man.”

Mr. Pickens just might be the key to my hopes for a peaceful Thanksgiving. It didn’t hurt that my mom seated him right between Wai Po and Granny M. He could be a buffer.

Mom sat down at the table last, even though it didn’t look like she got to cook anything on her menu. She took off her apron and pulled back her hair. “Why don’t you say the blessing over the Thanksgiving dinner, David,” she said.

Granny M didn’t miss a beat. “In Hebrew.”

“The turkey isn’t even kosher,” I said.

“It’s still good practice,” said my grandmother. She turned to Mr. Pickens. “David is having his bar mitzvah in January, so he needs to practice.”

“How wonderful,” said Mr. Pickens. “Knowing a second language is so important.” Granny M beamed in agreement.

What I really wanted to say was, Please, God, don’t let the Soviets or my grandmothers blow us up on Thanksgiving Day. But I didn’t know how to say that in Hebrew. The only specific food blessings I could say were for bread and wine. And then there’s the one that ends “shehakol nihiyah bed’varo,” which is supposed to cover a lot of the other stuff. We said it over candy at Hebrew school, so I figured that one would work. I also threw in tzipur, which is the Hebrew word for “bird” since we had two of them, the duck and the turkey.

“Gross,” said Lauren, who also knew the Hebrew word for bird. “I don’t want to think of it as a bird. I want to think of it as dinner.” She was wearing a button with a picture of Boy George, who was the lead singer for Culture Club. I thought she should have one for a band with a Thanksgiving theme, like the Eagles or America, but she didn’t like them.

“The Chinese word for Thanksgiving is gan en jie,” said Wai Po.

I guessed I’d better say something in Chinese, too. “Wo xihuan gan en jie,” I said. I like Thanksgiving. I was relieved to see Wai Po smile. So far, so good.

“I think we should all go around the table and say what we’re thankful for,” my mother said. This was one of her favorite traditions, even though it was awkward, year after year. “I am thankful that we can all be here, together, as a family. And that we can all remember how lucky we are.”

My dad went next. “I am thankful I don’t have to work until tonight so I can be here with all of you,” he said. My mother smiled. “And I’m thankful that the game is on TV.” My mother glared. His mother glared, too. “I am thankful for healthy children and that we have food on our table, and that today, at least, the world is at peace.” My mother smiled again, but Granny M cleared her throat, as though she was waiting for something. “I’m glad my mother is closer to us—physically. And I hope she knows she’s always been close in our hearts.”

My grandmother smiled. My dad had really figured her out over the years, which was a good thing. Then it was her turn.

“I’m thankful to be near my precious grandchildren, even though I am not in the bosom of the family and even if there’s no Waldbaum’s and I can’t find a decent bagel.”

I peeked over at Wai Po, and I swear she was smiling when Granny M said that.

“You’re around the corner,” my father said, and I thought maybe he hadn’t learned, because this was definitely the time to be quiet.

“That’s not the bosom,” Granny M said. “That’s an arm. Or an elbow.” She smiled like she was kidding, but she was showing too many teeth to be kidding.

Mr. Pickens coughed. Hearing Granny M talk about bosoms multiple times was probably as embarrassing for him as it was for me.

She changed the subject. Almost. “I’m glad we are all alive, when so many enemies have sought to destroy us.” That was a line from the Haggadah, which we read on Passover. “And I’m thankful my family survived the Holocaust.”

Mr. Pickens made these sympathetic clicking noises that old people make.

“I didn’t think any of our relatives were in the Holocaust,” Lauren said.

“Not direct relatives,” said Granny M. “Not my sister or my parents, thank God. But relatives. Aren’t I allowed to be thankful that they survived? And of course, I am thankful for my grandchildren, who are growing and blossoming before my very eyes. Or, at least, around the corner from my very eyes.”

Mr. Pickens said he was grateful to be spending Thanksgiving with neighbors. “And for all of this delicious food,” he said. “Without you, I would have only been grateful for a TV dinner.”

Wai Po nodded. Then she said: “I am thankful for Bao Bao. And all of you. I am thankful also for the survival of my own family, through difficult times, when we survived the Japanese occupation, when we fled the Communists and went to Taiwan. When I was a girl …” And she launched into a history lesson on China that started with the invention of paper and went through the Cultural Revolution.

Granny M looked at the ceiling and muttered, “My people know about difficult times, believe me.”

Wai Po stopped talking and looked at her as if Mr. Pickens’s head wasn’t even there. She gave the most forced smile in the history of the world. Granny M force-smiled back, right through Mr. Pickens. Technically, though, they were still getting along.

Before Wai Po could start talking again, Mom nudged Lauren to take her turn.

“I’m thankful there’s no school today and tomorrow,” she said. “I’m thankful for my family and my friends. And I’d be really thankful if someone bought me a—”

“This is not the time to talk about Hanukkah presents,” my mother said.

“I’m thankful for music,” Lauren said.

My mother smiled again and Granny M said, “So talented, my granddaughter.”

Mr. Pickens leaned forward and looked at Lauren’s button. “Is that a man wearing makeup? What strange times we live in.”

Lauren shrugged. “He’s a very good singer,” she said. “And it’s the song that’s important, not what he looks like.”

I had to admire Lauren for sticking up for Boy George.

Mom looked at me. “It’s your turn, David.”

“I already went,” I reminded her. “I said the first prayer.”

“But you didn’t say what you were thankful for.”

I thought about the things I was truly thankful for: I was thankful that Kelli Ann smelled like apple blossoms and that I wasn’t the slowest kid in my PE class and that I grew two inches over the summer and that my mom still put Little Debbie Snack Cakes in my lunch box even though I was in junior high. I was thankful we had won the school-wide trivia contest. I was thankful that my grandmothers hadn’t killed each other yet. I was thankful that the world hadn’t blown up, although things weren’t looking good, so maybe I should really be thankful for the shelter Scott and I were building.

“I’m thankful for everyone here,” I said out loud. And then my eyes watered because I really was thankful for everyone.

“Is that all?” my mother said.

I tried not to think about the Soviets and missiles, but trying not to think of something was pretty much a guaranteed way to think of something. I nodded.