Nancy Thayer

  “Who is? But you’ve got just a bit of a burn, a glow, actually; it becomes you.”

  Helen blushed. “I’ll go get your drink and your Cheez-Its.”

  Nona wedged herself up off her chaise, leaned on her cane, and wobbled off into her private bathroom. She urinated, washed her hands, and studied her reflection in the mirror. She looked as old as Moses, and about as attractive. From this room, she could hear Grace in the next bedroom.

  “I knew they’d do this! Helen’s children have always been unreliable! They’re going to ruin everything!”

  Kellogg’s voice was soothing. “Grace. They’ll be here, or they won’t; it doesn’t matter. You have arranged a magnificent party, and Nona will be thrilled.”

  Nona sighed. Why did Grace not have Worth’s ease? Was it her fault? Of course it was her fault. She would have to be fulsome in her compliments to Grace. Grace was such a worker.

  She hobbled back to her bedroom and lowered herself into the old wing chair by the fireplace. She knew from experience it was easy to pull up the old lacquered octagonal Chinese table, for eating. She was glad Helen had suggested a little treat. She was peckish.

  Through her open window, she heard the crackle of gravel. Doors slammed. Voices called out. More commotion. Laughter and more laughter. Then the pounding of feet up the back stairs, and her door opened.

  Into her room burst two gorgeous young men, their confident air of health, strength, and sheer love of life billowing around them like an invisible perfume. Oliver and Owen.

  “Nona! Forgive us for being late! Our plane had an emergency landing in Kansas City! It was such a drama!” Oliver strode over to Nona, talking, gesturing, smiling, while Owen stood shyly in the background. Tall, slender, elegant, Oliver had honey-brown hair, shining azure eyes, milk-white teeth, and the overall aura of a knight straight from King Arthur’s round table. He was wearing a three-piece tight black suit, and his hair had been cut and gelled into one of those bizarre thatches pointing straight up, and he hadn’t shaved for a day or two, so his square jaw was dotted with whiskers.

  “You look very metrosexual,” Nona said, as her grandson bent to kiss her. She was pleased with herself for knowing the modern term.

  “Well, Nona, get you!” Oliver pulled a chair over next to hers and held her hands. He cocked his head. “And you look as beautiful as always.”

  “Flatterer.” She gestured to Oliver’s partner. “Owen, come kiss me.”

  Owen approached, moving as gracefully as a dancer. He was smaller than Oliver, and somehow neater, and if he didn’t watch out, people would say he was dapper, which Nona knew Owen would find insulting. Owen wore a black suit, too, but with a black turtleneck instead of the white shirt and blue tie Oliver sported. His hair was ebony, his eyes chocolate, his eyelashes long and thick, like brushes.

  “Hello, Nona. Lovely to see you again. Happy birthday.” Owen bent to kiss her cheek.

  “Room service,” Helen called from the door. “Oliver, move that little Chinese table closer to Nona—that’s perfect. Thanks.” She set a Waterford tumbler and a basket of Cheez-Its on the table.

  “Thank you, Helen.” Nona eyed the Scotch. “My drink looks suspiciously pale.”

  “Grace fixed it,” Helen retorted. Plopping down on the chaise by the window, she smiled at her son and his partner. “You two look wonderful.”

  “Wait till you see us in our tuxes,” Oliver told her. “What time is the family going to the yacht club?”

  Grace stuck her head in the door. She wore a long silk dress, printed with geometric shapes, and pearls. She resembled, slightly, Barbara Bush—or was it Mamie Eisenhower?

  “Cocktails start at seven, but we want to be there around six-thirty I’m going to take some family photos before we set out, so drink up, Nona, so you can dress.” Grace looked at her watch and frowned. “Oliver, I don’t know if you two will have time to go back to the inn, change clothes, and return in time for the photos.”

  “Well, we’ll have them taken at the club, then.”

  “But I want to take them here. At the house.”

  “But who will know?” Oliver argued softly. “With so many people in the photo, the background won’t show up.”

  Grace’s lips tightened. “We’ll know.” A blush of frustration blotted her neck and face.

  Oliver said, placatingly, “Okay, then, we’ll just stay here and have our photos taken, then change into our tuxes on the way to the yacht club.”

  Grace crossed her arms under her bosom, battle-ax pose. “Yes, and ruin the photo. Everyone else will be in formal dress.”

  “We are in suits,” Oliver pointed out. “We’ll stand behind everyone else,” he added. “You’ll just see our heads.”

  “I know!” Brightly, a little desperately, Helen made a suggestion, “I’m sure we have some nice black bow ties in some closet out here, and some white shirts. You can look formal from the shoulders up; that’s all that will show.”

  “Oh, that’s just like you, Helen!” Grace snapped, losing her cool. “I’m trying to create a historical record of Nona’s dynasty, and you’re turning it into a comic routine.”

  Nona watched and listened, munching away at her cheese crackers and sipping her Scotch, thinking Grace could use a hearty slam shot of alcohol herself right now. The matter was finally decided when Glorious arrived to help Nona dress for the evening. Oliver and Owen assured Grace they could race to their inn, change clothes, and be back in time for the photo if they left now. And they ran out the door. Through the open window, their hearty male laughter floated, and then came the sound of their rental car peeling away down the drive.

  “It’s not funny!” Grace declared, hands on hips.

  Oh, the poor responsible child, Nona thought. “I know it’s not funny,” she said soothingly. “And Grace, I do appreciate all your thoughtfulness and preparations. I know how much work has gone into this, and I’m very grateful. Now I’d better get dressed so I can attend this magnificent occasion.”

  Grace, appeased, kissed Nona on the cheek and marched off down the hall to help Mandy dress the babies. Helen waved at Nona from the hallway and went off to change. Glorious, already garbed for the evening in red satin, shut the bedroom door. “All right, Mrs. Nona, let’s get you beauteous.”

  Nona had been in her seventies when she first realized that simply taking a bath and arranging her hair took energy and stamina. She had expected, as the years passed, that she would have less ability for such things as charity committees and sailing, but it never occurred to her that some days she might feel just too tired and weak to brush her own hair. In her eighties, she had considered cutting it, but when she finally seated herself in the hairdresser’s chair, an emotion like fear swept through her, as if her hair were life itself and she did not want it cut short. She had always considered the expense of having one’s hair done a waste, especially for simple daily life, but that day, instead of a cut and style, she had a simple wash and blow-dry, and after that she had what the salon called a “standing” appointment.

  Nona soon came to enjoy the luxury of lying back in a chair with her neck braced on the cool porcelain as Brad’s capable hands caressed her scalp. And she looked forward to the hour of gossip at the salon and seeing other people, people whom she didn’t know: young girls getting ready for proms or bridal parties, growly-voiced men having their heads shaved as they raved about the deer on the island. It opened the world up to her a bit, and she came away looking much better than she did when she washed her own hair. It was something about a product they used that made her fine white hair look silky.

  Brad had begged to be able to do her hair in some fancy style for this birthday party, but the thought secretly terrified Nona. She didn’t want to show up in front of everyone who knew her with her hair all puffed out or curled, and she hated hair spray. For thirty years at least she had worn her hair the same way, pulled back from her face and fastened in a chignon at the back of her head. She’d worn it this way
for so long she was surprised she still needed to use hairpins, surprised the hair didn’t just go into its little snail roll and stay there of its own accord.

  But of course it didn’t. She needed Glorious’s help to make it neat. But first she had to bathe, which she did with Glorious sitting outside the closed bathroom door, ready to rush in to Nona’s aid if she slipped or simply didn’t possess the power to step out of the tub. And getting out of the tub did take muscle and determination. After her bath, Nona sat for a few moments on a little stool, catching her breath. Glorious had seen her naked, of course. There had been the occasional sickness, when Nona was really too weak to get in and out of the tub herself. Glorious was patient, kind, even affectionate, but Nona still preferred her privacy as she pulled on and fastened her various undergarments. Afterward, she considered herself in the mirror. She appeared rather Germanic, girded for battle. Her braid still hung over her shoulder. All she needed was a shield, and she could be a Valkyrie. There her heavy breasts were, pooling into their cups like a pair of vanilla puddings. What pleasure they had given her all her life! She patted them gratefully. “Good girls,” she said.

  Then she opened the door and hobbled back into her bedroom. She sat on the bed and held up her arms like a little girl while Glorious slipped her floor-length navy-blue dress over her head.

  “I can’t remember when I wore this last,” Nona told Glorious. “It’s been at least a year. I wonder if I’ve shrunk some more. I hope the gown hasn’t gotten too long, I don’t want to step on the hem.”

  “Stand up and let’s see.”

  Glorious held out her wonderful strong arms. Nona put her own hands on them and used Glorious for support as she heaved herself up off the bed.

  “Oh, dear. Far too long. I’ve become a midget!”

  Glorious laughed wonderfully. “You don’t have your shoes on yet!”

  Nona held on to the bedpost while Glorious went to the closet and returned with Nona’s black court shoes. Glorious slipped one knee-high stocking and then the other over Nona’s legs, while Nona observed that her legs were not bad at all, for her age. But her feet were a disgrace. Her nails were cracking and yellow, and she had bunions, and everything was crooked. After wearing nothing but comfortable sneakers, the leather shoes felt like little prisons to her feet.

  “Oh, dear, Glorious. I don’t know if I can wear these. Do you suppose anyone would notice if I wore sneakers?”

  “Oh, Mrs. Nona, I almost forgot! I have a present for you.” Glorious reached into the pocket of her skirt and pulled out a package of foot inserts filled with turquoise bubbles. She maneuvered them into Nona’s shoes. “Now try.”

  Nona stood. “Glorious, it’s miraculous!” It was like standing on cushions. “How can something so thin feel so soft?”

  “It is a wonderful world we live in,” Glorious told her. “Now, look. Your dress is the perfect length.”

  “It is.”

  On her pillowed feet, Nona walked to her vanity and settled onto the stool. Her face was mirrored back to her in three different panes. She was ninety years old in each one. Glorious unbraided Nona’s white hair and brushed it—Nona closed her eyes and was a girl again—and coiled it into a crescent at the back of her head. When Glorious had finished, Nona patted her face with white powder and covered her thin lips with a bright red lipstick. She opened the vanity drawer and brought out a handsome black box, opened it, and lifted out her grandmother’s diamond brooch and matching earrings.

  “A young girl should wear these,” Nona said, as she screwed on the earrings.

  Glorious bent to pin on the brooch. “No, no, this is serious jewelry. Young girls are too frivolous. These are like medals of honor.”

  “Interesting perspective,” Nona said. She shook her head impatiently. “All right, I’m not going to get any younger staring at myself Help me up, Glorious, I think it’s time I got myself downstairs.”

  The hall was silent as Glorious and Nona processed toward the stairway. Nona knew she was late and everyone else was waiting for her, but that was as it should be. It was her birthday. Her family should be in attendance.

  “You look beautiful in that red dress,” Nona told Glorious.

  Glorious smiled shyly. “Thank you. I like wearing it.”

  “You know, I think we’re going to enjoy this evening,” Nona confided, leaning on Glorious’s arm.

  “I think we are,” Glorious agreed.

  Suddenly, before Nona had reached the bottom of the stairs, an explosion of noise swept through the house, as if every one of her family were talking at the same time as loudly as they could.

  Nona clutched Glorious’s arm more tightly. “I wonder what’s happened.”

  “Perhaps some flowers have arrived for you?” Glorious suggested.

  They walked as swiftly as Nona could into the living room. Everyone was there, and it was not flowers that had arrived but Nona’s youngest grandchild, Teddy.

  “Teddy!” Nona gasped.

  Teddy wore shabby jeans, filthy sneakers, a wrinkled cotton shirt in yellow covered with dancing martini glasses, and a camel’s hair blazer Nona remembered he’d had back in boarding school. His long caramel-colored hair hung over his shirt collar, and his shirt hem hung over his sagging low-slung jeans. But his eyes were clear and his smile was contagious as always. “Nona, you look like a queen!” he said.

  Then Teddy took a slender young girl by the wrist and tugged her forward. “Nona, this is Suzette. Suzette, Nona.”

  Nona managed to keep what she hoped was a welcoming expression on her face as she extended her hand. “Hello, Suzette.”

  Suzette ducked her head shyly. She was petite and short and extremely thin. Her hair was as multicolored as a tabby cat and stuck out strangely, as if bits of paintbrushes had been glued on. Her eyes were a lovely blue, and her face was heart-shaped, but her nose was pierced with a little gold ring, a number of earrings sparkled from the rims of her ears, and she wore a tattoo of wings on her upper arm.

  Her outfit was strange. Riding low on her hips, a skirt swirling with shades of green fell to her feet. A white cotton off-the-shoulder gypsy blouse ended at her midriff. Between the two garments, Suzette’s round belly protruded nakedly. Nona could see the girl’s belly button, also pierced and sporting a gold ring. And she couldn’t miss the fact, so proudly displayed, that Suzette was exceedingly pregnant.

  Nine

  Charlotte was trying not to meet Oliver’s eye, because every time she did, they began to snicker, and they didn’t want their younger brother to feel they were conspiring against him. Although they often had, in their childhood. Charlotte and Oliver, older than Teddy by eight and six years, had been not really distant to Teddy as much as close to each other. Charlotte had always been a good girl, hating disorder and mess, and Oliver, though flamboyant and theatrical, had always wanted to please. Their younger brother’s continual rebellious antics were funny, or shocking, and often even irritating, in a salt-in-the-sugar-bowl kind of way.

  But this, even in Charlotte’s amused opinion, was going a little too far. It was probably to be expected that Teddy would show up for this occasion ill-dressed and late enough to make everyone one else late, too. Adding a pregnant girl was over the top. The poor little thing was making the parents and even the Ms nervous. Mellie, who had draped her own belly like a piano in winter storage, had taken one look at Suzette’s basketball and collapsed into a chair. Charlotte’s father was red in the face; Charlotte was afraid he might have a heart attack. Auntie Grace and Uncle Kellogg both looked smug, exchanging glances and quirked eyebrows that telegraphed clearly their pleasure that once again it was Worth’s child who was causing trouble.

  But Nona was cool, as she clasped Suzette’s hand. “Lovely to meet you, Suzette. And Teddy, come let me hug you.”

  Teddy loped forward to embrace Nona, and for a moment Nona’s face softened with pleasure as she patted her youngest grandchild’s back, and everyone else in the room could see Nona rememb
ering how she had once held this man when he was a baby boy, how she had loved him then and loved him now.

  Aunt Grace trumpeted, “We’ll be late!” Shoving her way past her cluster of daughters, she reached Nona. “Nona. We need to take the photographs now.”

  Nona released her grandson and turned to her daughter. “Yes, dear, of course.”

  Grace went into directorial mode. “Nona, you sit here.” She gestured to a dining room chair she’d had Kellogg carry in. “Worth, you and Helen stand on Nona’s left, with your children in front of you, and Kellogg, you and I will stand on Nona’s right, with our family here and here.” She handed Glorious her digital camera. “You remember how to take the pictures?”

  “I do.” Glorious leaned against the wall, focusing the camera as everyone took his place.

  Grace ranged up and down the little assembly, checking and rechecking to be sure they were perfectly grouped. She bent to arrange Nona’s full skirts.

  Charlotte stood just behind Nona, with her mother just behind her, and Oliver on her left.

  “Owen, come stand next to Oliver,” Worth told his son’s partner.

  Grace bridled. “Worth. Is that appropriate? Sorry, Owen, I don’t mean to offend but it’s not as if you and Oliver are actually—um, married.”

  “They’ll be married this summer,” Nona reminded Grace smoothly. “I’d like Owen in the picture.”

  “Down, Daddee,” Christian whined, squirming impatiently in Claus’s arms. Next to him stood Mandy, holding baby Zoe, and on Mandy’s other side was pregnant Mellie with Douglas close to her, supporting her with his arm, and Mee had squeezed in close to Douglas, pouting at being alone.

  “For pity’s sake, try to look happy, Mee!” Grace commanded her youngest daughter. “Everyone, let’s have your best smile!”

  “Teddy,” Worth said, “you stand next to Owen.”

  Teddy stepped into the arrangement. “Suzette, you’ll be here, kind of in front of me,” he said.

  “Oh, really !” Grace turned red. “Teddy, this is a family photograph. A family record. This is your grandmother’s ninetieth birthday.” She approached Suzette, put a controlling hand on the girl’s arm, and tried to pull her out of the family group. “Suzette, it is lovely to meet you, but I’m sure you understand: only family members just for now.”