“Dee!” The waitress at the Starlight was the last person she’d expected to see. She quickly recovered her composure. “Happy Thanksgiving.”
“Happy Thanksgiving to you, too,” Dee. said. “Hang your coat in the closet and make yourself at home.”
Make herself at home? She might as well have told Alex to click her heels three times and fly off to Oz. “I brought pies,” she said, limiting herself to words of one syllable. “I thought I would just drop them off and—”
“Great.” Dee pushed her heavy red hair off her face with a quick gesture. “The more the merrier. The way this crowd eats, there won’t be any leftovers.” She cocked her head. “The phone. I’ll be right back.” She darted down the hallway.
Alex didn’t know whether to laugh or cry as she peered into the coat closet. Eddie said John wasn’t married, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t living with someone. Plastic storage boxes were lined up on the top shelf, neatly marked Hats, Gloves, and Scarves. No man on the face of the earth would even think of doing such a thing. And there was more. The scent of Shalimar rose above the mingled smells of cherry pipe tobacco and Old Spice. She didn’t have to ask who wore the Shalimar.
She started toward the rear of the house, where she assumed the kitchen was located. The hallway was papered in a pale blue shell pattern and lit by a pair of electric sconces hung on either side of an oval mirror. Someone cared a great deal about how this small house looked, and that someone probably was missing the Y chromosome.
“Need some help?” John Gallagher popped up at her elbow.
“Where on earth did you come from?” She’d been so busy analyzing the wallpaper she hadn’t heard footsteps. In truth, she was surprised she hadn’t sensed his presence.
He aimed a thumb over his right shoulder. She peered into a dimly lit room that was shrouded in a thick haze of cigar smoke.
“It’s halftime,” he said. “I’m on a beer run.”
“I see.”
He took the pies from her arms. “Did you bake these yourself?”
“Absolutely.” She tried to be modest, but it was impossible to keep the pride from her voice.
He peered under the aluminum foil. “I’m impressed. My mother used to make them like that, with that criss-cross stuff on top.”
“Latticework,” she said.
“It looks hard to do.”
“Actually it’s pretty easy.”
“You should be telling me it’s the hardest thing since splitting the atom.”
She met his eyes. “It’s the hardest thing since splitting the atom.”
He grinned. “That’s what I thought.”
They found Dee perched on top of the kitchen counter, her entire body curled around the telephone. She looked about sixteen.
“Sam?” John mouthed.
Dee shot him a fierce look, turned bright red, then turned away.
“Sam,” John said as he put the pies down on the already crowded kitchen table.
“Who’s Sam?” Alex asked.
“The guy she pretends she isn’t going with.”
“Oh.” She looked over at Dee, then back at John. “And you’re okay with that?”
“Sam’s a great guy,” John said. “Hell of a lot better than Tony.”
“Tony?”
“Her ex-husband.”
Alex’s head was spinning as she followed John back out of the room. “Are you two related?” she asked.
“Tony and me?”
“No,” she said, growing more puzzled by the second. “You and Dee.”
“Where’d you get that idea?”
“I—what I mean is, you all live here together, and I just thought—”
“This isn’t my house.”
“You and Eddie don’t live with Dee?”
“Dee lives with Mark.”
“Who’s Mark?”
“Her son.” They paused in the doorway to the family room. “This is their house. He’s the one sitting on the floor near Eddie.”
The boy’s face was illuminated by the television’s glow. There was no mistaking the resemblance. He had a thick head of dark red hair like his mother and the same proud set to his jaw, but the rest of him was pure Gallagher. His eyes were dark and deep-set over chiseled cheekbones. His mouth was wide and well-shaped. He looked exactly the way she imagined John had looked sixteen or seventeen years ago.
John, however, betrayed nothing. If he recognized the weirdness of the situation he didn’t let on. “Shove over and make room for Alex, Pop.”
Eddie’s smile warmed her heart. “Take a load off your feet, Alex, and watch the game with us.”
She recognized a number of the men in the room from the diner. They greeted her warmly, and some of her nervousness ebbed. Dee’s son looked up at her with a combination of curiosity and annoyance.
“Alex bought the Winslow place,” Eddie told the boy by way of explanation.
The boy shrugged and turned back to the football game. She didn’t blame him. When she was a girl, there had been nothing more deadly dull than her parents’ friends. Even if the friend wasn’t all that much older than she was.
“Where’s the Michelob?” one of the men demanded of John. “You weren’t supposed to come back empty-handed.”
“He didn’t come back empty-handed, Davey,” Eddie said with a broad wink to the room at large. “He brought back Alex.”
“Holy shit,” Davey said, pointing toward the television screen. “Did you see that interception?”
To a man they forgot she was standing there, and she used the opportunity to escape to the kitchen. Dee was off the phone and had turned her attention to a large ceramic bowl piled high with flour.
Alex hesitated in the doorway. Why hadn’t she just walked out the front door? She didn’t belong here at all.
“You’re still wearing your coat,” Dee said, looking over at her.
“I’m not staying,” Alex said. “Would you tell John and Eddie I said good-bye?”
“Why don’t you tell him yourself?”
“They’re watching football. I don’t want to interrupt.”
“Interrupt,” Dee said. “They’ll be watching football nonstop until the Super Bowl.”
Alex smiled to hide her unease. “Really,” she said. “All I wanted to do was drop off the pies and wish everyone a happy Thanksgiving.”
“I don’t suppose you know anything about making biscuits.” Dee scratched her nose with the back of her arm, leaving a floury streak along the side of her face.
She felt her resolve weakening. “I make a mean croissant.”
Dee rolled her eyes comically. “This crowd wouldn’t know a croissant from a crescent wrench, honey. I’m talking plain, ordinary biscuits.”
Alex slipped out of her coat and draped it over the back of a chair. “I can do plain and ordinary with the best of them.”
“Sure you can,” Dee said. “That’s why you look the way you do and I look the way I do.”
“You look great,” Alex said.
Dee wore a long kelly green sweater over tight black leggings. An enormous Maltese cross hung from a black velvet ribbon and dangling gypsy gold earrings jingled with every movement. There was nothing subtle about the outfit, but then there was nothing subtle about the woman who wore it.
Alex began measuring flour into a large mixing bowl. “I think I owe you an apology.”
“I knew it. You’re the one who broke my Ming vase.”
“There’s that,” Alex said, “and the fact that you probably had no idea I was coming to dinner.”
“Actually John called me this morning and told me Eddie invited you.”
“I thought I was going to their house,” she said. “I never would have said yes if I’d known.”
“Now, I’m real hard to offend, honey, but you’re coming close.”
“I don’t go where I’m not wanted,” Alex said simply. “And I don’t go where I’m not invited. Eddie should have told me.”
; “And he should stop wandering around town in his pajamas.” Dee shrugged. “He meant well.”
“I hope I’m not putting you out.”
“The way I look at it, you’re helping me even the odds. The testosterone level around here can get pretty overwhelming.”
She thought about the boy with John Gallagher’s eyes but said nothing. It was, after all, none of her business.
* * *
“So how’d you manage it, Johnny?” Vince Troisi tossed a peanut in his direction. “She’s in town two days, and you’ve got her coming over for Thanksgiving dinner.”
“Don’t know what you’re talking about,” John said with studied blandness.
“The princess,” Vince elaborated. “Last person I thought I’d see here at Dee’s.”
“You’re giving the younger generation too damn much credit,” Eddie said, draining his bottle of beer. “I’m the one who asked Alex.”
The room erupted in laughter.
“Tell them, Johnny.” Eddie nudged his son with his foot. “You were gonna let her spend the day by herself, weren’t you?”
“Yep,” said John. A Big Mac beneath the Golden Arches was starting to sound good. “That’s exactly what I was going to do.”
“I’m telling you, youth is wasted on the young,” Davey said with a shake of his graying head. “In my day, I’d never let a pretty girl spend a holiday alone.”
“She’s not a girl,” John said before he had a chance to stop himself. “She’s a woman.”
Vince let out a long, low whistle. “So that’s how it is,” he said with a knowing wink. “Looks like Johnny’s finally found someone he likes.”
John looked over at Dee’s son Mark. “Don’t get old, kid. It rots the brain cells.”
Mark snorted with laughter. “I already figured that out.”
“What the hell’s his problem?” Vince said to Eddie. He gestured toward John. “It’s not like he’s married or anything.”
John unfolded himself from the recliner. “Don’t you bozos have anything better to do?”
“No,” said Vince. “If we didn’t have you to talk about, we’d have to start watching Oprah.”
Mark leaned over and gave John a conspiratorial look that would have had more impact if he were old enough to shave. “I think she’s a babe.”
“You’re all pathetic,” John said. “Why aren’t you home with your wives?”
“Because they won’t let us watch football,” Vince and Davey said in unison.
Everyone laughed but John.
“They’ll be here in time for dinner,” Rich explained, not taking his gaze away from the TV screen. “The women’s club is helping out over at St. John’s.” St. John’s was the local hospital that served Sea Gate and the adjacent town.
“Johnny’s forgotten everything he ever knew about being married,” Vince said, popping a handful of salted nuts in his mouth.
“Hell, he wasn’t married long enough to get it all figured out,” Davey said. “Takes a good twenty or—” Davey stopped mid-sentence. The rest of the men in the room were looking down at the floor. “Jesus, Johnny. I’m sorry.”
John nodded. There was nothing he could say to make Davey feel better, nothing he wanted to say. Libby and the boys had only been dead three years. Three Thanksgivings. A man couldn’t forget his family in just three Thanksgivings.
“Where you going?” Vince called out. “Dallas is about to score.”
“Let him go,” he heard Eddie say as he bolted from the room. “You goddamn fools, just let him go.”
* * *
“What an idiot,” Dee said with a groan. “I left the sweet potatoes in the trunk of the car.”
Alex placed the last biscuit on the baking sheet and stepped back to admire her handiwork. “Why don’t I go out to the car and get them?”
“What about the biscuits?” Dee asked.
“Finished,” Alex said. “All you’ll have to do is pop them into the oven.” She was trying to make it clear that she wouldn’t be joining them for dinner, but Dee didn’t seem to notice.
Dee tossed another peeled shrimp onto the pile. “You twisted my arm. The car keys are hanging on the peg by the door. Go get the sweet potatoes.”
Alex slipped into her coat. “Back in a second.” She popped out the back door, then walked around the side of the house toward the driveway. Dee’s chocolate brown Toyota was parked in front of the garage door. It was old, Alex noticed, but not nearly as old as her VW. She took perverse satisfaction from that fact.
As it turned out, Dee had left not only the sweet potatoes in the trunk, but two cans of cranberry sauce and a huge turkey baster. The turkey baster had wedged itself under the spare tire, and it took Alex a minute to pry it loose.
She put the baster in the grocery bag and was about to dash back into the house when she heard a sound. She stilled her breath for a moment and listened harder. There it was again. Curious, she put the grocery bag down on top of the trunk, and looked around. A gull swooped low, then darted upward again, emitting a keening cry as it rose into the sky.
Mystery solved, she thought. Was there anything as mournful as the cry of a gull? But then her eye was drawn to the cars in the driveway, and from there to John’s truck... and from there to John. His arms were braced on the steering wheel, forehead resting against his hands. She heard the sound again, a low, guttural sound of loss that seemed to pierce her chest like a knife as she made her way down the muddy driveway.
He was a stranger, she told herself. His problems were no concern of hers. She had more than enough problems of her own to keep her occupied for a long time to come. Still she kept moving toward him. Was he crying? Please God don’t let him be crying. She couldn’t imagine what terrible event could bring so powerful a man to tears.
He drew his right arm across his eyes, then looked up, and she froze. For one crazy second she considered ducking behind the old blue Chevy next to her, but she couldn’t move. Not while he was looking at her like that, as if a world of understanding suddenly existed between them.
* * *
How long had she been standing there, watching him with those sad dark eyes?
She was looking at him as if she knew what he was feeling, as if she felt it herself. He knew it was impossible, that they were strangers and nothing more, but the sense of connection seemed to pulse between them just the same.
“You’re not leaving?” he asked. “You haven’t had dinner yet.”
She shook her head. “Dee left the sweet potatoes in the trunk of her car.”
“We’re lucky she didn’t leave the turkey in the trunk.”
She smiled, but the look of concern lingered. “Sorry if I startled you.”
“No problem. I came out for a smoke.”
If they gave awards for asshole remarks, he’d win hands down with that one. The family room was so smoky it looked like an opium den. You could set your lungs back five years without even lighting up. They wouldn’t have noticed if he’d smoked an entire carton inside.’
“Well, I won’t bother you,” she said, edging away. Her face was wet with rain. Droplets beaded the tips of her lashes and shimmered across her cheekbones. Beautiful, he thought. So goddamn beautiful she made him ache with loneliness.
“You didn’t,” he said.
Her expression grew shadowed. “Didn’t what?”
“Bother me,” he said.
“I’m glad.” She backed away. “I’d better get those sweet potatoes inside.”
“Wait,” he said, opening the truck door. “I’ll give you a hand.”
She picked up the grocery bag. “I can manage.”
“That looks heavy.”
“It isn’t.”
“I insist.” He reached for the bag, but she clutched it against her chest.
“I’m not helpless.” There was an edge to her voice, a sharpness he might not have noticed another time.
“Nobody said you were.”
“In fact, I’m
a great deal more capable than you might think.”
Where the hell had that come from? “Nobody’s going to argue that, Alex. You’re the one who paid cash for your house. The rest of us have mortgages.”
She softened visibly, as if just thinking about the rundown Winslow house was enough to make her happy.
“Humor me,” he said. “Sister Mary Bernadette used to rap my knuckles if I didn’t carry Mitzy Donohue’s book bag.”
A smile tugged at her mouth. “You don’t expect me to believe that, do you?”
He placed a hand over his heart and stared at her in mock indignation. “Eight years at St. Aloysius leaves its mark on a man.”
“Here.” She handed him the grocery bag. “Since it means that much to you.” She smiled when she said it, and this time the smile reached her eyes.
Thanks,” he said, tucking it under his right arm. “You can relax now. You’ve done your good deed for the day.”
“I’m glad to hear that.” She had the most amazing face he’d ever seen, filled with enough shadow and light to keep a man interested for the rest of his life. “I’ve been neglecting my good deeds lately.”
“And thanks for not asking.”
She inclined her head. “We’re all entitled to our secrets.”
“Yeah,” he said, thinking about Libby and the boys and how quickly your life can fade to black, “but sometimes I can’t remember why.”
Seven
“Great turkey, Dee Dee,” Rich Ippolito called from his seat at the far end of the table. “Even if you forgot to save a drumstick for me.”
“Will you look at that?” His wife, Jen, shot him a fierce look. “Seventy-two years old, and he still talks with his mouth full. Don’t they ever learn?”
“At least he keeps his teeth in.” Sally Whitton looked up from her mountain of candied sweet potatoes. “Last year’s boyfriend only popped his choppers in when he wanted to kiss me.”
“You’re a cruel woman, Sal,” Dee said as she put a big bowl of mashed potatoes on the table. That made three bowls of mashed potatoes, two of candied sweets, and more biscuits than she could count. “At least you have a boyfriend.”
“Hey, Dee.” Eddie nudged her with his elbow. “You know I’m available.”
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