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Her eyes are glassy when she lifts her gaze, as if she’s on the verge of tears. She sets the album on the coffee table and struggles to get the footrest down on the lounger. It’s been giving her more trouble lately, which makes me nervous. I don’t know how she’ll handle it if my dad’s old lounger stops working. I can’t see her being okay with getting rid of it.
“Oh yes, everything’s fine.” The footrest finally goes down with a grinding metallic squeal and a clunk. “I was giving the shelves a dust and I pulled an album down and well . . . ” She motions to the stack on the floor. “You know how that goes.”
“I could give you a hand with that after dinner,” I suggest.
“I can finish it up tomorrow since it’s my day off. Let me help put the groceries away.”
She follows me to the kitchen, and we unload the bags together.
“You’ve been gone a lot lately,” she muses as she transfers the oranges to the fruit bowl.
“I’ve been helping out a new client with his cat,” I explain.
“Which client is this? I get them confused since you have so many.” She sets the canned tomatoes on the counter, along with the tomato paste. Tonight we’re having lasagna soup for dinner.
I fill my mother in on Prince Francis, who I’ve mentioned before, and she hums and nods, but I’m not sure she’s paying attention.
“His mother is going into a home soon, and he’s not sure if she’ll be able to take the cat with her. I’m hoping she can, or else Miles will have to find a new home for Prince Francis.” I grab two onions and the cutting board, then move around the kitchen, pulling out ingredients for the soup while we chat.
“What kind of cat is it again? Hopefully not one that will be hard to find a home for,” Mom asks absently.
“A sphynx. They’re usually in high demand, so I doubt finding him a new human will be too difficult, but he can be destructive.”
“You’ll fix that, though.”
“I’m working on it.”
“Smokey was such a well-trained cat. I remember when your sister was a baby, and he would lie under her crib and then come get me in the morning when she was ready to be fed.” Mom smiles wistfully. “I miss those days sometimes.”
“Yeah, me too. He was a great cat.” I swallow down the sadness that comes with thinking about Smokey. All the great memories I had of him as a child are tainted by a single event that changed our entire family. Normally, the second he started pulling on the screen, I would let him in. Except that one time.
Still, I wander down memory lane. “He used to follow Dad around like a shadow after dinner, waiting for him to sit in his recliner so he could take up residence in his lap.”
“He was your dad’s cat, that’s for sure,” Mom muses.
She’s right, he was, and a few months after he passed, Smokey ran away. One day I let him out for his morning frolic in the backyard, and he never came home. I feel as though I’m experiencing the sadness I associated with these memories through a window, a protective barrier from the pain.
Hattie messages to say she’s going to be home later and not to wait on her for dinner.
“Are you here tonight? Maybe we can play a game of Farkle after we watch Jeopardy.” Mom asks.
I hate to say no to my mom, but I need to get the situation with Prince Francis under control. “I’m going back to my client’s house for the night. I’m trying to extinguish some bad behaviors, and Prince Francis isn’t used to being alone all the time. But maybe tomorrow night?”
“That would be lovely, dear. I think it’s wonderful that you’re so dedicated to your job.”
“I really do love it.” But as I sit here, eating dinner at the table set for three, my dad’s spot empty, though full of the weight of his memory, I realize that staying at Miles’s mother’s house has felt like a mini vacation. And that’s saying something considering the emotional ghosts that live there.
I mull that over while I help clean up the dinner dishes. How Miles’s house is full of memories he’s trying to escape, while I’m trying to hold on to mine. It’s almost like I’ve put my life on pause every time I walk through the door and stay that teenage girl. Any time my mom suggests redecorating, I’ve been the one to say I love it the way it is. But maybe I just love the memories. Even if the most pervasive one is a black cloud hanging. Like Toby’s bedroom, mine hasn’t changed much since I was sixteen. I see the parallels: his is a shrine to a life none of his family live anymore. And mine is a shrine to the days before I lost my dad.
