The memory keeper's daughter - Kim Edwards [167]
“I know,” he said. “I know, Caroline.”
Beside them, wide-eyed, Phoebe started to cry, pressing the sobs back into her mouth with her hand. Caroline sat up and put an arm around her. She stroked Phoebe’s hair, felt the sturdy warmth of her body.
“Phoebe,” Al said. “Look at you here, just getting off work. Did you have a good day, honey? I didn’t get to Cleveland, so I didn’t get those rolls you like so much, sorry to say. Next time, okay?”
Phoebe nodded, wiping her hands across her cheeks. “Where’s your truck?” she asked, and Caroline remembered the times Al had taken them both for a ride, Phoebe sitting high up in the cab and pulling her fist down when they passed other trucks to make them blow their horns.
“Honey, it’s broken,” Al said. “I’m sorry, but it’s really smashed up.”
Al was in the hospital for two days, and then he came home. Caroline’s time passed in a blur of getting Phoebe to work and going to work herself, tending to Al, making meals, trying to make a dent in the laundry. She fell into bed exhausted each night, woke in the morning, and started all over again. It didn’t help that Al was an awful patient, ornery at being so confined, short-tempered and demanding. She was reminded, unhappily, of those early days with Leo in this same house, as if time were not traveling in a straight line but circling around instead.
A week passed. On Saturday, Caroline, exhausted, put a load in the washer and went into the kitchen to get something made for dinner. She pulled a pound of carrots out of the refrigerator for a salad and rummaged in the freezer, hoping for inspiration. Nothing. Well, Al wouldn’t like it, but maybe she’d order a pizza. It was five o’clock already, and in a few minutes she would have to leave to pick Phoebe up from work. She paused in the peeling, looking past her own faint reflection in the window to the Foodland sign flashing red through the bare branches of the trees, thinking of David Henry. She thought of Norah too, so objectified in his photographs, her flesh rising like hills and her hair filling the frame with unexpected light. The letter from the lawyer was still in the desk drawer. She’d kept the appointment she’d made before Al’s accident, visiting the substantial oak-paneled office and learning the details of David Henry’s bequest. The conversation had been in her mind all week, though she’d had no time to think about it or talk with Al.
There was a noise outside. Caroline turned, startled. Through the window in the back door she glimpsed Phoebe outside, on the porch. She’d gotten home on her own, somehow; she wasn’t wearing her coat. Caroline dropped the peeler and went to the door, drying her hands on her apron. There she saw what had been hidden from inside: Robert, standing next to Phoebe, his arm around her shoulders.
“What are you doing here?” she asked sharply, stepping outside.
“I took the day off,” Phoebe said.
“You did? What about your job?”
“Max is there. I’ll work her hours on Monday.”
Caroline nodded slowly. “But how did you get home? I was about to come and get you.”
“We took the bus,” Robert said.
“Yes.” Caroline laughed, but when she spoke her voice was sharp with worry. “Right. Of course. You took the bus. Oh, Phoebe, I told you not to do that. It’s not safe.”
“Me and Robert are safe,” Phoebe said, her lower lip protruding slightly, as it did when she got angry. “Me and Robert are getting married.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Caroline said, pushed to the limit of her patience. “How can you get married? You don’t know the first thing about marriage, either one of you.”
“We know,” Robert said. “We know about marriage.”
Caroline sighed. “Look, Robert, you have to go home,” she said. “You took the bus here, so you can take the bus home. I don’t have time to drive you anywhere. It’s too much. You have to go home.”
To her surprise, Robert smiled. He looked at Phoebe, and then he walked into the shadowy part of the back porch and leaned under the swing. He came back carrying a sheaf of red and white roses, which seemed to glow slightly in the gathering dusk.