Seeing my mom laugh, dress up, and fall in love again after so many lonely years should have been enough to quiet my doubts. Instead, one unanswered question kept growing louder every time Richard came to dinner.
My mom hadn’t hummed in 11 years! Not since Dad died. But there she was on Sunday afternoon, standing in front of her bedroom mirror, humming an old Sinatra tune while she clipped on the pearl earrings Dad gave her for their 30th anniversary.
I watched her from the doorway, arms folded, trying not to cry.
“Mom, you look beautiful!”
“Oh, stop,” she said, waving me off with a smile. “It’s just dinner, Avery.”
Not since Dad died.
“You’re even wearing the red dress!”
“I’m allowed to wear the red dress.”
“You bought that red dress recently, and it’s already been out of the closet more than my winter coat!”
Mom laughed, and it was such a nice sound that I almost forgot why I’d come upstairs in the first place. Which, honestly, was to snoop.
“I’m allowed to wear the red dress.”
My mom had been alone for 11 years, and now she was floating around the house like a woman in a shampoo commercial.
The reason was named Richard. He was 52, lived alone as far as we knew, and met her at the community gardening club. He complimented her tomato plants.
Within a month, he was bringing her sunflowers.
She was floating around the house.
Within two months, he’d fixed her porch railing without being asked. He remembered that Chloe, my 15-year-old, liked mint chocolate chip and always brought her a pint.
Within months, I saw a version of Mom I thought we’d lost with Dad. She bought the red dress, started wearing perfume again, and sometimes smiled at her phone like a teenager.
I wanted to like him. I really did.
He’d fixed her porch railing.
***
“So, what time is he coming?” I asked.
“Five. And he’ll need to leave by 7:30 p.m. again, so let’s eat by six.”
I paused halfway to the stairs.
“Seven-thirty again?”
“Avery.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You said it with your face.”
“What time is he coming?”
***
Downstairs, Chloe was setting the table with the good plates, the ones Mom only pulled out for company. My daughter had her grandmother’s cheekbones and her father’s stubborn chin, and lately, she’d been watching Richard like a cat watches a screen door.
“Cinderella’s coming to dinner,” Chloe announced, folding a napkin into something vaguely swan-shaped.
“Be nice.”
“I’m being nice. I’m just saying. The man runs on a Cinderella schedule.”
“Cinderella’s coming to dinner.”
“Chloe.”
“What?! He does! Every Sunday, boom, 7:30 p.m., out the door like the pumpkin’s about to blow.” She held up the crooked napkin swan and squinted at it. “I’m only half joking, by the way.”
I opened my mouth to defend him, then closed it because she wasn’t wrong.
Six months of Sunday dinners, and the man had never once stayed past 7:30 p.m. He was always polite about it. Always had a reason. But the reasons kept shuffling, like someone dealing a new hand every week.
I opened my mouth to defend him.
“Set out the water glasses,” I said instead.
“Deflection…”
I gave my daughter a look.
Mom came down the stairs then, and Chloe whistled low. Mom swatted at her, blushed like a schoolgirl, and asked if her lipstick was too much. It wasn’t. It was perfect.
She looked 10 years younger than she had at Christmas!
I gave my daughter a look.
***
Richard arrived exactly at 5 p.m., holding a bouquet of daisies and a bottle of the sparkling grape juice Chloe liked because she was too young for wine. That charming man shook my hand, kissed my mother’s cheek, and asked my daughter about her history project.
He was, on paper, wonderful.
But at 7:29 p.m., he’d be gone.
He was, on paper, wonderful.
Chloe caught my eye across the kitchen while Richard was in the living room with Mom, but didn’t say anything. She just tapped her wrist, mouthed the numbers seven-three-zero, and raised one eyebrow so high it nearly touched her hairline.
I turned back to the stove and stirred the gravy that didn’t need stirring because, somewhere in my chest, a small, tight knot had started to pull.
Chloe caught my eye across the kitchen.
***
The Sunday after Chloe’s little Cinderella joke, I watched Richard like a woman studying a suspect through a two-way mirror. He was carving the roast beautifully, but also checking his watch between slices.
“Big plans tonight, Richard?” I asked, sliding the potatoes over.
“Oh, nothing exciting. I’ve got a client in Singapore, believe it or not. Eight o’clock call.”
Chloe’s fork paused halfway to her mouth.
I watched Richard like a woman studying a suspect.
“Singapore? On a Sunday?”
“Markets never sleep, kiddo.”
“Cool,” my daughter said. “Neither do plumbers, apparently.”
I nearly choked on my water. Two weeks earlier, Richard had rushed out, claiming a plumber was coming to his house at 9 p.m. Even Mom had blinked at that one.
Richard laughed it off, but there was a stiffness around his eyes that hadn’t been there when he’d first started coming over.
I nearly choked on my water.
The following Sunday, by 7:25 p.m., his leather briefcase was already in his hand. This time, it was the neighbor.
“Mr. Mendez can’t get his blood pressure pills open. Arthritis. I told him I’d swing by.”
“That’s so sweet of you,” Mom said, glowing.
“So sweet,” I echoed, and Chloe kicked me under the table hard enough to bruise.
“I told him I’d swing by.”
By 7:30 p.m., the porch light was clicking on behind Richard, and the leather tote was tucked under his arm as if it were full of state secrets. Every single Sunday. Like clockwork. Like a man on a leash, we couldn’t see.
***
After the dishes, I trapped Mom by the sink.
“Mom, can I ask you something without you getting mad?”
“That’s usually a great start, Avery.”
I trapped Mom by the sink.
“Six months you’ve been dating this man. Have you been inside his house? Even once? Have you seen his kitchen? His couch? His mailbox?”
She turned the faucet on harder than the dishes required.
“He’s private.”
“He’s evasive.”
“There’s a difference.”
“Is there? Because Chloe says twice now she’s watched him turn south after dinner, and he supposedly lives 20 minutes north.”
Mom’s shoulders went tight. She set the plate down with a small, sharp clink.
“He’s evasive.”
“I trust him, Avery.”
“Mom, I want to trust him too. I want that for you. But a grown man with no wife, no kids, no roommate, and no reason to be anywhere at 7:30 p.m. on a Sunday…”
“Maybe he has reasons I don’t need to know yet.”
“That’s exactly the problem.”
She looked at me then, and I saw something under the defensiveness. Mom knew it too. She just wasn’t ready.
“That’s exactly the problem.”
“Please,” she said quietly. “Let me have this. Even if it turns out badly, let me have the part where I still get to hope.”
I didn’t know what to say to that. So I dried a plate.
***
Later, on the porch, Chloe sat on the top step with her knees pulled up. I sat down beside her.
“Grandma knows something’s up. She’s just scared.”
“Let me have this.”
“Chloe. Whatever you’re thinking, don’t.”
“I’m not thinking anything.”
“You’re always thinking something. Your face has a thinking setting, and it’s currently on.”
My daughter smiled a little.
“Richard has another woman. Doesn’t he?”
“We don’t know that.”
“Or another family. A whole secret family in a house with a plumber that only works at night.”
“Chloe.”
“Whatever you’re thinking, don’t.”
“What? I’m just saying what everyone is thinking. Grandma is thinking so, too. She just won’t say it because if she does, it might be true.”
I wrapped my arm around her shoulders.
“Her birthday is next Sunday,” I said. “I’m asking you, as your mother and as a coward, to please just let us get through dessert. We’ll deal with Richard afterwards.”
