Night of Miracles

by Elizabeth Berg

  “Really?” he asked.

  “Well, just as good as,” she said. And then, quickly, “Okay, almost as good,” and then he was content.

  “So what do you think of our neighbor lady?” Jason asks.

  “I told you. She’s odd, but nice enough.”

  “But would you trust her with Lincoln?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe. If we have to. But she’d feed him sugar.”

  “I don’t think we can worry about stuff like that now. He did seem to like her well enough.”

  “Well, yeah. As an oddity.”

  “No,” Jason says. “I think he really liked her. When I went in to see him before bed that night, he said, ‘Do you think you could ask Lucille anything, and she’d just be honest?’ ”

  Abby smiles. “Right. Honest she is, though I’d call it rude. ‘Well, I can’t say I care for tofu lasagna.’ ”

  “But she ate it.”

  “Indeed.”

  “She’s comfortable with kids,” Jason says. “She taught for a long time. And she lives right next door. It’s handy.”

  “We’ll see,” Abby says. “She’s awfully old.”

  “But she’s healthy!”

  Abby nods and looks down, and Jason wishes he could take back what he said. She’s healthy, as opposed to you.

  Abby looks up at her IV bag, with its garish fluorescent orange label, she looks at her watch, she looks around the room at all the little cubicles with patients like her hidden from view. They hear a long, low groan, and Abby looks at Jason. “Maybe some almonds, after all. Or maybe…a Snickers bar? With almonds?”

  “You don’t eat Snickers bars!”

  “Not since I was twenty years old. So yeah, not for twenty years. But you know what? I look at them. Every time I go to the grocery store here, I look at them. Sometimes I squeeze them. They make them now with two in one package. Get that, and then you can have one. We’ll see if they’re like we remember.”

  “Want a National Enquirer, too? They have them in the gift shop.”

  “Are you kidding?”

  “Would I kid about a thing like that? I’ll get you one.”

  “And a Star magazine?”

  “If they have it, I’ll get it.”

  He kisses her forehead. He loves her so. Her and Lincoln and their lazy dog, Henry, and their life together. Sometimes at night, when she’s sleeping, he lets himself think about what life would be like without her. At those times, he can hardly breathe.

  Hired or Fired?

  “I’M SORRY I’M LATE,” IRIS says to Lucille, though three minutes after the appointed hour is not what most people would call late. “The last interview I had took a bit longer than I thought it might.”

  “You’re coming from another job interview?” Lucille asks.

  “Yes.”

  “Where?”

  “Building Blocks Daycare?”

  “I see. So this is a competition?”

  “No, not at all. You’re both part-time.”

  Lucille steps back from the front door. “All right. Well, come on into the kitchen. Can I offer you something? Coffee or tea?”

  Iris declines, and sits in the chair that Lucille has pointed to. The walls are covered with children’s drawings, and Iris tries very hard not to look at them. Instead, she focuses on a coconut cake at the center of the table, one slice removed to reveal what looks like lemon filling.

  “What a beautiful cake!” Iris says.

  “You can’t have any of that,” Lucille says. “That’s my demo cake for the class I’m teaching later today. I make a demo for every class I teach. That way, the students are inspired the moment they walk in the door. They see what we’re going to do, I give them the recipe, and then they learn how to make it. While the second cake is baking, we have a question-and-answer period, and then, when both cakes are done, we eat them. Most of them go right ahead and try the recipes again at home, right away. They want to show off for their families and friends. And they get all excited because I teach them secrets that not everyone knows.” She points to the cake. “For example, in this case? Citric acid in the lemon filling. You want that pucker.”

  “Yes, of course,” Iris says, though she’s not completely sure what Lucille means. She can cook savory things, but she has never gotten into baking. Ed was one of those rare people who didn’t like sweets, and she didn’t want to bake for one, so she never learned how.

  “For heaven’s sake,” Lucille says, “look at most of the lemon meringue pies you get when you eat out. First of all, the crust is horrible, that goes without saying. But the filling is usually way too sweet, too. Sweet and gummy and that terrible garish yellow. What a disappointment to order a slice of a lemon pie and not taste lemon at all!”

  “Right!” Iris says.

  “Now, you look like a perfectly fine person. Nicely dressed, well spoken, and I’m glad to see you have no visible tattoos. Or body parts pierced where they should not be. But before we go any further, I want to give you a little quiz. Just a little one, a few basic questions. Because it will be the sine qua non. All right?”

  Uh-oh, Iris thinks, but she says, enthusiastically, “Sure!”

  Lucille goes to a kitchen drawer and takes out a piece of paper. “Now. I’ve got it all prepared, and here are two sharpened number-two pencils, and I’m going to give you fifteen minutes, I don’t feel you should need more time than that. I’ll leave the room.” She puts the test facedown in front of Iris. “You may begin.” She starts to leave, then turns around and says, “No cheating!”

  She says this last part merrily, as though it’s a joke, but Iris doesn’t think it is.

  After fifteen minutes, Lucille peeks her head into the kitchen. “Finished?”

  Iris is not; she’s holding the pencil over the paper and staring intently down. Her stomach aches. But she was warned that she’d get only fifteen minutes and, looking at her watch, she sees that fifteen minutes are indeed up. “I guess so,” she says.

  Lucille sails smoothly into the kitchen and stands expectantly before her.

  Iris hands her the quiz.

  Lucille sits down at the kitchen table. “All right, let’s go through the questions together, shall we?” She rearranges her bottom on the chair. “Number one. What is the best way to tell if meringue has been whipped enough?

  “A toothpick, you say. Well, no. That’s wrong. The correct answer is that you turn the bowl upside down. If it’s ready, the meringue will stay in the bowl.” Using a red pencil, Lucille makes an X beside Iris’s answer.

  “Number two. What is a quick way to bring raw, refrigerated eggs to room temperature? Microwave, you say. Huh. Microwave. Now, Irene.”

  “It’s Iris.”

  “What?”

  “It’s Iris. My name is Iris.”

  “Oh, you’re right, I beg your pardon. Right. Iris, like the flower. Well, Iris, your answer is not a totally unreasonable answer, but it, too, is wrong. You cannot control the heat enough with a microwave. The right answer is to put the eggs in your bra. Your body temperature will gently warm them in just a few minutes. Okay?”

  “Okay,” Iris says.

  “Number three. What can you add to milk to make it a substitute for buttermilk? You say, Butter.” Iris hears a tiny sigh escape Lucille. “This also is wrong. The right answer is to add a bit of vinegar or lemon until the milk curdles.”

  “Oh. Isn’t that interesting!”

  Lucille looks over at her in what Iris would call a severe way, and Iris looks down into her lap.

  “Number four. If you can’t get fresh, which is better, canned or frozen? Well! For this one you said, Frozen, and that is correct. Congratulations.

  “Number five. Why should pie crust be refrigerated before you roll it out? You say, Because it’s a good place to keep
it until you’re ready for it. Oh, my. Wrong. You refrigerate it so that it keeps its shape. Have you ever even rolled out pie crust?”

  “You mean the kind in the grocery store?”

  Lucille closes her eyes.

  “Number six. What is the difference between baking powder and baking soda? You say, One comes in a can and one comes in a box.” Oh, Lord. That is true, but it is not the right answer. The answer is that baking powder is a leavener that contains both sodium bicarbonate and flavor-saving acid, and so it is usually paired with non-acid ingredients like whole milk and Dutch-processed cocoa. Baking soda needs an acid; baking powder already has an acid. If you were to try to substitute baking soda for baking powder in a recipe where no acidic ingredient is present, there would be no release of gas and therefore no rising would occur.”

  “Ah,” Iris says.

  “Number seven. Should one use orange zest or orange juice when making orange cream cheese spread? You answered, What is orange cream cheese spread? And you failed to even try to answer the last three questions.”

  Lucille lowers Iris’s paper onto her lap and looks over her glasses at her.

  Iris smiles. Shrugs.

  “Do you think I should hire you?”

  Iris says nothing.

  “I must tell you that I had decided beforehand to accept only a certain number of errors in this test. What do you think that number was?”

  Iris has no idea. But she says, “Four?”

  “Nope. It was zero.” Lucille stands. “It was very nice meeting you, Miss Winters. I hope you’ll be happy at the daycare center. Let me walk you out.”

  Iris stays sitting. “You know…I can’t work there, actually.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because they won’t hire me. When I went into the baby room, I started to cry. Because I feel so bad that I never had a baby. And I really wanted one. And now it’s too late.”

  A cuckoo clock on the kitchen wall sounds the hour, and both women fall silent. Eleven times the little door opens and closes and the bird says, “Cuckoo!”

  And then Lucille speaks quietly. “I never had a baby, either. I’m lucky to have a young woman in my life, Maddy, who is like a daughter to me. She has a little girl named Nola, and I call her my grandchild. Those are Nola’s drawings on the wall. But I never even got married. I only got engaged. He died before we could get married.”

  “I’m so sorry,” Iris says, and her eyes fill with tears. Some of it is for Lucille and some of it is for herself.

  “I’m sorry, too,” Lucille says, and then, “I hope you can understand, though, that your test results indicate that you would have a very difficult time working here. I need someone who knows what they’re doing.” She folds Iris’s test in half and stands. “I do thank you for coming.”

  Iris leans forward and speaks earnestly. “Lucille, I can cook, but as you have seen, I’m no baker. Still, I think I can really help you. I ran a very successful business back in Boston. I can make you a website, do spreadsheets, figure out ways to grow your business, and find creative and inexpensive ways to advertise. I can write course descriptions and make it so people can sign up online, and the fees for the classes would be direct-deposited into your bank account. And I am utterly dependable.”

  Lucille looks at her. “I don’t know….”

  “Plus I’ll work for peanuts. Because I don’t need the money, I just want to work. And…well, I want you to know that whether you decide to hire me or not, I really appreciated learning what I just did from you. You’re a good teacher.”

  Lucille narrows her eyes. “What’s the difference between baking soda and baking powder?”

  Lightning-fast, Iris shoots back, “Baking powder has an acid, baking soda needs one.”

  Lucille stares at her. And then she says, “Oh, all right, you’re hired. You can start next Monday. At least you have nice penmanship. You go ahead and do that computer mumbo-jumbo. Also, you can help with setup and cleanup. And you can shop for supplies. But don’t even think about interacting directly with the students, I have a reputation to maintain. Deal?”

  Iris holds out her hand and Lucille shakes it.

  On her way home, Iris thinks about the baby room she’d seen at the daycare center, the cheerful yellow walls, the polka-dotted curtains, the white cribs, the sight of six or seven little ones, some sleeping, some awake, one standing at the side of her crib, holding out her arms to Iris. Nothing could have prepared Iris for the emotional response she had. She didn’t start to cry; she started to sob. The director looked at her, alarmed. “I’m sorry,” Iris said. “I guess I’m not…I’m sorry.” And she fled the room.

  Thank goodness for Lucille taking a chance on her. She won’t let her down.

  Maddy and Nola

  IT IS A SPECTACULARLY BRIGHT Saturday morning, the kind of day that always makes Lucille feel as though the sun has been through the car wash. It’s a welcome thing after so many gray days in a row. She is still in her pajamas, just rinsing out her coffee cup, when she hears a rapping at the door. Who could this be, at such an indecent hour? She looks up at the kitchen clock and sees that it’s 10:50. All right, not such an indecent hour, but still, no call, no warning of any kind. It’s probably one of those religious people shoving pamphlets at you, smiling their wide smiles, but with a note of pity in their eyes for your sorry state—soon to be rectified, if only you would let them. Lucille used to try to explain why she wasn’t interested, but that never worked, so one day she tried something different, which was to pretend she was French and couldn’t speak English. A teacher friend who had taught French at the high school used to give Lucille private lessons now and then, mostly so that Lucille could pronounce the names of French desserts with a certain flair. But wouldn’t you know it, the one time Lucille tried to say she didn’t speak English—in French, of course—the do-gooder’s eyes lit up and she said, “Ah, vraiment? Mais je parle français!” Then Lucille had to quickly look ill and say, “Pardon, pardon, je me sens malade,” and slam the door. Well, that woman stood there for a full minute before she left a pamphlet in the mailbox, and then she went on to Arthur Moses’s house, next door to Lucille’s, and didn’t Arthur just invite that woman right in.

  Arthur was not a religious man, he never went to church and he once told Lucille that he saw God in the eye of a daisy. But he invited that woman in and then she didn’t leave for half an hour! Lucille kept an eye out in case Arthur might need help, periodically looking out her kitchen window into his, but of course he didn’t. And the woman left smiling after what appeared to be a most amiable chat. That’s how Arthur was. You could get all up in arms about this or that, but Arthur would, by quiet example, remind you of the worth of simple kindness no matter what the occasion. It could get on your nerves sometimes.

  Now the doorbell rings, and she tightens her robe belt and goes to answer it. She opens the door and before her is…no one. But then she hears, “Hi, Grandma Lucille!” and she looks down to see towheaded five-year-old Nola, her hair in pigtails that stick out of the sides of her head like handles. She has a cellophane-wrapped bouquet that she holds up now, saying, “This is for you!” It’s a bouquet from the grocery store, so it has those irritating alstroemeria that never die, even when you want them to, but it is always the thought. Nola’s mother, Maddy, is coming up the walk from the car, dragging a suitcase, a bedraggled teddy bear, and a bag of groceries. “Hi, Lucille!” she says. “Surprise!” It is indeed a surprise, but since it’s Maddy, it’s fine.

  Nola runs past Lucille and into the living room, where she will want to fool around with the music box Lucille’s mother gave her, which Lucille keeps on her coffee table. Lucille feels torn about whether to wait for Maddy to come in or to go over and say to Nola, “Now, remember to be gentle.”

  Luckily, Maddy comes rapidly toward her and embraces Lucille, and then Lucille is free to mov
e into the living room, where she sits down on the sofa, an arm’s length away from Nola. The little girl is kneeling on the floor in front of the music box, regarding it as though it is a rare Egyptian artifact just now unearthed from the sand. “Wind it?” Nola says, and Lucille does.

  The music box is rosewood, with flowers etched on the surface. It plays five songs: “Rio Rita,” “Two Hearts in Waltz Time,” “Blue Danube,” “Donkey Serenade,” and “In an Eighteenth-Century Drawing Room.” If you lift the lid, you can see through a clear piece of glass how the thing works, the turning cylinder with its tiny pins, the teeth of the steel comb that get plucked like a harp. Lucille had never met anyone as enchanted by the box as she was, but then along came Nola. Lucille has left the music box in her will for the child, but for now, she watches, hawklike, as Nola moves her hand closer to the box. Nola is watching Lucille the same way. “Caaaaareful,” Lucille says, and Nola whispers back solemnly, “I knooooow.” And then, suddenly sitting back on her heels, “Grandma, do you have some cookies for me?”

  Now you’re talking, Lucille thinks, and though her mother says, “Nola, you wait to be offered,” she and Nola head hand in hand for the kitchen and the big self-satisfied porcelain pig with his hooves crossed over his belly, Lucille’s favorite cookie jar. “You go ahead and take one,” Lucille tells Nola, lowering the jar. “They’re sugar cookies stuffed with raspberry jam, and I made the jam, too, and is it ever good.”

  “May I have two?” Nola asks.

  “All right,” Lucille says, meeting Maddy’s eyes. She is leaning against the doorjamb with her arms crossed, smiling and shaking her head. My, Lucille thinks, she’s become such a beautiful young woman. And there’s a certain glow that makes Lucille wonder, Is she pregnant again?

  Then Maddy holds up her left hand. A ring! It’s not a diamond, but what appears to be an emerald. Lucille points to it. “Is that what I think it is? Are you engaged?”