Page 103 of Meet Me in the Garden

My shoulders ease. “I was so afraid you were going to say you were moving there for good.”

“To New York? God, no. We’ll set up the show, be there for the first few weeks, and hire someone to work the rest of it.”

I sip my coffee, lean back and look at her, let the relief settle over me. Her dream, finally in motion. She’s smiling, relaxed, less dressed up than usual. “Your own gallery. A New York show. I’m thrilled for you,” I say. “This is wonderful.”

“It will be a group show.” She pauses, her eyes on mine. “Mostly established artists, but a brand new one, too. We hope.” And there’s aspark, a moment when I know what she’s going to say, and then she says it: “We want to include some of your paintings.”

Down in my studio, we pull all the paintings out, line them up like the day when Espen and Douglass came. But this time it’s just Elise and me, and I have even more now, and she’s a beautiful sight, focused and discerning, stepping back and getting closer. “Espen and I have already agreed on Clément’s poor bird. We’ll show it even if it isn’t for sale.”

“I’m sure he’ll lend it to you,” I say.

“And I have my heart set on the destroyed pink cake. The chair in the forest part is a must.Marriage Bed, of course. And I’m considering this one,” she says in front of a newer piece. It’s a tablescape, inspired by one of Claire’s old issues ofBetter Homes and Gardens, with my own dishes and linens and candles against a background of vivid blue.

“There’s an expectation to it,” I say.

“And glorious imperfection. The tiny chip in the plate. The skewed angle of the fork.”

“One of the spoons is from a different set. See?”

“I do. It’s more cerebral than the others. Would you agree?”

I nod. “Not much of the terror Douglass was so fond of.”

She rolls her eyes. “Oh, Douglass. He’ll stay a know-it-all until he dies.”

I show her another new painting I’m pleased with, and we discuss how each piece “talks” to the others, as Elise puts it. She chooses five paintings available for purchase, and Clément’s bird, which she’ll mark as already sold. She talks about pricing, the amounts attached to each piece astronomical, nonsensical. When we finally finish up in the studio, Nathalie is playing the piano. We hear it from outside. “She sounds wonderful,” Elise says.

Inside, Elise tells her to keep playing, kisses her on the cheek, then collects her purse and heads home. I fix some hot water with lemon and honey and I sit on the sofa with a magazine that I’m not reading. I just flip through it so as not to make Nathalie uncomfortable. All I’m doing is listening to her play. Who cares about a fire in the fireplace? Who cares about the awkwardness of a piano set against a hearth? Only another fewmonths with them living here at home with me, and the weeks tick away so swiftly, and I’m finished with my small annoyances, I’m full of needing to hold on to the dwindling number of lunches I’ll pack for them, the mornings of waiting for Nathalie to finish in the bathroom so I can have my turn, and reading the paper with Clément over coffee, him asking me my opinion of whatever’s going on in the world. And time passes, and I’m so occupied with holding on to it that before I know it, it’s spring.

THIRTY-FOUR

IT’SBEEN A YEARSINCELionel left for Oakland. I can see the toll it’s taken on Al when I unlock the gate for him. He called me earlier, asked to come by to see the pigeons. Clément’s out flying them. I fix Al and me old-fashioneds and join them outside.

“Nothing for me?” Clément asks, teasing, and I reach up to rumple his hair. My grown son, his voice deep. Al and I sit at the garden table, watching the birds’ final flight of the evening. A dark-gray one with white feathers spins and drops.

“Who is that?” I ask.

“Chickadee,” Clément says. “I bred one of KR’s sons with Lady Jane to get her.”

“She’s a good flyer,” I say.

“She’s really taken off lately. Can’t wait for Lionel to see her.”

After Clément finishes in the coop and goes inside, I touch Al’s knee. “A year,” I say. “Isn’t there something we can do?Someauthority we can talk to?”

“Well,” he says, “not while the LAPD is making murdering Negroes their company pastime.”

“I hate it that he had to run again. From New Orleans first. And then LA. It scares me,” I say. “To think that he might be running forever.”

Al sighs. “There’s something in him that tempts trouble, but then he doesn’t know how to handle it when trouble catches up to him. He’s sensitive. You know that.”

“Was he always that way?”

“Sensitive? Yeah. Did he ever tell you about the pigeons in our attic when we were young?”

“No.”

“It’s not a nice story. Or maybe it is. I don’t know. Depends on how you tell it.” I wait, and he says, “Christmastime. I was thirteen, Lionel was nine. The depths of the Depression. You remember how it was. All through that year we had a family of pigeons taking roost in the attic. At first we tried to get rid of them, but they kept coming back and they didn’t do any harm. Lionel and I grew to like them. Lionel especially. They made their nests up there, we watched the eggs hatch. His first little squeakers. We must have gone to the attic almost every day just to see what they were up to. They got to know us, didn’t mind it if we held them. Dada had been working for the same man for years, doing odd jobs, anything he needed. And this year the man kept promising payment and delaying it. Mommee needed to buy the Christmas chicken, but we didn’t have any money. Finally, the man gave his word that he’d pay on Christmas Eve morning, so Mommee was to convince the butcher to place the chicken on hold under our name, and on Christmas Eve, Dada would collect his pay, and pick up the chicken on the way home. It had been a long time since we’d had meat for a meal; the chicken was all we could talk about. On Christmas Eve, we stood out front and waited, and then Dada appeared from around the corner. He wasn’t carrying anything.”