He pulls her to her feet, hits the switch on his tape player and Nat King Cole sings, “Unforgettable, that’s what you are…” He’s thought of everything. They dance, holding each other, swaying, the way they did at the Y. Is this what she wants? Is this why she came here? She loves the idea of the kids they were, the sweetness between them.
She sometimes thinks of Mason when she and Andy are making love. When she’s not sure she can get there—something new, something perimenopausal—as soon as she puts herself back—ohmygod—as soon as she’s there, she calls out, Yes, yes, yes! And Andy is happy he’s satisfied her so well. Does Mason imagine her when he’s with Rebecca? Does he imagine Polina?
“Do you ever wonder about what might have been?” Mason asks.
“Who doesn’t?” She collects her shawl, her bag, the kaleidoscope. When they say goodnight at the hotel room door he touches her face.
She goes back to her room, kicks off her boots, falls back on the bed and calls Andy. She needs to hear his voice.
“Are you okay?” he asks.
“Yes…but I miss you.”
“Miss you, too.”
“See you tomorrow,” she tells him.
“I’ll meet you at the airport.”
“But I left my car there.”
“So what?”
She tears up.
“Ask me about the snow on the mountain,” he says.
“How was the snow?”
“Perfect.”
—
SHE MEETS Mason for breakfast the next morning, then he drives her to the cemetery to visit Irene and Ben. The cemetery is close to Newark Airport, not exactly a peaceful site, but it’s where they wanted to be, with their families and old friends. She places a stone on top of each headstone. Ben Sapphire, the stepgrandfather she came to admire, and Irene Ammerman Sapphire. She misses Irene, her nana, who loved her unconditionally, who taught her, by example, to take another chance on love. Miri wipes the tears from her eyes, then blows her nose.
“She gave me her recipe for brisket,” Mason says.
“No.”
“Yeah, she did. And I passed it on to Rebecca. Every Friday night we have Irene’s brisket. It’s not exactly the same, not quite as good as I remember, but it’s good. I look forward to it.”
“Irene would love knowing that.”
“She knew.”
“You kept in touch with her?”
“Holiday cards, the occasional note.”
“She never told me.”
“She didn’t want to upset the cart. One summer, when she and Ben were vacationing down the shore, she invited me and Rebecca and our kids to lunch.”
“I can’t believe she kept you a secret from me!”
“She wanted to see for herself that I was happy. She already knew you were.”
“She never stopped trying to rescue people, to fix what wasn’t right.”
“Rebecca fell in love with her.”
“Who didn’t?” She stops, then asks, “You and Rebecca?”
“Up and down. But I think we’re going to make it.”
“I hope you do.”
He checks his watch. “I have to get you to the airport…if you’re really going.”
She gives him a you must be kidding look.
He shrugs and smiles. They walk back to his car. “I’m glad we got to spend time together.”
“I’m glad, too.” She feels satisfied, happy.
At the airport he kisses her goodbye in the car. “If someday…” he begins.
“Yes, if…But for now…”
“I get it,” he says, kissing her one last time.
—
SHE’S MADE A PLAN to meet Natalie for coffee in the first-class lounge at the airport before their flights. How long has it been since Natalie visited them in Las Vegas? She gave a lecture at the library on “channeling your past lives” during one of her book tours, but that was years ago, and she flew in and out of town quickly, with no time for family. Fern, who’d come in from Shiprock with her girlfriend, Ora, also a doctor on the Navajo reservation, had been disappointed. Now the two of them run a family clinic outside of Las Vegas.
Natalie spies her first. “Hey, Brenda Starr…how’s it going?”
“Not so bad.”
“You look better today. Yesterday, you looked like a corporate executive in that suit.”
If Miri thought Natalie would be different now that she’d achieved fame, she was wrong.
“How was it seeing Mason again?” she asks.
“Like seeing a long-lost friend,” Miri tells her. “Like seeing you.”
“I saw your goodbye kiss. I doubt if that’s how you’d say goodbye to me.”
Miri feels her face flush. “It didn’t mean anything.”
“If you say so.”
Change the subject before this escalates, Miri tells herself. “So, Warren Beatty?”
“You like that story?”
“It grabbed my attention.”
“He was great.”
“So, it’s true?”
“Maybe yes, maybe no.”
“We’re back to that?”
“Ask me another one, Girl Reporter.”
“How did you know Kathy Stein was on that plane?”
Natalie pauses for just a moment. “Ruby told me.”
“No, really…how did you know?”
“Sorry if you don’t like my answer but it’s the truth. Next…”
Miri reminds herself not to push it. “Corinne?”
“She and her hubby spend winters in Palm Beach, summers on Nantucket. They play golf. I don’t know how they can stand it. But, then, I never understood my mother. I suppose you see a lot of Fern.”