Breathing Lessons (1989 Pulitzer Prize) - Anne Tyler [79]
"No, this was-" "Excellent Rock Around the Clock. A Brittstown station." "This was WNTK," Maggie said.
"And they claimed I was getting married?" "You claimed it. You called in and claimed your wedding was next Saturday." "Not me," Fiona said.
There was a kind of alteration of rhythm in the room.
Maggie experienced a surge of relief, followed by acute embarrassment. How could she have been so sure? What on earth had got into her, not even to question that the voice she'd heard was Fiona's? And on such a staticky, inadequate radio; she'd known perfectly well how inadequate it was, with those dinky little auto speakers that didn't begin to approach high fidelity.
She braced herself for Ira's I-told-you-so. He still seemed absorbed in the appliance, though, which was nice of him.
"I guess I made a mistake," she said finally.
"I guess you did," Fiona said.
And Leroy said, "Married!" and uttered a little hiss of amusement and wiggled her toes. Each toenail, Maggie saw, bore the tiniest dot of red polish, almost completely chipped off.
"So who was the lucky guy?" Fiona asked.
"You didn't say," Maggie told her.
"What: I just came on the air and announced my engagement?" "It was a call-in talk show," Maggie said. She spoke slowly; she was rearranging her thoughts. All at once Fiona was not getting married. There was still a chance, then! Things could still be worked out! And yet in some illogical way Maggie continued to believe the wedding really had been planned, so that she wondered at the girl's inconsistency. "People called in to discuss their marriages with the host," she said.
Fiona knit her pale brows, as if considering the possibility that she might have been one of them.
She was so pretty, and Leroy was so endearingly spiky and unusual; Maggie felt how thirsty her eyes were, drinking them in. It was like the early days with her children, when every neck-crease, every knuckle-dent, could send her into a reverie. Look at Fiona's hair shining like ribbons, like bands of crinkle gift ribbon! Look at the darling little gold studs in Leroy's earlobes! Ira, speaking into the grille of the appliance, said, "This thing really do much good?" His voice rang back at them tinnily.
"So far as I know," Fiona said.
"Fairly energy-efficient?" She lifted both hands, palms up. "Beats me." "How many BTUs does it give off?" ' 'That's just something Mom runs in the wintertime to keep her feet warm," Fiona said. "I never have paid it much heed, to tell the truth." Ira leaned farther forward to read a decal on the appliance's rear.
Maggie seized on a change of subject. She said, "How is your mother, Fiona?" "Oh, she's fine. Right now she's at the grocery store." "Wonderful," Maggie said. Wonderful that she was fine, she meant. But it was also wonderful that she was out. She said, "And you're looking well too. You're wearing your hair a little fuller, aren't you?" "It's crimped," Fiona said. "I use this special iron, like; you know bigger hair has a slimming effect." "Slimming! You don't need slimming." "I most certainly do. I put on seven pounds over this past summer." "Oh, you didn't, either. You couldn't have! Why you're just a-" Just a twig, she was going to say; or just a stick. But she got mixed up and combined the two words: "You're just a twick!" Fiona glanced at her sharply, and no wonder; it had sounded vaguely insulting. "Just skin and bones, I mean," Maggie said, fighting back a giggle. She remembered now how fragile their relationship had been, how edgy and defensive Fiona had often seemed. She folded her hands and placed her feet carefully together on the green shag rug.
So Fiona was not getting married after all, "How's Daisy?" Fiona asked.
"She's doing well." Leroy said, "Daisy who?" "Daisy Moran," Fiona said. Without further explanation, she turned back to Maggie. "All grown up by now, I bet." "Daisy is your aunt. Your daddy's little