Anne Tyler: Digging to America

In the silence that followed, the Vite! Vite! of the overeager cardinal chipped the air above their heads.

She's not home, a small voice said sadly Maryam's first indication that Jin-Ho must be standing on the porch with her mother.

The others were murmuring and debating. Maybe…, one said.

And, See if..

Then either Mac or Abe said something decisive that Maryam couldn't make out, and she bent closer to the window and saw a kind of shuffling motion in the group below first one person and then another turning away, hesitating, then peeling off to leave. Brad was no longer holding Xiu-Mei, who was headed now for Dave. When she reached him she took his hand, and he looked down at her for a second as if trying to remember who she was before he, too, turned and began walking toward the street. Polly and Bridget had Jin-Ho between them. Deirdre twirled a little purse by its pink ribbon strap as she followed.

And then at long last here came Bitsy, catching up with Brad and taking hold of his arm. So frail, she seemed! In fact, she was leaning on him for support, and her tightly wrapped headscarf gave her skull a shrunken look.

Maryam thought of Bitsy's hopefulness, her wholeheartedness, her manufactured traditions that seemed brave now rather than silly. The sudden wrench to her heart made her wonder if it might be Bitsy she loved. Or maybe it was all of them.

She spun away from the window. She left the bedroom. She crossed the hall. By the time she reached the stairs, she was running. She ran down the stairs; she ran to the door. She burst out of the house crying, Stop!

Wait! she called. Don't go!

Wait for me! she called.

They stopped. They turned. They looked up at her and they started smiling, and they waited for her to join them.