The Goddesses of Kitchen Avenue: A Novel

by Barbara O'Neal

  Rick simply stands there, looking at the children, then at me. I see he is very close to tears, and I go over to him, take his hand, sit him down at the table. Still singing, I pour a cup of wassail for him, put it in front of him, and when we reach the end of the song, I let the pause grow the smallest bit. Then I start to sing, “Come, they told me.…”

  In our family, we sang this song every year, practicing the rhythms as a group, learning to weave our voices together sweetly. My reedy alto, Richard’s deep bass, Annie’s sweet soprano, Colin’s steady midrange. And Rick, there at the center, with his low, strong, sweet voice, adding a stabilizing weight to the soft melody.

  I put a hand on his shoulder because he is still not singing, and look at Angel. His eyes are bright and warm, and he gives me the slightest of nods.

  But Rick does not sing. He doesn’t lift his cup of wassail. He doesn’t even look at his kids. In the middle of the song, he stands up and lifts a hand and walks out.

  “He forgot his cake,” Roberta says.

  Annie jumps up. “I’ll take it.”

  I stop her, giving Rick the chance to get out before his tears spill. “We’ll take it over there tomorrow.”

  * * *

  The evening goes well after that, at least for the purpose I had intended—to give all of us, on this difficult Christmas, a place to go and be with others. Roberta is fairly cheerful, which I find heartening after the lull the past week. Jade sings vigorously if not well, and at one point, Angel and I sing “Fum, Fum, Fum” together in Spanish.

  After they leave, the kids disappear into their rooms and I warn them to stay there until morning. In the stillness, I clean up the party mess, get out my favorite Christmas CD, the one with “Angels We Have Heard on High,” then get out the stockings and all the hidden candy.

  Rick and I always did this together. I think of those times now, all the years we stayed up late getting out presents and labeling them for each child, writing notes from Santa to them, eating the cookies and milk the children left out.

  And it strikes me that I won’t be doing this much longer. This part of my life, the mommy part, is over. It has been for a while. For the first time, it doesn’t grieve me. I wonder, instead, what my life will be like next Christmas. If I will spend it here or somewhere else. If I will still be living in this house. If I will be far away, studying Spanish.

  As I get ready for bed, showering, then sitting on the edge of the bed to brush out my hair, I’m bemused by the sense of release, mixed with a kind of hollowness I can’t quite name.

  It won’t let me sleep. I’ll need to be rested to get through the day tomorrow, but after an hour, I get up in the dark and pull open the curtains. There is a light in Angel’s kitchen window, and I can see his shoulder in a white shirt. He’s sitting at his table. I wonder if I can call him to the window, to look up and see me.

  It shames me a little, and I go downstairs in the dark, surprised that neither Annie’s nor Colin’s light is on. I smile. Some things never change. They’ll be up early, my two vampires, eager as when they were eight to find out what Santa brought them.

  It’s one A.M. The moon is bright and the wind is still. Through the window, I see bare branches outlined against the sky, and they look beautiful. Dragging a velveteen throw around my shoulders, I wander outside.

  All I can think of is Rick’s haggard face, the threat of tears in his eyes. I am still furious with him, furious over his betrayal, furious that he could not just come to me and say, “I’m really unhappy and I don’t know why. Help me figure it out.”

  But it comes to me, standing on my porch in the middle of the night, under a full moon, that I had not been happy, either. I’d begun to resent all that I’d given up to be with him. There were times during my stint at the natural-healing school that I’d talk all afternoon with a man and think, Why can’t Rick hear me this way? Why doesn’t he ever want to talk about what I want to talk about?

  There were times—a lot of them, I realize now with a thrum of guilt—that I shut him out during that long, dark stretch. I was grieving, too, after all. Joe was not my best friend, but I loved him. My mother-in-law had been more of a mother to me than my own, and I missed her desperately sometimes. If she were still alive, I sometimes thought none of this would have happened.

  In the chair on the porch, Lucille says, “Getting there, sweetheart.”

  “Are you real?”

  She gazes at me with her cornflower-blue eyes. “What’s real?”

  And then there is a step on the porch, the heavy foot of a real man, and for one long moment, I’m hoping it’s Rick, letting go of his pride to come to me and ask for his place back in this house.

  Instead, it’s Angel, who says nothing at all, just comes close and puts his arms around me and kisses my forehead. I lean against him, my head in the hollow of the wrong shoulder, and the tears come. He strokes my hair and presses his cheek against my head and makes a low, soft noise of comfort.

  “You love him very much,” he says at last, his strong young hands rubbing my back.

  “Yes.”

  He takes my hand and we sit on the step. “Listen,” he says, quiet and earnest, his voice as lovely as a song. “Tonight I saw him. His love is for you, not his other woman. What will you do about that?”

  “What can I do?”

  He chuckles, brushes hair away from my mouth. “Americans have forgotten the passion,” he says. “Let the duende help you. Fight for him.”

  I raise my head. “And you, Angel, are you going to fight for your woman?”

  “Pssh.” He pulls away, shakes his head. “She is not worth it.”

  “Is anyone?”

  He bows his head, and I want to kiss the vulnerable bend of his neck. “She shamed me in front of my whole town.”

  “Bring her to America, then.”

  “She does not love me. I say you should love a man back who loves you.”

  “She doesn’t love you?”

  He shakes his head.

  “But she writes you letters? How often does she write her letters?”

  “Every week. And every week, the same thing. She is so sorry. So sorry. So sorry.”

  “Maybe she really is, Angel.”

  He says nothing, only stares with his shattered heart into the night. I lean over and kiss his cheek. He picks up my hand and kisses the palm. “Perhaps, this night, we can soothe the sorrows of the other, eh?”

  “I think, love, that part is over for us.”

  He looks at me, a half-smile on his face. “I will not forget you, my Trudy.”

  “I won’t forget you, either, my sweet.”

  And he kisses me, a dark rich kiss that tastes of cinnamon. His breath rustles over my hair, and then he’s gone.

  Federico García Lorca was born on June 5, 1898 at Fuentevaqueros, near Granada in Spain. His first book was published in 1918 when he was only twenty years old. He was executed in Granada in 1936. His body has never been recovered.

  36

  TRUDY

  The children drag me out of bed at eight, their eyes shining with mischief. “Come see what Santa left you,” they say. “C’mon!”

  “What?”

  It takes me a minute, but I brush my teeth and come down the stairs to the smell of coffee brewing. Beneath the tree is a package wrapped in red foil paper. Annie puts it in my hands. “Where did it come from?” I ask.

  “Santa,” Colin says.

  I grin. They’ve obviously cooked up something between the two of them, and I feel the heft of the package curiously. It feels like a book. I give them a quizzical look.

  “Open it!”

  I tear away the paper, and halt. It is a book. An old one, in Spanish. A first edition of Libro de Poemas, Federico García Lorca’s first book of poetry. It’s a first edition.

  Signed.

  I cover my mouth with my hand. Whisper, “Oh, my God!”

  Rick has enclosed a card, and my hands are shaking as I open it. It says onl
y, “I hope you like it, kid. Love, Rick.”

  I’m blinking away tears as I look at the expectant faces of the children. “I wonder how in the world he found it.”

  “We helped,” Annie said. “Me and Colin. He called Colin to ask him how to find it, and then one night when you were gone, me and Dad got online and tracked down a copy and ordered it. He sent it to Colin at school.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Thank Dad. He’s the one who did it.”

  “I will,” I say, and tuck the book close to my chest.

  “You should call him now, Mom,” Annie says.

  I want to, but what if he has someone there. Or isn’t home? The familiar burn kicks up. And it brings with it an edge of despair. Last night, with Angel, I had felt hope. This morning, it feels as bleak as ever. But they are looking at me so earnestly and I can’t let them down, so I get up and pick up the phone and carry it into the kitchen. While I dial the number, I pour a cup of coffee. Stir in some sugar, listen to it ring on the other end, my bones thinning with each ring … two, three … four, and I’m going to hang up when I hear a rushed, “Hello?”

  “Hi, Rick,” I say. “I hope I’m not disturbing you.”

  “Of course not. I just couldn’t find the damned phone.”

  “I called to thank you.” There are tears in my eyes again. “This is the most thoughtful gift I’ve ever received, and I know you paid a fortune. I love it.”

  “Really? You like it?”

  “I cried when I opened it.”

  “Colin said you would.”

  “I didn’t get you anything, Rick. I didn’t think we were doing that. I’m sorry.”

  “Trudy, that’s not why I gave it to you. I didn’t expect anything.”

  “I know. I just feel bad. All year, I planned to get you that super-califragilistic CD player, and it bummed me out not to get it.”

  “The one with the remote?”

  “Yep.” I grin.

  “Ah, man.” A reverent pause. “But I wouldn’t have wanted you to get it.”

  “Still. Thanks.” In the silence between our voices, I hear the gurgle of the coffeemaker, the soft clank of a heavy iron pan on the stove. He’s cooking breakfast. “Well,” I say, “Merry Christmas, Rick.”

  “You, too, kid.”

  “Bye.”

  * * *

  After lunch, Colin says, “I told Dad I’d come over and visit this afternoon. Is it okay if I call him now?”

  “Sure.”

  A few minutes later, he comes back. “He sounds really depressed. We should take Christmas to him, Mom.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Annie says, “Let’s take him some turkey and the cake Roberta made for him and his presents and a stocking and everything.” She gives me a pleading look. “Will you come with us?”

  “I don’t know.” I sigh. “I think you two are trying to put things back together, and it’s sweet, but it’s not your job.”

  “We just think Dad is really lonely and we’d like to see him have a decent Christmas, that’s all,” Colin says.

  “I’ll drive you over there, but I don’t think I’ll come in.”

  We pack food and cookies into a basket. Colin even brings a halfgallon of eggnog, in case Rick doesn’t have any. I pack a Tupperware container with his favorite cookies—angel bars and chocolate chip and pizzelles—and dig his traditional stocking out of the box of Christmas things I have stashed in the back room. I used all the candy in the kids’ stockings, so they each ante up a portion of the Hershey’s Kisses, candy bars, and Life Savers. “There are Jelly Bellies,” Annie says. “We have to get some.” She’s so tragic, I stop at Safeway, the only thing open, and pick up a box on the way.

  It’s a bright, clear Christmas Day. Quiet as all holidays are. I have butterflies in my stomach as we drive through town. Little kids are outside in their shirtsleeves, riding new trikes and Big Wheels. Families sit out on front porches, drinking beer and tea in the mildness. The air smells of baked turkey.

  Even in Rick’s grim neighborhood, things look festive. A kindly-looking uncle or grandpa waves at us as we park behind Rick’s truck and get out, all of our arms full. As we walk over the grass, I feel a wave of unsteadiness, warning, something, and just shake it off. It’s Christmas. Everything can go on hold for one day.

  We go into the hallway to his apartment and Colin starts to sing “God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman,” and Annie joins in cheerfully, her arms filled with packages, her cheeks ruddy with good cheer. Neither of them has a hand empty, so I knock.

  Disaster opens the door. It’s Carolyn, who stares at all of us with tear-reddened eyes.

  Colin says with chilly fury, “Is my father here?”

  Rick pulls the door out of her hand. “I’m here, son. Carolyn was just leaving.”

  He looks furious. He’s dressed up, in a pair of nice slacks and his turquoise corduroy shirt, even a necklace I gave him years ago, a Saint Joseph medallion, which I thought would be sexy against his dark chest. I see again that it is.

  Carolyn resists, but Rick shoves her very lightly, and she lets go of the door, pushes between the kids and me. Rick puts his hand on my arm. “This is not what it seems,” he says, looking right at me. “Don’t go, okay?”

  Carolyn starts to say something, and Rick says in that no-nonsense tone, “Not right now.” To us, he says, “Go on in, I’ll be right with you.”

  Annie and Colin look at me for direction. I waver, feeling sick and nervous. Their hopeful eyes give me the answer. It’s Christmas. I’ll go in. One hour, then home.

  I nod.

  The sound of his low voice countering her hysteria comes to us as we stand in the middle of the living room, waiting for him to come back. It’s very silent and we’re trying to figure out what to do. Sit down? Remain standing? “Put everything in the kitchen, Annie,” I say. “Colin, the packages can go right there on the coffee table.”

  “Mom,” Annie says, “I’m sure he didn’t mean for us to see her.”

  “I know, honey.” I touch her shoulder. “Don’t worry about it.”

  Rick comes back in a moment, his cheeks bright red. “I am so, so sorry, you guys. She just showed up without an invitation and—”

  I catch his eye and give him the parent look, waving my hand discreetly—Let it go. He nods, sighs, pushes a hand through his hair. “We brought you some goodies,” I say, and sit down. “Presents and cookies and even—”

  Annie pulls out the stocking. “Ta-da! Jelly Bellies.”

  He hugs her, looks at me over her shoulder. His eyes say how thankful he is.

  * * *

  We feast on the food we’ve brought, eating turkey and dressing and gravy all over again. Rick puts a CD in the stereo, and we tell stories about Christmases past, and talk about Colin’s plans and Annie’s hopes for college admission.

  After a couple of hours, I’m thinking it’s probably time to go. Soon the conversation will wane and there will be nothing for us to talk about except the dark things. The sun is going down. Maybe I want to be home when it gets dark. I’m about to say that, when Colin says, “We need to play Monopoly.”

  “I’m not playing Monopoly with you,” I say. “No way, Mr. Real Estate.”

  “Aw, c’mon, Mom. Nobody ever plays with me.”

  “I’ll play,” Annie says.

  Rick and I look at her in astonishment at the same instant. She hates losing to her big brother, and she does lose, every time. “What?” she says. “Is it okay if I want to play a game with my family?”

  “I was honestly thinking it’s probably time to go.”

  “No!” Annie protests. “We haven’t even had dessert yet.”

  “I don’t have Monopoly,” Rick says.

  “Will you play if I go get ours?” Colin asks, directly to his dad. Something shimmers there between them and it makes me feel nostalgic or sad or maybe touched.

  “Sure.” Rick’s voice is a little rough.

  “C’mon, An
nie. You can ride with me. Mom and Dad can talk or something.”

  “No,” I say, standing. “You two sit and visit and I’ll go get the game. It’ll only take a few minutes.”

  But Annie already has her coat on and they’re moving toward the door. “I need to check my messages,” she says, and pushes on her brother’s back the slightest bit. “We’ll be right back.”

  They’re gone. I sink down on the chair and look over at Rick, who is grinning. “They’re plotting, you know.” He chuckles. “You think?”

  Against the turquoise shirt, his skin looks dark and smooth. There’s a twinkle in his eye that makes him look like a pirate. I think of Carolyn suddenly, red-eyed, and I almost say, Woman trouble? Instead, I let it all go and lean back in the chair. “Do you have any wine around here?”

  “How about a beer?” He stands to head for the kitchen, and I’m remembering the man I met so many years ago, the lean, irreverent man who stole my heart.

  “Heineken?”

  It takes him a second; then he turns slowly. “Skunk piss.” His eyes are sleepy and slow, and my entire body goes on alert. “How about a Bud?”

  “Buffalo piss.” I cross my arms, incline my head. Give him a slight, pained sigh. “Guess it’ll have to do.”

  He gets two and brings one to me. Standing in front of me, his hips slightly thrust forward in that bad-boy way, he screws off the top and hands it over. Our fingers brush as he gives it to me. “God, you were a snot.”

  I laugh. “Yes, I was.” I take a good swallow, toss my hair back. He sits on the couch, but forward, on the edge. “And you thought I was the hottest thing you’d ever seen.”

  He raises his eyebrows, ducks his head, abashed a little. “That’s the truth. Jesus, it was awful.”

  “Awful!”

  His face is sober. “What’d I have to give a woman like you?”

  “Ended up being quite a bit, didn’t it?”

  “I guess.”

  I say, “No dark stuff allowed, okay? Let’s just not. Think of something good.”

  He takes a breath, falls backward, kicks up his feet on the battered coffee table. “You know what I was thinking about the other day?”