They came up with it at the same time. “Bum bum—do-do-do-do-do—”
“Do-do-do-do-do!” Caddie played the first four measures with her right hand, and they burst out laughing.
“You see? It never fails!”
“You’re right, it’s happy music. But I can’t play any more without the sheet music, I really can’t.” So there wasn’t much more they could do at Thea’s first lesson. “Would you like to have some coffee?” Caddie invited, and they adjourned to the kitchen.
Thea spotted an envelope from Wake House on the counter and tapped her fingernail on it. “You got one, too.”
“Brenda’s letter?” It had come yesterday. She apologized over and over, but the bottom line was, rates at Wake House were going up. “It’s worse for you, Thea—you’ve hardly been here a month, and she’s raising the price.”
“Sounds like it’s unavoidable. Repairs for staying certified, that kind of thing. Last week it was squirrels in the chimney, this week the roof leaks. Always something.”
“I know, but still. It’s a hardship.”
“Are you and Frances…”
“We’re okay. I worry about some of the others, though.”
“Caddie, look.” She froze in front of the window over the sink, pointing. “You’ve got a Baltimore oriole on your feeder. Oh—he flew away. Did you see him?”
“No. Well, wings, I saw something.”
“They’re getting so rare, and they used to be everywhere.” She sat down in Nana’s old chair at the scratched white metal table, and Caddie thought how natural she looked there, comfortable and relaxed, as if she were in her own kitchen. How long had it been since Caddie had had company, somebody in the house who was a friend, not a student?
“Are you a birder?” she asked. “Nana was, sort of. I put food out, but I don’t pay much attention to who’s who.”
“Not me—Will was the bird-watcher. His lifelong hobby. He was so keen, and he knew every thing.” She had wistful gray eyes that crinkled at the corners, even when she wasn’t smiling. “I think of him all the time, but seeing a bird, oh my, just about any bird, that’s a guaranteed memory.”
“Will was your husband?” Thea nodded. “Did you lose him recently? I was thinking it had been some time.”
“It was two years ago in February. February the eighth.”
“You miss him a lot,” Caddie said shyly, setting their cups on the table, sitting down in her old chair. “How long were you married?”
“Four years.”
“Oh. Oh, I thought—”
“He wasn’t my first husband. And we lived together for a couple of years before we got married.” She sipped her coffee pensively. “He was nothing like the kind of man I ever thought I’d marry, but for the time we had together I’d never been happier. Which shows what I knew.”
“What was he like?”
“Younger than me. Not too much, six years. And not successful, not in the way most people define success. The way I defined success—he was nothing like my first husband, in other words. Or my father, or my grandfather, the men in my life I’d always used as models.”
“Thea,” Caddie interrupted, “I could write your biography. You could talk to me just like this, and I could write it down for you.”
“That’s sweet.”
“Want me to? It’d be fun.”
“Oh, but then I’d have to reveal all my secrets.”
“You keep secrets from me?” She mimed shock.
“Only the ones you don’t need to know.” Thea’s smile was more tender than jocular. “Anyway, I’m too young for a biography! You’d have to keep updating it.”
“You are, much too young. Do you have a picture of Will?”
“Not with me, I’ve got one at home.” She gave a wondering laugh. “At home, listen to me.”
“Does it feel like home already? It does to Nana, I think. Your room is fabulous.” Thea’s tower suite had the sun all day from three windows set deep in its graceful, rounded wall. “You must feel like a princess.”
“Maybe one that’s a little long in the tooth.”
“Why did you come to Wake House? If I may ask,” Caddie thought to add. “You’re younger than anybody. You’re healthy, you could be independent if you wanted.”
“I’m getting macular degeneration in one eye.”
“But still—”
“And arthritis in my toe, I told you. Don’t laugh, it’s disabling. I have to wear old-lady shoes or I hobble around like a cripple. But at least it’s my toe and not my thumb—then I couldn’t play ‘Maple Leaf Rag.’ ”
“Seriously,” Caddie pressed.
“Seriously.” She sat back in her chair. “The house was so sad without Will. The nicest thing Carl, my first husband, ever gave me—he was a banker, a pillar of the community, we didn’t suit at all—was our vacation home in the settlement. It’s not very big or fancy, but it’s old and lovely, and it’s on the prettiest little creek. Heron Creek—near Berlin on the Eastern Shore. I went to live there after the divorce, and eventually I hired Will to dam up a little piece of the creek so I could swim there. That’s how we met.”
“How romantic.”
“He was a handyman. That’s how I found him in the want ads, under ‘Handyman.’ Oh, my, there wasn’t anything he couldn’t fix. Or make.” She slid one finger around the rim of her cup, her face dreamy. “It started with me taking coffee out to him and talking with him while he worked. We were both divorced, but his was friendlier and his ex-wife had just died. So he was sad. He had a daughter, but she was married and living way out in Phoenix. Still does.”
“You were both lonely.”
“Well, I was. Will had more outlets.” She laughed. “After he dammed up the creek, he built me a garden shed. Oh, you should see it, it’s a work of art. Then it was bookcases for my bedroom, then a new chimney. When fall came, he went back to his real job—selling woodstoves and solar heat panels. And he was a poet.”
“Goodness.”
“I’d never met anybody like him, needless to say. He didn’t care a thing about money, had no ambition except to enjoy his life—that’s what drove wife number one crazy. ‘It goes by so fast,’ he’d say, ‘I can’t sleep through any of it.’ That was his philosophy. One day we just drove up to Atlantic City and got married. Ha! He proposed to me in a poem. Oh, we were like teenagers. He made our wedding rings.”
“Oh, Thea.”
“I told you he could do anything.”
“It’s beautiful.” Caddie had admired it before, an unusual ring of heavy, twisted gold.
“We had nine perfect years, which is more than lots of people get. The last one wasn’t so good—he got cancer, and it killed him. ‘You see?’ he’d say. ‘I told you it goes by fast. I didn’t want to have to prove it to you, though.’ ” Her smile was full of melancholy.
“After he was gone, I waited two years—that’s what they say, don’t do anything, take no drastic steps after you lose your spouse for at least two years. And I found I couldn’t stay in the house without him. So here I am, I’ve come home. This is the town I grew up in, you know.”
“Where, what street?”
“I’ll take you by it sometime, my aunt and uncle’s house—I went to live with them after my mother died.”
“How old were you? When your mother died?”
“I was nine.”
“Oh, Thea—”
“But that’s another story. A long story. Hey, you’re worming my biography out of me!”
“I wasn’t trying to, honest. But, Thea, I was nine when my mother died, too.”
“Were you?” She looked at her with warmth and interest and no surprise. “Then we have something sad in common.” She stroked her finger lightly over the top of Caddie’s hand. “Remember that game we played? The one where we had to describe each other?”
Caddie made a face. “When I found out I’m the kind of person who wears flannel pajamas and never gets a speeding ticket.”<
br />
“Oh, did that hurt your feelings?” Thea chuckled. “When it was your turn, I said you made me wish for something again. Something I used to wish for, but then I got too old. Do you know what it was?”
Caddie shook her head, but she did know. She hoped.
“Carl and I wanted children so badly, but in those days there weren’t as many miracles as there are today, so—we just couldn’t. And now look. In my old age, my golden years, look what I’ve found. I hope that doesn’t embarrass you.”
“No. No.” Caddie kept her gaze on their touching hands, not quite able to look Thea in the eye. It hardly ever happened that she got her heart’s desire. “I feel the same,” she said in a murmur. “I didn’t have much of a mother. She was a musician. Always leaving. Always…”
The phone rang.
“I didn’t call in the middle of a lesson, did I?”
It was Christopher. “Hi, no, it’s fine. I have company, though.”
Thea made a knowing face. She pointed to herself, pointed to the dining room door, started to get up.
Caddie walked over, pulling the tangled phone cord tight, and pressed her back down. “It’s my friend Thea, from Wake House. We’re just having coffee, sitting here having such a nice—”
“I only have a sec,” Christopher interrupted. “I’ve got an appointment. Just wanted to make sure we’re still on for the weekend before I make the reservation.”
“We absolutely are.”
“You canceled what you had to cancel?”
“Yep.” Nine lessons, three on Friday afternoon, six on Saturday. Rescheduling had been a nightmare.
“Excellent.”
She could hear the smile in his voice. “Excellent,” she repeated, grinning like the Cheshire cat.
“Okay, then we’re on.”
“Who’s driving? I don’t mind driving.”
He laughed heartily. “That piece of junk? No, thanks, I’ll drive.”
“I resent that—my car’s a classic.”
“Classic piece of junk.”
She started giggling and couldn’t stop. This was how most of their phone conversations went, at least on her end.
“Drive it over to my place tonight, though,” he said in a different voice. “I’m dying to see you.”
“Well, I don’t know, what if it broke down? Maybe I shouldn’t take the chance.”
She wanted to keep on teasing him, but he had to go. “See you tonight,” he said, and hung up.
“That was Christopher.”
“I gathered,” Thea said dryly. “Are you going on a trip?”
“I’m so excited—we’re going to Washington for the weekend. He’s only been once, when he was a little boy, so I’m going to show him around.”
“I am dying to meet this man.”
“I’ll bring him to Wake House soon—he wants to come. He’ll probably bring King—that’s his dog I told you about.”
“The perfect dog for the perfect man.”
“Oh, Thea. Wait till you meet him.” She gave a tight-shouldered shrug of excitement.
“Is this getting serious?”
“I don’t know! I’m serious. Oh, God, I’m so…I finally get what they’re talking about in love songs.” She blushed. “I mean, I always got it, but now—I’m having it.”
“Ah, that stage. You never forget it. What’s he like, this Christopher?”
“Well…he’s very handsome.”
“Of course.”
“He’s serious, but he’s also funny. He’s a really good person. His whole life is like one long good deed, and that makes him happy. I think people who love what they do are so lucky, don’t you? It’s what makes them good. You can’t be mean or unkind or nasty if you love your work. Anyway, that’s my theory.”
“Don’t you love your job?”
“Well, sometimes. And I’m pretty good at it—that’s satisfying.”
Thea put her elbow on the table, chin on her hand. “What’s missing?”
Caddie hesitated. It was easier to talk about Christopher.
“What would you be if you could be anything?” Thea asked.
She laughed. “Regardless of skill, you mean.”
Thea shrugged. “What would you be? Still a musician?”
“Oh, yes. It’s my only talent.”
“Well, what kind of musician? If you could be anything.”
She laughed again—to show in advance that this was all a joke. “Okay, I have this fantasy. That I’m singing the blues in a smoky jazz club. You know, Billie Holiday, Peggy Lee. I’m a lounge singer!”
Thea didn’t laugh. She narrowed her eyes. “Oh, yes, I can see it. You in a slinky black dress with that blonde hair—stunning. Do you sing?”
“Not like Billie Holiday! Ha! No, and anyway, pop music isn’t for me, I’m completely classical, that’s the kind of person I am. It’s all I know, and really, it’s all I want to know. It suits me.”
Thea raised a skeptical eyebrow.
“Plus I get terrible stage fright,” she confessed. Might as well tell Thea everything.
“Stage fright? Really?”
“I used to play the violin in the Michaelstown Community Orchestra, but I had to give it up. Terrified.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know! I wasn’t even first violin. I just—” She gave a mock shudder. “I’m too self-conscious, and then I get scared. So I just don’t play in front of people anymore.”
“What a shame. Do you know why Henry took up skydiving?”
“What?” The question was so unexpected, she couldn’t think.
“Do you know why Henry took up skydiving?”
“No. Why?”
“Because,” she said distinctly, looking straight into Caddie’s eyes, “he was afraid of heights.” She got up and carried her cup to the sink. “My cab’s coming. I’d better wait by the door so I can see it.”
Caddie followed her out to the hall, frowning. She didn’t much care for parables. If Thea had advice for her, she wished she’d just come out and say it.
“So you’re going to simplify my song, right?”
“Yes, I’ll either find or make a very rudimentary version, and I’ll tape it, record me playing it. Probably in a different key, something easier than whatever it’s in. For some reason I keep thinking A-flat major.”
“And you’re going to record it slowly.”
“Very slowly. Dirgelike. And we’ll use that for our starting point. I have no idea how this is going to work—I hope you won’t be too disappointed, Thea, if it doesn’t. But I have to tell you, you’ve chosen one of the worst songs in the world for your one and only song.”
“But it is going to work! You worry too much.”
“But I think it’s wonderful that you want to learn it, I really—”
“You mean, at my age.”
“Yeah. No—I mean—”
“I agree with you, I’m very admirable.” She leaned against one side of the screen door, Caddie leaned against the other. “And this is only one thing I want to do. I’ve got a whole list.”
“You do? What else is on it?”
“Well, one thing, I definitely want to smoke weed.”
Caddie’s eyes bulged.
Thea laughed gaily. “I do! Everybody in the whole world has smoked pot but me, and I want to try it. You don’t have a dealer, do you?”
“A dealer?”
“Or know of one?”
“Sorry.”
“I know—I’ll ask Magill.”
“Good idea,” Caddie said, chortling with her. “He’s probably got a secret stash in his room.”
“Or a plant.”
The taxi pulled up.
Thea got halfway down the walk, turned, and spread her arms wide. “How,” she called back, “how could you not love these sculptures? Look at them!”
“I have. Every day for years!”
She shook her head. “Bye—thanks for the lesson. If I don’t see you before the weeke
nd, have a grand time in Washington.”
“Oh, I will.”
Thea cupped her ear.
“I’m planning to!”
Dolores, Mrs. Brill’s youngest daughter, drove up from the Washington suburbs once a week to visit. When she heard Caddie was writing down Wake House residents’ life stories, she asked if she would mind writing her mother’s. Caddie said yes, gladly. Mrs. Brill talked about the weather, about flowers, and about the food at Wake House—if it was good; if it wasn’t, she said nothing—and she sympathized with other people’s physical ailments but wouldn’t discuss her own (which must be numerous, since she was forever going to some doctor’s appointment or other). What she never talked about was her personal life, and Caddie was curious. And “Sunday School Teacher, Retired” was a pretty skimpy biography—she was sure she could do better.
They sat out on the front porch on a clear, sunny day, Mrs. Brill, Dolores, Caddie, and Dolores’s seven-year-old daughter, Keesha. Caddie planned just to jot down notes while Dolores chatted with her mother, drawing out dates and major events of her life, but pretty soon she could see things weren’t going to be that easy.
“Mama,” Dolores began, “when were you born?”
“Now, I don’t see why anybody needs to know that.” Mrs. Brill had a daunting way of holding her head back and looking down at you through thick glasses that magnified her eyes and made them seem closer to the lenses than they really were. And she always looked like she was either on her way to church or just getting back.
Dolores didn’t look like her at all. She was a thin, nervous woman in her early fifties, with smart gray eyes and the longest fingernails Caddie had ever seen. Today she had on white capri pants and platform shoes, and a soft perfume that smelled like lilacs. When she turned her head, rows and rows of beads in her hair clacked like dice. “Uh-oh,” she said, crossing her legs and setting her chair to a fast rock. “Question number one, and we’re stuck already.”
Mrs. Brill hesitated, then gave a regal shrug. “September the fifth, nineteen and twenty.”
“She’s a Virgo,” Dolores told Caddie.
“Well, that I don’t hold with. What I am is a Baptist.”
“What was your maiden name?” Caddie asked.
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