Daughters for a Time

by Handford, Jennifer

  “But it was Lyon, remember?”

  “Oh, yeah,” he said dreamily, and opened the card.

  Dear Claire,

  I’m writing you from Lyon, the gastronomical capital of the world! I’m sitting in a bouchon (a small restaurant), eating an amazing dish called poularde demi-deuil (pullet hen with black truffles), along with soft cheese with herbs piled on the most amazing baguette, and washing it down with the most amazing Cotes du Rhone wine. Hilarious! I see that I just wrote “amazing” three times. But truly, this food is AMAZING!

  So wish you were here. Do you believe that I miss you? I really do, but I know you’re taking the world by storm. I tell everyone about you: MBA, youngest senior investment manager at Goldman Sachs. Someone asked me if you did “arbitrage.” I told them I wasn’t sure. What the heck is arbitrage? Sounds kind of scary. Don’t do it if it’s dangerous.

  Anyway, I can just see you all put together in your banker-gray, pin-striped, double-breasted suit, pointy heels, and smart chignon, strolling into the office, snapping your fingers for one of your minions to bring you a latte and the Wall Street Journal. Just kidding, I know you wouldn’t be bossy. Ha, ha. Seriously, I’m sure you’re the best to work for and with.

  Love ya, Helen

  Chapter Eight

  The next afternoon, after I had left Harvest following a morning of baking, I drove straight to Larry’s house. There was one more thing that I needed to know. I strode up to his door and knocked, this time with the certainty I had been hoping for the night before. He answered, dressed again in jeans and the same Green Bay sweatshirt.

  “Two visits in twenty-four hours,” he noted.

  “May I come in?”

  “Of course,” he said, taking a step back, waving me in. “You look like you have something to say.”

  “A question,” I said. “I want to know why, of course. Not why you left Mom. I could find reasons for that. I know adults drift apart. But why’d you leave us?”

  Larry shifted uncomfortably, walked to the easy chair in the corner of the room. I sat on the edge of the couch.

  He kept his eyes in his lap and swallowed once. Twice. “When you kids were little, you thought I was funny.” He cupped his chin with his hand and then shuddered, as if the memory were alive in him. “We played hide-and-go-seek. I’d give you ice cream for lunch. I’d crawl on the floor with you and make tents and forts. Then, one day, you girls no longer found me amusing.”

  “I was fourteen years old,” I said. “I didn’t think anything was amusing then.”

  Larry grinned, cocking his chin up.

  “We were growing up,” I said.

  “You grew up, that’s for sure. You were always locked in your room, and Claire was already at college and working. Neither of you ever had a word to say to your old dad. I’d ask you something and you two would just look at me like I had two heads. What use does a teenage girl have for her dad, anyway?” He laughed, as though the question tickled him.

  A lot of use, I wanted to say. Having a father around could have done wonders for the choices I made in the years following Mom’s death. I gravitated toward boys, then men, who were certain to hurt me because I already knew what that felt like and the devil I knew was comforting in its own way. They were predictable, easy. Real love, I had convinced myself, meant opening up and trusting that my heart would be safe in the hands of someone new. That seemed excessively risky, and failure seemed as certain as the fact that Mom was gone. Love hurt; that was what a girl learned when her father left. And the pain wasn’t a quick one-two blow; it was chronic, like the flu in your bones, an ache that persisted, a constant reminder of what you used to have. The fact that I found and married Tim, a guy who could look me in the eyes and swear that he would never leave, should go down in history as a true miracle.

  “By then I was a lost cause,” he said. “I didn’t know how to deal with your mom’s sickness, especially on the heels of our separation the year before. I didn’t feel I had anything to give you girls. All I know is that there were years when I’d drive home, sit in the driveway, and think, ‘Who the hell even gives a damn if I walk through the door?’ I was in a pretty low spot in my life, thinking that I’d really messed things up.”

  “Hindsight’s twenty-twenty,” I said. “But it would have been nice if you’d have stayed.”

  Larry’s jaw shifted back and forth, and he rubbed at the corners of his eyes.

  I saw him cry once and it was awful. After Mom had died, Claire and I had met him for lunch. He’d sat slumped in a booth as tears poured down his face, his body jolting as he emitted gulping, wailing groans. “I wish I could take it all back,” he had sobbed. He’d sounded like an animal dying.

  “I wish that I stayed, too,” he said now in a gruff bark. His mouth twitched, and he turned away, facing the fireplace mantel.

  “We survived,” I said, hoping to navigate the conversation to a lighter place.

  “That’s right,” he said, turning in my direction, straightening himself, his chest puffing back to normal. “By the time your mother was sick, I wasn’t clear on whether she wanted me around or not. I had hurt her and I figured I was only making matters worse by staying. I think now that that was just a cop-out on my part. If I had it to do over again, I would have stayed, no matter what.”

  “The past is the past,” I said.

  “Nothing I can do about it now,” he agreed. “Any other questions?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Do you think that I’m more like you or more like Mom?”

  “I’m sure you’re more like your mother,” he said. “When it comes to things that matter, anyway. Taking care of your family, that sort of thing. But I think that you and I are alike, too. Neither one of us is good at accepting the cards that we’ve been dealt. I think people like us get stuck in the past and have a hard time moving forward. Do you agree with that?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I always sensed that you and I might have been able to help each other after Mom died. Well, maybe not help each other, but at least we could have kept each other company in our misery. But circumstances…It didn’t work out that way.”

  I thought of something I had just read in my guidebook, about Buddhism, how one could never find happiness while dwelling in the past. I thought of how much I clung to the past, how I loved it in such a personal way, how giving it up for the sake of a future might be too daunting a proposition.

  “It was hard to see the forest for the trees.”

  “I am moving forward, though. We’re adopting a baby,” I said. “From China.” Saying the words aloud still sounded funny in my ears, as if I were unsure of the pronunciation.

  “That’s great, Helen,” he said, and then looked away. “Maybe you’ll bring her over one day. I’d get a real kick out of seeing my granddaughter.”

  “Maybe,” I said. I had to give him credit for putting himself out on a limb. “See you.” I left the house and slid into the car. I turned the key and saw that it was almost three o’clock. If I hurried, I could catch Claire and Maura at Gymboree class.

  Chapter Nine

  June’s oppressive heat covered us like a wet wool blanket. The kitchen at Harvest was nearly too hot to bear by noon, so I did most of my work in the early morning, adjusting my recipes to accommodate the humidity and heat. Every bread’s crust and crumb was affected by these elemental changes.

  In the afternoon, I would meet Claire at the swimming pool and keep her company as Maura took swim lessons, splashed in the water, and played with friends.

  Today, Claire and I relaxed on the chaise lounges while Maura swam in front of us, her arms buoying her with swim wings, her mouth blowing bubbles, her legs circling like a frog’s.

  We watched two teenage girls walk by, sipping milk shakes with whipped cream on top.

  “Reminds me of when we were kids,” I said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “We used to play restaurant. You were the chef and I was the waitress. Chocolate milk
with whipped cream on top was what we always served as the drink.”

  “I don’t remember that.” Claire furrowed her brow. “Did we serve real food?”

  “Tuna casserole, mainly.”

  “With potato chips crumbled on top,” Claire said, her face opening in remembrance.

  “That’s right.”

  “I remember making it, but to whom did we serve it?”

  “We served it to Dad.”

  “When would we have done that? Larry wasn’t around that often.”

  “When we were little, he was. Sometimes he worked nights, so he was home in the daytime. We’d eat an early dinner before he left.”

  “That is so bizarre,” said Claire. “I haven’t thought about that in over twenty years.”

  “It’s your selective memory. Larry was a bundle of laughs back then.”

  “How can you be so charitable? This is Larry we’re speaking of.”

  “He wasn’t so bad.”

  “Mom certainly didn’t mention any good times.”

  “Mom was hurt. What would you expect?” I said. “Don’t you ever think about him?”

  “Not really. Last time I talked to him was maybe five years ago. He was moving to Chicago for work.”

  He’s back! I wanted to yell. He lives in Arlington. He still drives the same Buick. I sat in his family room.

  “Do you ever think that maybe he could stand another chance?”

  “It’s too much to forgive.”

  “He tried, didn’t he? After Mom died, didn’t he try to keep in touch with us? I remember him coming back.”

  “That was after Mom died. You’re right,” Claire said. “Before Mom died? He was pure useless. You didn’t know the half of it. There was no need for you to get sucked in.”

  “How bad could he have been? I mean, other than the obvious—leaving while Mom was sick.”

  “Right before she died, Mom was in so much pain she was begging me to give her too much morphine. She was as frail as a bird, but I can still feel the grasp of her hand around my wrist. ‘Please, Claire, please.’ It nearly killed me seeing her in that pain, but I couldn’t help end her life. I gave her the correct dosage of morphine and waited until she fell asleep. Then I came out of her room and plastered on a smile for you. ‘She’s asleep!’ I cheered, like nothing was wrong. Then I went into the kitchen and called Larry. ‘I need help,’ I told him. ‘I can’t handle all of this on my own.’”

  “What did he do?” I asked.

  “He came over and the two of us stood over Mom and he just cried and shook his head and kept saying, ‘What am I supposed to do? What am I supposed to do now?’”

  “But how could you fault him for not knowing what to do?”

  “Because, Helen, I was twenty! I needed him to know what to do. It wasn’t right that he didn’t know. It wasn’t right that all the decisions were left to me.”

  “But you took such great care of Mom.”

  “There was no way I could’ve known that, though, Helen. I was scared every step of the way that I was making the wrong decisions. I needed him to tell me I was doing the right thing.”

  “I never thought about that. I’m so sorry, Claire. I knew you made all of the decisions, but it never once occurred to me that you second-guessed any of them. I didn’t know you ever second-guessed yourself at all.”

  “It was a long time ago,” Claire said.

  “Still. I feel bad. That you dealt with everything.” I reached over and squeezed my sister’s arm. “I know that we have different memories of Mom and Dad.”

  “I do remember the tuna casserole, though,” Claire said, a softness flushing over her face in memory of a nicer time. “Potato chips on top—that’s hilarious.”

  “Aunt Helen!” Maura hollered. “Come in, come in!”

  I looked at Claire, wished that I wasn’t such a chicken, and decided to put myself on the hook. “When I get out, I need to talk to you about something,” I said, standing and pulling off my swim cover-up.

  I bobbed in the pool with Maura wrapped around my waist, zoomed her through the glassy, cool water like a motor-boat, tossed her gently in the air, and caught her before her toes dipped. “More, more!” she cried. We went through the routine again, and then I coaxed her out of the pool with the promise of a treat at the snack shack. Once Maura was sitting on her beach blanket with a chocolate sundae ice cream cone, Claire looked at me pointedly.

  I smiled, took a deep breath. “Listen, Claire. About Dad. For a while now, I’ve been driving past his house.”

  Claire wrinkled her nose like something smelled. “He’s back from Chicago, then.”

  “He was listed in the phone book,” I said. “I just searched his name on the computer. He lives only a few blocks from our old house.”

  “And why have you been driving past his house?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You must know,” she said, “or you wouldn’t be doing it.”

  “I was curious.”

  “Was?”

  “I saw him, okay? I was in his house. I talked to him. We had a drink. He told me stuff I never knew about Mom.”

  Claire shook her head. “You’re crazy.”

  “He looked good,” I said.

  Claire stood, pulled off her cover-up. “I can’t be part of your little reunion.” She reached for Maura, who was still eating her ice cream, and led her to the steps. I followed them into the shallow end.

  “He told me stuff,” I pressed.

  Claire ignored me, held Maura high on her hip, licked the drops of ice cream inching their way down the cone.

  “Nice stuff,” I continued. “About how he and Mom met. How they had so much in common—at least in the beginning.”

  “He walked out on us while our mother was dying of cancer.”

  “I don’t think he did that because he was evil. I think he couldn’t cope with the situation—dying wife, two daughters. Claire, I really think that he was damaged from it.”

  “We were all damaged from it,” Claire said, her voice cracking. She looked away, cleared her throat, and took a deep breath. “When you’re a parent, you don’t have a choice. You’ll see.” Claire raised an eyebrow at me. “You cope, period. It’s your job to step up to the plate and deal with whatever is thrown your way. No ifs, ands, or buts.”

  “That’s you, Claire,” I said. “You’re strong, and you see everything in black and white. But most people struggle with making the right decisions and with having the staying power to stick through the tough times. Larry’s not the first parent to leave. Parents leave all the time.”

  “They do, but it’s not right. They shouldn’t,” Claire said, her cheeks flushing red. “Larry should have stuck around. It was his responsibility. What kind of father leaves his daughters at a time like that? What kind of father lets his daughter carry such a burden?” Now that Maura was finished with her cone, Claire slid her daughter onto her back, held onto her little hands, and swam to the opposite side of the pool.

  The night our father left for good was the same day our mother underwent surgery to see if the cancer had spread beyond her ovaries.

  The day had started like any other. Mom sat at our avocado-green Formica kitchen table, sipping Sanka, thumbing through the newspaper, and nibbling on an English muffin. “They’re checking the thing this afternoon,” Mom said to Claire, who was dressed in a pressed Polo shirt, pleated khakis, and loafers, her hair pulled neatly in a low ponytail.

  I remember recoiling at the word “thing.” At the time, it made me angry that Mom couldn’t just say “cancer.” It made me angry that Mom spoke only to Claire, as if, at age thirteen, I was too young to comprehend what was going on.

  “I know,” said Claire. “I have a copy of your admittance paperwork in my purse.”

  “Can’t we go with you?” I whined, setting my cereal bowl down next to Mom. She pulled me toward her and wrapped her arms around me, my scrawny body swimming in a too-big black T-shirt, kissing the n
ape of my neck. “There’s no need, pumpkin. I’ll be home after supper. Dad will be with me the whole time.”

  “You’ll be fine,” Claire said in her adult way, reassuring everyone involved. “We’ll be fine. Come on, Helen. Finish your breakfast and I’ll drive you to school so you don’t have to take the bus.”

  I remember being so angry at Claire’s bossy, know-it-all tone that I had wanted to scream at her, but I also wanted a ride to school, so I kept my mouth shut.

  That evening, Claire warmed up a chicken casserole from the night before, and we sat in front of the television with trays, watching a rerun of Cheers. I hated casserole is what I remember, the chicken and cashews and pineapple all tasting exactly the same. Dad pulled in around seven o’clock and Claire and I ran to the door. He carried Mom into bed. She was groggy and tired and far from lucid.

  “They let her leave the hospital like that?” Claire asked.

  “No, she was awake when we left, but she started to have some pain on the ride home, so she took a pill. It knocked her out pretty fast.”

  I kneeled by her bedside, put my face in front of hers. “Mom, Mom?”

  Her eyelids shifted and twitched, but she didn’t open them.

  We followed Larry into the kitchen, where he poured himself a tumbler of Scotch.

  “So?” Claire asked impatiently.

  “The surgery went well,” he said, trudging through his words as if he were stuck in mud. “She should sleep through the night. If she wakes up and needs pills, she has morphine in her bag.” He looked to the window as he spoke, specks of dust dancing in the thin slant of light.

  “What did they find out?” Claire asked. “Did the cancer spread?”

  “No. It’s contained for now. But your mother will have to talk to her doctor tomorrow.”

  Claire and I followed him into the hall. Without turning on the light, he opened a closet and pulled out a duffel bag.

  “Where are you going?” Claire asked.