Now, watching Margaret stir gravy at the stove, Eleanor understood that something was happening inside the woman who had taught her to bake apple pies, sew loose buttons, and identify birds by their songs. Whatever it was, it had begun quietly enough that her father had been able to conceal it during their weekly telephone calls.
“How long?” Eleanor asked him when Margaret stepped into the pantry.
Daniel kept his eyes on the potatoes.
“A while.”
“How long is a while?”
“Since last winter, perhaps.”
“Last winter?”
He nodded.
“And you didn’t tell me?”
“I thought she’d improve.”
“People don’t just improve from something like this.”
“We don’t know what it is yet.”
Eleanor stared at him.
“Then why haven’t you taken her to a doctor?”
Daniel set the knife down.
“She has an appointment on Thursday.”
“You should have called me.”
He dried his hands on a towel, folded it, and laid it beside the sink.
“You’ve been busy.”
The words irritated her more than an accusation would have.
“I could have come.”
Her father looked at her for a moment.
“I know.”
Margaret returned carrying a jar of cranberry sauce.
“What’s all this whispering?” she asked.
“Nothing, Mum,” Daniel said.
“Good. Then someone can help me with these potatoes before they turn cold.”
At dinner, Margaret told a story Eleanor had heard dozens of times, about the winter Daniel was seven and tried to rescue a frozen bird from the garden. He had brought it inside, wrapped it in one of his mother’s good dishcloths, and placed it beside the fireplace.
The bird had recovered and escaped through an open window, leaving droppings across the mantelpiece.
Margaret laughed at the memory, and Daniel shook his head.
“You’ve been telling that story for fifty years.”
“And I’ll tell it for fifty more.”
Eleanor smiled.
She did not yet understand how painful those words would become.
Later that night, after Margaret had gone upstairs, Eleanor found her father in the dining room.
He was collecting the plates.
Four were dirty.
The fifth remained untouched.
Daniel lifted it carefully, carried it into the kitchen, and washed it with the others.
“Why did you do that?” Eleanor asked.
“Do what?”
“Set a place for Grandpa.”
Her father turned off the tap.
“Because she was happy when I did.”
“But you can’t keep pretending he’s alive.”
Daniel stood at the sink, looking through the dark window at his own reflection.
“She spent forty-six years making sure he had somewhere to sit,” he said. “I don’t think one more evening will hurt anyone.”
Eleanor had no answer.
Upstairs, the floorboards creaked beneath her grandmother’s footsteps.
Daniel listened until the sounds stopped.
Then he switched off the kitchen light and went to check on her.
