“No.” I wanted her to hurry, but she counted the pennies slowly and carefully, whispering to herself so she wouldn’t lose track.
Jeremy tried again. “Mrs. Guerraoui,” he said. “Hello there.” His voice was deep and clear, and I couldn’t pretend any longer that I hadn’t heard him.
“Oh,” I said, feigning surprise, “hello.” He was very tall, and I had to look up to meet his eyes, which were very blue against his tanned face, it was not an unpleasant face, though his lips had a purple tint that came from smoking, a terrible habit. On his upper arm was a tattoo, which is common enough in this town, you see them everywhere, especially on low-class people and criminals, although nowadays artists get them, too. My daughter has one, it’s very tiny, it’s usually hidden by her bracelets, but a tattoo on the arm is different, it makes a statement, it wants to be seen, perhaps that was what this young man wanted.
The cashier was still counting my change, while the store bagger, a teenage boy with braces on his teeth, finished putting away my groceries.
“Do you need help with that?” Jeremy asked, coming closer to me.
“I’m fine,” I said, and quickly reached for the fabric tote and hoisted it up, but I had misjudged how heavy it was, and had trouble lifting it up over my shoulder.
“Here,” he said, taking it off my hands easily. “Let me help you.”
“Ma’am,” the cashier said, “your change.”
I took the two bills and the handful of pennies from her, and while I put them away in my wallet, she started scanning Jeremy’s items, so that I had no choice but to wait for him to pay.
Afterward, we stepped out of the store together. It was a sunny morning in June, the heat was rising fast, and on the sidewalk two children ate ice creams, the chocolate melting and running down their shirts, not caring about the mess they were making, they were enjoying their cones. I started across the parking lot to my car, Jeremy walking beside me with my groceries, and the silence between us grew so long that I felt compelled to make polite chatter. “How is your father?” I asked. “Mark, right?”
“My father?” he said, glancing at me with surprise. “He’s fine—I guess. I haven’t seen him in a while.”
“He fixed my garage door. A long time ago.”
“Ah. He doesn’t work much these days, though; he’s getting old.”
I didn’t expect the rush of sadness that came over me when I heard this, perhaps it was the familiarity of it—after all I know something about how families can grow apart, and how hard it is to bring them together again. We made it to my car, and after Jeremy handed me my bag of groceries, I stood in the sun and watched him walk away, thinking we were no longer strangers, he and I.
Nora
A couple of weeks later, Salma invited me to her house for Father’s Day. I didn’t particularly want to see her, but she said that brunch would be followed by a visit to our father’s grave at Rose Hills, which made it impossible for me to come up with a valid reason to skip one and not the other. With a mix of dread and resignation, I drove down Old Woman Springs Road, heading toward Landers, the little town where my sister and brother-in-law had moved a few years earlier. Their home was a 2,800-square-foot house with a transom on the front door and huge windows that faced east. Everything about it screamed money—the landscaping, the custom mailbox, the sign that warned SIMPSON SECURITY: ARMED RESPONSE. As it happened, the door had been left ajar, and I was halfway across the living room before I saw my brother-in-law. “It was open,” I said.
“You don’t have to explain,” Tareq said mildly. “This is your home. You’re welcome here anytime.”
“Happy Father’s Day,” I said, giving him the greeting card I’d bought that morning at Walgreens. The stationery aisle had been packed with children young and old, and somehow I had managed to keep my composure until I saw a little girl, perhaps eight or nine years old, asking her older brother if he thought their dad would like the card she’d picked out. I had to sit in my car for a while after that, trying to collect myself before I could drive to my sister’s house. “Where is everyone?”
“Thank you for this,” Tareq said. He seemed genuinely pleased and held on to the card as we spoke. “Your mom’s not here yet. The kids are playing, and Salma’s out on the deck. Why don’t you go talk to her? I’ll bring you ladies some lemonade.”
From the family room came the sound of a crash—a Jenga tower?—and the taunting laughter of Aida. I slid the glass door open and stepped outside. Under the shade of the umbrella, Salma sat on a lounge chair, so motionless that for a moment I thought she was sleeping. She was in a mint-green top and white linen pants, a vivid rendering of what Orange Coast magazine might have featured under Casual Weekend Wear, and her hair was in an elaborate updo that must have taken hours of practice. But when she looked up, I noticed deep bags under her eyes, which not even her carefully applied makeup could disguise. “Oh,” she said. “You made it.”
“Of course,” I said, bending down to kiss her on the cheeks. “I can only stay for a couple of hours, though. I have to go back to work.” I took the chair next to hers. My back hurt from having carried boxes of groceries earlier that morning, and I stretched my legs out and heaved a sigh of relief. A soft wind blew, rustling the leaves of the sage bushes that bordered the deck. Beyond it the lot sloped into a valley of Joshua trees, and, in the distance, giant red-rock formations. “What a great view you have here, Salma.”
She smiled. “Yes, it’s nice and clear today, too.”
Maybe it was the satisfaction in her voice that grated on my ear, or maybe it was seeing her lounging like this, but instantly I found myself thinking about Baker’s arraignment. Salma had made no effort to be in court, hadn’t rescheduled her clinic appointments, hadn’t even called me afterward to hear the details of the hearing. I was trying to think of a way to bring this up when the door slid open again and Tareq appeared, carrying a pitcher.
“I have a migraine,” my sister told him, somewhat abruptly.
Tareq didn’t reply. He stirred the lemonade with a metal spoon, bruised the mint leaves for a minute, then poured two glasses.
“The bright light can’t be good for you,” I said. “Maybe we should go inside.”
“No, I like it out here.” Turning to her husband again, she asked, “Can I get a pill?”
A raven landed near us and eyed the ground for any crumbs. Tareq waved it away. “Drink the lemonade,” he said. “It should help.”
“I’d rather have something.” Her eyes were pleading.
“I’ll leave you two to catch up.”
I didn’t know what to make of this exchange between them, or the tension that I sensed beneath their pleasantries. Why wouldn’t he give her something for her migraine? “Are you all right?” I asked her after he left.
“I’m fine,” she said.
For the first time, it occurred to me that the perfection my sister wore like an armor was starting to show some cracks. It could only be grief, I thought; grief had done this to her. All at once my irritation disappeared. I reached across the side table to touch her arm, and immediately she put her hand over her mouth to stifle a sob. “Oh, Salma,” I said.
“I’m fine,” she said again, and took a long sip of her lemonade. From the neighbor’s yard came the rattle of a wire fence being opened, followed by the joyful barking of a dog. “Why do you have to leave so early anyway?” she asked.
“I told you, I have to go back to work.”
“You mean the restaurant?”
“Yes.”
“Nora, why are you doing this?” she asked me warily. “Mama doesn’t want to run the restaurant anymore, and she shouldn’t have to. She’s getting on in years, you know. She just wants to retire.”
“She can still retire. I can buy her share of the business so long as you keep yours.” Then, warming up to my idea, I said, “We could be partners, you and I. The Guerraoui sisters. How about that?”
“That sounds nice, but then what? Who’s going to run it?”