Life From Scratch

by Sasha Martin

  A little ice water

  For the filling:

  2 quarts fresh or frozen peach slices, from 8 peaches

  A couple heaping tablespoons brown sugar, more if peaches are tart

  A couple good pinches cinnamon

  1 tablespoon flour for thickening (optional)

  Finishing touches:

  1 egg white whisked with 1 teaspoon of water

  1 teaspoon sugar

  Make the cobbler dough by whisking together the flour, salt, and sugar, and then cutting in the butter with a pastry cutter (or two knives held like an X and drawn across each other). When the butter is mostly pea-size, switch to a large fork and drizzle on the ice water, tossing until a shaggy dough forms (6 to 8 tablespoons usually does the trick). Press the dough together and form a disk. Wrap in plastic wrap, and refrigerate while prepping the peach filling.

  Preheat the oven to 350°F.

  Slice the peaches in eighths and add them to a 2-quart baking dish (such as an 8 × 8 inch). Sprinkle with brown sugar and cinnamon. Toss with flour, if using. Roll out the dough on a clean work surface with a bit of flour to prevent sticking. When it is an inch larger than the baking dish, drape it across the peaches and roll the edges under, tucking them against the inner edge of the dish. Cut three vents in the center, and brush with just enough egg white to lightly glaze the crust. Sprinkle with sugar. Bake 45 minutes to an hour, or until the fruit is tender and bubbling, and the crust is browned. Serve under a softened ball of vanilla ice cream.

  Enough for 6 to 8

  Six months before the wedding, I asked Mom and Wanda to send me their guest lists. Wanda’s had come back with about 30 people on it. Mom mailed me a list of 300, seven pages long.

  “I have three hundred family members?”

  “And friends.”

  “Mom, I only have a hundred stamps!” I drew a red line through the name of my childhood therapist. The next five names on the list were the Dumonts. My hand began to shake.

  “Mom, the Dumonts aren’t going to come.”

  “You have to invite them Sasha. They took care of you. They paid for your college! Let them make that decision. You might be pleasantly surprised. If not, you made the gesture. Are you really trying to cut family because you don’t have enough stamps? I can buy you more stamps.”

  “It’s not that.” I swallowed hard. “Mom, who’s going to walk me down the aisle?”

  “Things like this have a way of working themselves out.”

  “Mom, a father isn’t going to show up out of thin air.”

  I knew my brothers Connor and Tim would do it in a heartbeat. But that felt contrived. And every time I saw a photo of a bride in a magazine, her escort was gray haired. Leaning on the older generation seemed proper. “Do you think your dad will come?”

  “At 95, I think a cross-country wedding is a bit much for him.”

  “What about you, then?”

  “Me?” She laughed. “I don’t think that’s my pl—”

  “Well, whose place is it?” I stamped my foot impatiently. “Can’t you just do this one thing for me, Mom?”

  She paused. “Let’s just wait and see what the Dumonts say, OK?”

  Toni responded first, sending warm wishes but sincere regrets. She’d just switched jobs and moved into a new apartment. She signed the card for her two sisters; they wouldn’t be able to come, either.

  A few weeks later, Patricia and Pierre’s regrets came in the form of 13 boxes. Each battered, musty container held long-forgotten memories from my time in France and Luxembourg, stored for a decade. I’d now lived as long without the Dumonts as I had with them. And yet, I still missed them.

  As I peeled back the flaps, yearbooks, photos, and the trinkets of a teenager piled up in my living room. Then my hand touched something soft and fuzzy. I reached in farther and squeezed. I knew what it was even before I unearthed him: my old white teddy bear, that cotton friend from all those foster homes, all those transitions, all those goodbyes.

  I sat down on the floor and held the bear for a good while, forgetting for a moment that I was nearly 29 years old. I closed my eyes and imagined walking down the aisle. The grass was emerald, the sky aquamarine. Each of my two fathers held one of my arms, but when I turned to look into their eyes, they’d vanished.

  Once I released the idea of Pierre attending my wedding, I considered my birth father. For the first time in my life, I hungered for his presence. But I knew that even if I could find him, there’d be no connection, no reason for him to walk me down the aisle.

  The next time I spoke with Mom, I told her that it was time to face reality: She was the only parent I had. I asked her one more time to escort me. In the lengthy pause that ensued, I lost my cool.

  “You know what, forget it! I’ll just walk myself down the aisle.”

  “No, I’ll walk with you,” she said quietly. “I want to do it.”

  Finally, I thought, relief washing over me.

  But all I said was, “Thank you.”

  Thunder cracked and rolled the morning of our wedding. Over my first cup of chai, I sat at the bay window and watched black clouds dump torrents onto Tulsa. At 10 a.m., my brother Connor, our volunteer photographer, reported that the earth around the old barn we’d rented for the occasion was thick with mud. But by early afternoon, a scalding sun had beat the water back. By 5 p.m., the ground was dry again.

  Mom guided me from the old barn, down the hill, between the trees. We were a vision of moss and cream. My lace, corseted gown ballooned out from my hips, while her crocheted shift hung straight to her knees. I wore my hair long and straight, held back with a ribbon and punctuated with a veil. She wore an airy woven hat the color of sand.

  Mom squeezed my arm gently as we stepped between 45 family and friends onto the runner I’d made from a bolt of burlap. They weren’t the 300 she’d wished for me, but love is love, and they were enough. Grace, my maid of honor, and my dear friends, Katya and Rebekah, stood to the left in coral sundresses. Keith’s brother, Daniel, my brother, Tim, and Ryan stood to the right in pistachio shirts and sand-colored linen slacks. Connor flitted about, taking photos—his wedding gift to us.

  In the middle was Keith, stunning in his linen ensemble, his snow-white shirt set in relief against the shimmering pond behind him.

  As I approached, I saw that Keith’s eyes were wet with tears. With each step closer to him, my smile grew.

  Mom kissed my cheek and handed me over to Keith. Fifteen minutes later, he kissed me. I felt the most curious feeling burst through my core: an expanding, a bubbling, an overwhelming shortness of breath. And then it hit me.

  This must be what it feels like to be full. Content—a hundred percent happy.

  CHAPTER 20

  Cinnamon Eyes

  THE ACHE BEGAN AT 4 A.M., three months after our wedding and an unlikely eight weeks after Keith’s reversal procedure. My hand flitted to my abdomen: It felt different, somehow. I was pregnant. There was no test, no doctor to confirm it, just the brazen confidence of intuition. In this foggy awakening, I even imagined that this baby would be a girl.

  My sister, Grace, phoned me early that same morning.

  “Are you asleep? Sorry. But the most amazing thing just happened,” she gushed. “I was sitting in my office, doing some paperwork. You suddenly … popped into my mind. I looked up at the bookshelf across the room, at your picture. At that exact same moment, it tilted, and get this, a baby grasshopper jumped in front of it. What do you think it means?”

  I sat up against the headboard. “What time did it happen?”

  “Maybe 5 a.m.?”

  It was an hour later on the East Coast. “I woke up at that exact same time,” I chuckled. “Grace, I’m pregnant!”

  “Are you serious!? Congratulations! How far along are you?”

  “I have no idea. No more than two weeks; that’s the soonest Keith could—you know—after his procedure. It sounds crazy, but I just know it. I think it’s a girl.”

&n
bsp; Keith did his best to accept my premonition with cautious hopefulness. When the doctor who performed the reversal heard our happy news, he gave Keith a high five. It takes six weeks to heal post-op. The doctor had never had someone show up for a three-month follow-up appointment with a wife nearly two months into her pregnancy.

  This would be our miracle baby.

  By my five-month checkup, I’d sold my bike, my boots, and my leather jacket. I even gave away my back protector. There was no way I was going to risk a miscarriage by taking my little miracle on a bumpy ride.

  Baby things soon took the place of my motorcycle paraphernalia: a borrowed crib, a flea market rocker spray-painted white, and a Craigslist changing table. Even my nightstand became a pregnancy shrine, spilling over with What to Expect When You’re Expecting and Your Self-Confident Baby.

  One day I grabbed my diary and settled into the couch for a moment of reflection. From the kitchen, doughy ravioli bloomed on the air, mingling with the tomato sauce Keith had promised to make earlier that day. The pasta was frozen and the sauce jarred, but the rising scent of that simple dinner made my mouth water. I’d taught Keith how to cook the pasta on a gentle bubble. It all felt so ordinary, so comfortable—so right.

  I cracked open my diary and wrote: “I have my happy ending. Thank you, thank you, thank you.”

  Just then my laptop chirped on the coffee table, announcing new email. “My name is Phoenix,” the message read. “I’m your sister. We have the same father. I’ve been looking for you for a long time. I’m writing to let you know that our father died last year.”

  I gasped as I read and reread the words.

  Keith ran into the living room, sauce-covered spoon still in hand.

  “What is it? Are you OK?” He looked down and, seeing my hand on my belly, knelt by my side. “Is the baby OK?”

  I pointed to the screen, hand trembling.

  He leaned over and read the message. He looked up at me, tears in his eyes.

  “Oh, Sasha, I’m so sorry.”

  “I thought I didn’t care. Now I’ll never meet him.” I shook my head in tight bursts, willing the email away.

  “What are you going to do?” he asked.

  I thought of Greg’s words: No one can create peace for you.

  “The only thing I can do. Go to her.” Even while sniffling, I laughed. “And get a therapist.” Aside from a few halfhearted attempts, I hadn’t seen one since Michael died.

  By my second therapy session in as many weeks, I was ready to call Mom.

  “I got an email from Phoenix the other day.”

  I could almost hear her hackles go up over the phone.

  “Oh?” she said noncommittally.

  “When were you going to tell me about her?”

  “I told you he probably had kids all over the country! You need to stay away from those people. Please, you have no idea what I went through to get away from that man …” The fear in her voice was palpable.

  “You mean Oliver? My father?” I paused. “That’s his name, isn’t it? Mom, you’ve never told me anything about him except that he was a charismatic con artist.”

  “There’s nothing else to—”

  “Let me finish. I’m going to do for you what you couldn’t do for me. I’m going to share some information you might want to know.”

  “I want nothing to do with him, Sasha. And if you know what’s good for you, you’ll stay as far away from him as possible.”

  “He’s dead.” I winced as I said the words.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Phoenix gave me his full name. I went to the Social Security office two weeks ago to confirm it.” I gulped. “I can send you the paperwork. He died two years ago.”

  Mom didn’t say anything right away, so I continued. “I’m going to California to visit Phoenix.”

  “How did he die?” she asked.

  “Some sort of cancer. Lung, I think.”

  She sighed through the phone.

  “Did you hear what I said, Mom? I’m going to California.”

  “Why?”

  “Because she’s my sister! I want to get to know her.”

  “She’s a space cadet.”

  “Wait a minute, Mom,” I yelled. “I thought you didn’t know her? For once in my life, this is my decision. I only told you as a courtesy.”

  I hung up on her and was slamming open the refrigerator just as the phone rang.

  “I’m sorry, Sasha,” Mom began, her voice softer than before. “He wasn’t all bad, you know. He was beautiful and smart, and always inventing something. If you ever want to know something about him, you don’t need to go to California—you can just talk to me.”

  She spoke the way a prisoner speaks about a guard, even years after being released: with breathlessness, fear, and admiration.

  I couldn’t bite back my sarcasm. “You’re ready to talk about him now?”

  She chuckled, indifferent to my rising indignation. “Not really. It’s different with him … gone. You don’t understand what a relief it is.”

  I gripped the handle on the refrigerator tighter, the cool air pressing onto my reddening cheeks.

  “No, I don’t.”

  Our flight landed in San Jose, California, a few weeks later on a dewy morning in February. The air was almost warm, the sun sharp. Our rental slugged through one sticky traffic jam after another, a grid of offices and retaining walls framing the mountains beyond. While Keith drove, I phoned Phoenix.

  “We’re here! If you want, we can come straight to you—grab some lunch, maybe?”

  “Oh, that’s great, honey! But the thing is, I’m in the middle of a few things. And at 3 p.m., I have a manicure. Why don’t I meet you later—say, 6?”

  “Six tonight?” I stammered. “OK, where?”

  Phoenix offered to take us to see her mother, Lotty, who’d been married to my father for two years back in the sixties. She clicked off with a cheery goodbye.

  I put the phone in my lap and turned to Keith.

  “She’s … busy.”

  Keith tilted his head to the side and opened his mouth, then shut it again.

  In the background, the GPS crowed: “Recalculating route …”

  That night Phoenix met us at her mother’s impeccable brownstone, a retirement complex with tall ceilings and grand hallways. Phoenix was 16 years older than me, now cresting her 40s. I could see the years marked along her face. She was soft in the middle, but carried her weight like a woman who was once thin.

  We had the same flat cheekbones and eyebrows, and the same brown hair, though hers skimmed the waistband of her peasant skirt. Her big brown eyes were my eyes. When she smiled, her upper lip almost disappeared, just like mine.

  Astonished, I realized we must have his cheekbones, his eyebrows, his eyes, his lips. She gushed over my belly and hugged me warmly, her bracelets making soft music as they collided with my shoulder blades and each other.

  Upstairs, Lotty invited us into her apartment with a gentle smile. She was a slight woman with turnip-colored hair, but she hugged me with the force of a linebacker.

  Keith and I sat on a couch in the living room, a wide-open space lined with windows from floor to ceiling. They were cracked open, a natural breeze ruffling the silence. I reached for Keith’s hand and squeezed.

  Lotty brought in a pitcher of Mexican horchata and invited us to sweeten our glasses with sliced strawberries. A moment later, she emerged from the back bedroom with a worn shoe box and a manila envelope. She slid the contents of the box onto the coffee table: two dozen photos. “Here are the ones you’ll be interested in,” she said.

  In the first photo, I am sitting on Phoenix’s lap in the water. I must have been a year and a half old. Together, we’re splashing the waves and clapping.

  “This is astonishing!” I said. “We used to play with each other? We’ve actually met?”

  Lotty explained that Phoenix had come out to the Cape to visit her father every summer. I locked eyes wit
h her. This was, in fact, a reunion.

  Phoenix smiled weakly and turned back to the flowers. Her mother picked up the next photo, folded in half.

  “You might recognize this lady,” she winked.

  On one side of the crease was my mother, on the other: a man. The two stand shoulder to shoulder, their faces frozen in a moment of stillness. Though the photo is tight around their arms, I can still make out a grove of pine trees in the distance. Mom almost disappears: Her eyes are at once expressionless and intense, like an old black-and-white portrait from the late 1800s. The man is half a head taller than she is, bearded, wearing a rumpled, plaid flannel shirt.

  I took the photo from Lotty, trying not to snatch it. Even under the beard, this man’s face is thin, his eyes shining. No, not just shining—they are beautiful, the color of cinnamon. The left side of his mouth lifts almost imperceptibly. He looks like a stranger, but even more like someone I knew. He looks like Michael.

  This was my father’s face. I looked at every detail over again, trying to read him like a bedtime story.

  Keith put his hand on my leg and squeezed. “Hey, Sash …?”

  I looked up. Lotty was holding out a third photo.

  The faces were hard to make out: a mess of shadows and poor exposure in a grassy knoll. There’s a small child in a blue gingham sundress, maybe two years old. There’s a man with a floppy-brimmed hat, like the kind Jed Clampett used to wear. He’s resting on his haunches, arm wrapped around the child. His face is mostly dark, but I can still make out the smile; it’s him again—my father. To the left, another child leans in, with a dimpled smile and baby-blond hair—Michael.

  “Is that Sasha?” Keith asked Lotty, his voice drawn out with wonder. I don’t need to look up to know the answer.

  This little version of me leans toward her father, squirming with uproarious laughter at some silliness long since sublimated. One of his arms drapes around me; the other lies behind Michael’s shoulder.

  A lump formed in my throat.