by Ian Hamilton
As Brent was recounting a story about a deal he’d closed in London, Allison looked at her watch. “Mom, it’s almost six-thirty. Where’s Dad? He should be home by now.”
“I’m sure traffic was difficult in the city, and the Mass Pike will be busy.”
“How long will the lasagna take to heat?”
“About an hour. We can put it in now, if you want.”
“Let’s do that.”
At seven o’clock there was still no sign of Jack Anderson, and Anne began to fret. By seven-thirty, as Allison and Maggie were taking the lasagna and bread out of the oven, she was really beginning to worry. “This isn’t like your father. He always calls if he’s going to be this late,” she said.
“I’m sure he’s sitting on the Mass Pike in the middle of a traffic jam,” Allison said.
“Well, we can’t wait for him. I don’t want this food to get cold,” Anne said.
Dinner was laid out on the sideboard and everyone began to serve themselves. Mark went last, and just as he was setting his plate on the table, there was a noise at the front door.
Anne stood up. “It’s your father,” she said, and left the table.
Anne, like her daughter, was tall and lean. Her long, thin face had a pointed nose, a sharp chin, and clearly defined cheekbones. She could have looked imperious, maybe even harsh, but her appearance was softened by a curly mass of blonde hair and large blue-green eyes that usually radiated kindness and concern. Not this night.
“Where were you?” she said sharply to her husband. “We’ve already started dinner.”
Standing six foot four, Jack towered over her. He held out his arms and she stepped into them tentatively. “I’m sorry. I had an unexpected last-minute meeting.”
“On the night before Thanksgiving?”
“It wasn’t scheduled, but I had to take it.”
She gazed up at him. Jack was sixty but looked fifty. His face was as finely hewn as hers, but his chin was square, not sharp, and where her skin was beginning to crease, his was still taut. The only real sign of ageing was the silver streaks running through his full head of black hair, which he combed straight back.
“You should have phoned,” Anne said.
“I know. I’m sorry, I was distracted.”
“And you’ve been drinking. I can smell it on your breath.”
“It was that kind of meeting.”
“Is everything okay?”
“It couldn’t be better,” he said. “Now don’t keep me standing by the door. I’d like to see the kids.”
“C’mon,” she said, finally smiling.
Jack took off his tie and undid the top button of his shirt as he walked towards the kitchen. “Hi, everyone. Don’t get up,” he said as he hung the tie and his suit jacket on a wall hook.
“I’ll make up your plate,” Anne said.
“Thanks, sweetheart,” he said, and then began to work his way around the table, sharing hugs and kisses and shaking outstretched hands.
When he sat down, the food was at his place, and next to it was a cut crystal tumbler holding four ice cubes and a healthy shot of Scotch. He picked up the glass. “It’s so wonderful to have you all home. Let’s make this a marvellous holiday.”
Jack sat at one end of the table and his wife at the other. Several times during the meal she saw him staring at her, but every time she made eye contact, he lowered his head. She thought something might be worrying him, although he wasn’t displaying any obvious signs of concern.
Drinks were poured continually throughout dinner. Anne restricted herself to two martinis, but the others let loose, and no one more than Jack. Anne couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen him drink so much.
The family never ate dessert, so when the last of the lasagna was consumed and the table had been cleared, Anne said, “Scrabble?”
“Of course,” Brent said.
“I’ll get the boards,” Mark said.
Scrabble was an Anderson family tradition. When the children were young, it was Anne’s way of helping the family bond, and Jack’s way of breeding competitiveness. They played at least once a week until the children went off to university. Now Scrabble was reserved for holidays or whenever else the family managed to get together.
Three boards were laid on the kitchen table, and tiles were drawn to determine the pairings for the first round. Anne was the odd one out, which didn’t bother her; she quite enjoyed flitting from contest to contest.
There was a strict time limit of thirty seconds per move and the length of a game was restricted to thirty minutes. When the first game ended, scores were announced, Anne replaced the low scorer, and tiles were redrawn. So it went for three hours, as the drinks continued to flow. Strangely, Anne never had a chance to play against Jack, and odder still, he had the lowest score in two of the rounds.
When the last game had ended, Anne and Allison carried the drink glasses to the dishwasher while Mark and Brent put away the boards.
“Is everything okay with Dad?” Allison asked quietly.
“I think so,” Anne said. “Why do you ask?”
“He seemed very distracted. He’s usually a demon at Scrabble, but tonight it felt like he didn’t care if he won or lost.”
“He’s probably just tired. He left the house at six this morning, and you saw what time he got back.”
“Still, it isn’t like him.”
“With retirement looming, I think he’s becoming more conscious of his age and his capacity for work. When we started dating, I’d see him on Friday and Saturday nights and on Sunday mornings at church. The rest of the time he was working. When we were first married, and after you kids started coming along, he cut back some, but I remember having to insist that he spend weekends at home — even if he brought work with him — and I had to fight to get him to take two weeks off in the summer.”
“How is he ever going to manage retirement?”
“Mark asked me the same question. I said Dad will do charitable work and join some boards, but the truth is I don’t really know. He hasn’t talked to me about it.”
“Does he really have to pack it in?”
“When Bob Young was removed as president and CEO of Pilgrim, it was because the board of directors had passed a resolution limiting the time any one person could occupy either of those positions to twenty years,” she said. “Your father initiated and promoted that resolution. When it passed, he assumed control of the company. Now it’s come back to bite him in the ass — his words, not mine. He says it would be hypocritical of him not to play by the rules he used to force out Bob.”
“That’s Dad for you. Always doing the honourable thing.”
“What are you two talking about?” a voice asked from behind.
They turned and saw Jack looking down at them, his eyes a bit glazed and his speech slightly slurred.
“We were talking about you,” Anne said.
“Nothing nasty, I hope.”
“How could you even think that’s possible?” Allison said.
“From you two, I’d like to believe it’s unlikely,” he said, laughing, and then spoke directly to his wife. “I’m going to sit in the library for a while. There’s a book I’ve been meaning to finish, and tonight seems like a good night for it.”
“Which book?” she asked.
“The Prince of Tides.”
“That’s my usual type of read, not yours. Whatever made you pick it up?”
“I don’t really know, but I did, and now I intend to finish it, so don’t wait up for me,” he said.
“Don’t worry about that. I’ll be sleeping in a matter of minutes. Don’t wake me.”
“I won’t. Goodnight. Sweet dreams,” he said, and stepped forward to kiss each woman on the forehead.
Allison watched him pick up the bottle of Scotch from the
sideboard and carry it and a clean glass into the library. “Prince of Tides is fiction, isn’t it? He doesn’t normally read fiction.”
“He will read historical fiction, like Gore Vidal’s, but this book is a departure. It’s about a man and his twin sister trying to cope with a dysfunctional family. I have no idea what made your father start reading it — or why he thinks he has to finish it.”
2
Anne slept well until she was awakened by the faint but persistent noise of Ainsley crying. From the moment her first child was born, she had been hypersensitive to baby noises. She could hear them through thick walls several rooms away, and even when she was outside the house and the baby inside. She couldn’t explain why her hearing was so sensitive, and had never tried to. It was enough that everyone came to accept that it was Mother’s special gift, so when she knocked on Brent and Maggie’s bedroom door, Brent knew who it was and had the baby ready to hand over to her.
“Maggie has changed her. The formula bottle is in a saucepan on the stove. All you have to do is heat it,” Brent said. “We’ll be down shortly.”
“No rush,” Anne said, taking Ainsley.
It was just past six-thirty and the house was quiet. The winding staircase that led to the ground floor was heavily carpeted, and Anne’s descent was silent except for the cooing of the baby. Compared to the action of the night before, the kitchen was eerily quiet. Anne turned on the stove and sat on one of the benches with the baby on her lap. A few minutes later she decided the formula was warm enough for Ainsley and started feeding her. Before she had finished, Maggie came into the kitchen.
“You could have stayed in bed,” Anne said. “I have things under control.”
“I know you do, but I can’t seem to sleep in anymore.”
Anne looked at the baby. “She has taken to the bottle very well.”
“I felt so guilty when I weaned her.”
“I’ve read that breast milk is perfect for the first few months, but after that there’s nothing inferior about formula.”
“I know, but I miss the bonding that breastfeeding gave us.”
“There is that difference,” Anne said. “Do you know that I never breastfed any of my children?”
“I do know, but it wasn’t fashionable in those days.”
“That isn’t why. I’m afraid my reason was vanity,” Anne said. “My best friend from high school, Mary Hughes, had three children before she was twenty-five and she breastfed them all. When I saw what a mess they’d made of her breasts, I decided it wasn’t for me.”
“Anne!”
“Sorry, Maggie. I wasn’t suggesting that your breasts aren’t still wonderful.”
“Well, Brent doesn’t complain about them.”
“And that’s all that matters.”
Maggie smiled and stretched a hand towards Anne. “If he knew we were talking about this he’d be quite shocked.”
“He’s like his father in so many ways, and being prudish is one of them. If you asked Jack how he happens to have three children, he would act as if he had no idea how they were conceived.”
“Oh my god, that is so Brent,” Maggie said. “When we’re in bed, he treats me as if every time is the first. He never takes me for granted, and I can’t tell you how much I appreciate that. I have friends whose husbands treat them like they’re being paid to perform tricks.”
“Who’s paid to perform tricks?” Brent said from the doorway.
“No one you’d know,” Maggie said.
He walked into the kitchen and leaned over to kiss his mother. “Do you want me to make coffee?” he asked.
“Please.”
By the time Brent had the coffee brewing, Ainsley had finished her bottle and was being burped.
“It’s going to be a beautiful day. I’m looking forward to our walk,” Brent said.
“I won’t be joining you today. I have too much to do in the kitchen,” Anne said.
“And I’ll be helping your mother,” Maggie said.
“I hope the others are more willing.”
“They always are. I’ve never seen a family that likes to hang around together as much as the Andersons,” Maggie said.
“Maybe that’s because we’re such a small family,” Anne said. “Jack and I are both only children of only children, so there have never been aunts, uncles, or cousins in the picture. And our parents are dead, so the people under this roof are the entirety of who we are.”
“And we were raised to support and look after each other. The family comes first for all of us. There wasn’t anything Mom or Dad wouldn’t do for us, and we kids adopted that same attitude,” Brent said.
“And of course we feel the same way about our children’s partners,” Anne said.
A beep from the coffee machine interrupted the conversation. “Can I pour for everyone?” Brent asked, and then walked to the counter without waiting for a reply.
Over the next couple of hours, the remainder of the family straggled into the kitchen, with Jack the last to arrive. Fresh coffee was made and then made again, eggs were boiled and poached, bacon and sausages fried, and most of a loaf of bread toasted. At nine o’clock, as the last of the breakfast dishes were being put in the dishwasher, Anne said, “Okay, it’s time for you all to leave. Maggie and I need the kitchen to ourselves. We have a turkey that will take close to four hours to cook, and we need to get it ready for the oven.”
“Time for a walk,” Brent said. “It’s so nice outside I don’t think we’ll need jackets. Sweaters should do.”
“This is when I miss Buffy,” Allison said to her mother. “I’ll never understand why you didn’t get another dog after she died.”
“She was always your dog. Neither your father nor I have the patience to look after one on our own,” Anne said.
As the family gathered near the front door, Jack hung back in the kitchen. “Aren’t you going with the children?” Anne asked.
“I think I’m going to pass,” he said. “I went to bed rather late last night and didn’t sleep well.”
“Are you feeling all right?”
“I’m just a bit tired.”
“The fresh air might do you some good.”
“I think I’d rather sit in the den and finish that book.”
“The children will be disappointed.”
“I’ll explain it to them,” Jack said, and went over to the front door.
From the kitchen Anne could hear him tell the children he wasn’t going with them. She frowned when she heard their disappointed reactions. It wasn’t like Jack not to go on the walk. She hoped he wouldn’t decline to play in the touch football game on the front lawn that typically followed it.
As Jack came back through the kitchen on his way to the den, Anne saw Maggie eyeing him with concern. After he had closed the den door behind him, Anne said to her, “There’s no need to worry. If there’s something wrong I’m sure he’d tell us.”
“Brent thinks that as retirement gets closer, the reality of it is beginning to weigh on Jack,” Maggie said.
“Brent could be right,” Anne said. “Jack has made some comments recently that seem out of character. For example, Pilgrim had its annual meeting at the end of September. He mentioned three or four times that it was his last one and he wanted it to be first-rate. Most years I had no idea the meeting was even happening.”
“Did the company do anything special for him at the meeting?”
“I don’t know,” Anne said. “He’s never wanted me to attend company functions. It’s his other life, and I’m not part of it. I don’t mind, though. I’ve always had enough on my plate with the children and the house.”
“I’m sure they’ll do something to honour him. Jack Anderson is Pilgrim.”
“I hope so. He certainly deserves it,” Anne said. “Now, how about Brent? Does he include you in
his company’s events?”
“He does ask me, but most often I choose not to go.”
“Can I give you some advice?” Anne asked.
“Sure.”
“You should start going. What you don’t want is for him to stop asking.”
“Maybe when the baby is a bit older.”
“Don’t wait that long. Babies have a way of never becoming quite old enough. Before you know it, they’re teenagers and you have an entirely new set of challenges to worry about.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Maggie said, laughing.
The two women worked side by side for the next few hours until the turkey was stuffed and in the oven and the yams, potatoes, green beans, cranberry sauce, and a small ham were prepped and sitting on the counter. They were at the kitchen table enjoying a fresh cup of coffee when the front door opened.
“We’re back,” Mark shouted, and then walked into the kitchen. “Time for football.”
“How far did you walk?” Anne asked.
“How far is it from here to the town centre?”
“Almost three miles.”
“Then that’s how far we went. We stopped for a leisurely coffee at a bistro and then walked back. It took us twice as long to get home. I’d forgotten how much of the walk from town is uphill.”
“It is a serious walk,” Anne said. “I do it three times a week.”
“Which means you’re fit enough to play football.”
“I’m fit enough to play at football,” she said. “After all these years I still don’t know how to catch the darn thing.”
“That puts you in good company — with Allison and Maggie,” Mark said.
“Don’t be such a male chauvinist,” Maggie said.
“We’ll move you from team to team so things will be even. C’mon, everyone else is waiting on the lawn,” Mark said. Then he paused. “Where’s Dad?”