Anne Tyler - Back When We Were Grownups

“Well, thank you, Bee. I’m awfully glad you came.”

“Are we eating supper, or not? Because I have things to do.”

Will looked over at Rebecca. She smiled at him encouragingly. He looked at Beatrice. “Wouldn’t you like to sit around a while first?” he asked. “Have a little talk?”

“Talk? Talk about what? Is there something you want to tell me?”

“No, just—”

“Who is this lady, anyhow? I don’t get it.”

Will tugged violently at a handful of his hair. Rebecca was the one who answered. “I’m an old, old friend of your father’s,” she said. “He and I grew up together.”

This earned her another cool stare, from head to foot. All at once, Rebecca was less confident of her outfit.

“So,” Beatrice said, “I guess you’re going to tell me next you’ve fallen madly in love or something.”

Will said, “Beatrice!” in an explosion of pent-up breath.

“Well, it’s true we’ve… fallen in fond, I guess,” Rebecca said. “But really I just came here tonight to meet you.”

“Okay: we’ve met,” Beatrice said. “Can I go now?” she asked her father.

“Go?” he said. “But you haven’t eaten!”

“All right. If you insist, let’s eat,” she said.

Will sent Rebecca another look. She said, “Yes! Why don’t we.”

Anyhow, there weren’t enough cleared chairs for the three of them to sit in the living room.

They went out to the dining room, Will leading the way. The table was incongruously elegant — a dark, varnished oval on a pedestal of lion paws — but the chairs were the folding metal kind you’d see in church fellowship halls, and a dozen cardboard boxes partially blocked the window. Will said, “You two sit down and I’ll bring the food.” Then he disappeared behind a swinging door.

“Well!” Rebecca said. “Where’s your usual seat?” Because she wasn’t about to make the mistake of displacing Beatrice.

But Beatrice said, “I don’t have one,” and pulled out the chair at the head of the table.

Rebecca chose the chair to Beatrice’s right. She took some time settling herself, unfolding her napkin (paper) and spreading it in her lap. Three green glass plates had been laid directly on the table, each with a rust-specked knife and fork to its left. Reflexively, Rebecca started to switch her knife to the other side. Then she thought better of it and left it where it was.

“When your dad was your age,” she told Beatrice, “his entire aim in life was to get his driver’s license.” This was one of her preplanned topics — something to break the ice. “He was the only boy in our class who wasn’t driving yet. He kept failing the road test. Has he told you that?”

“No, but it doesn’t surprise me,” Beatrice said. She seemed more affable now. She had picked up her plate and was holding it in front of her face, either checking her reflection or peering through it. “He’s such a klutz,” she said, setting the plate back down. “Every time he goes anywhere, just about, he comes back with a dented fender or something.”

“Well, he’s thinking,” Rebecca defended him. “He’s got his mind on more intellectual matters.”

Beatrice merely raised her eyebrows. Rebecca wondered if that was painful, considering the gold ring.

Something clanged on the kitchen floor, and Will said, “Drat!” Rebecca smiled conspiratorially at Beatrice. Beatrice remained stony-faced.

“Do you know how I imagined you?” Rebecca asked. “I thought you’d be the scholarly type. I don’t know why, but I used to picture that Will would have a son who was very studious and scientific. Tristram, I decided his name was. And then when he said he had a daughter instead, I sort of turned you into a female Tristram. I imagined you’d wear a long muslin dress and this meek, old-fashioned hair style.”

She attempted a light laugh that came out sounding tinny. Beatrice didn’t laugh herself, but she seemed to be listening. Her eyes, for the first time, rested on Rebecca’s eyes, and she stopped fiddling with her fork.

“I had this vision of you reading aloud to him in front of the fire,” Rebecca told her. “I thought you’d have these serious philosophical discussions.”

“Well, we don’t,” Beatrice said flatly.

“No, I can see that.”

“End of the day? We’re not speaking.”

Rebecca misunderstood her, at first. Accustomed though she was to young people’s turns of phrase, she thought that Beatrice meant they didn’t say good night to each other. Then she said, “Oh. You don’t speak ever? ”

“This supper’s an exception. But I’m not here because I want to be.”

“Well… still, it was nice of you to come.”

“I’m here because he promised me my own e-mail account if I came.”

Rebecca said, “Oh.”

Will barged through the swinging door, carrying a Pyrex casserole in both hands. “Ta-da!” he said. He set it on the table. Rebecca sprang to pick it up — she expected it to be hot, although he’d carried it in bare-handed — but she discovered it was lukewarm, nowhere near a temperature that would damage the varnish. She sank back down, feeling silly.

“This is a complete-in-one-dish, whole-grain meal,” Will told Beatrice. “Entirely vegetarian.”

“Actually, I eat meat now,” she said.

“You do?”

His shoulders drooped. He looked over at Rebecca.

“We could all stand to eat more grains from time to time,” she assured him.

“Okay, well… I’m not serving anything else because this is complete in one dish. Oh. I already said that.”

“Have a seat,” she told him.

He sat down across from her and stared glumly at the casserole. It was Rebecca, finally, who lifted the lid. Chunks of broccoli and cauliflower dotted what looked like oatmeal. A serving spoon was submerged almost the length of its handle. Rebecca plucked the spoon out with the tips of her fingers. “Beatrice?” she said. “Care to pass me your plate?”

Beatrice rolled her eyes, but she obeyed.

“Will? Some for you?”

He held out his plate. A fleck of something green clung to his lower lip. Rebecca resisted the urge to brush it off.

She served herself last, and then wiped her fingers and picked up her fork. “Mm!” she said once she’d taken a bite. The other two were already eating, chewing crunchily and steadily, and she couldn’t think how because the dish was downright disgusting. The vegetables tasted raw and rooty, and the grain was so undercooked that she imagined it swelling up in her stomach and exploding. She looked around for water. There was none. Amazingly, Beatrice lifted another forkful to her mouth.

“I’m afraid I’m not much of a chef,” Will said.

“I just think you’re wonderful to make the effort,” Rebecca told him. “There are lots of men who would serve TV dinners, in your situation.”

He ducked his head shyly and said, “It’s not as if it’s all that complicated a recipe.”

Beatrice said, “So, do many men have you to supper, Rebecca?”

“Um…”

“Do you do a good bit of dating?”

Will glanced over at Beatrice, looking alarmed. Rebecca said, “Well, no, I—”

“Because you actually seem pretty normal, on the surface. And I’m just wondering if you realize what kind of a guy you’re eating with, here.”

“A very nice guy,” Rebecca said firmly. “I’ve known him since he was a toddler.”

“This is the guy who kidnapped our dog when Mom asked him for a divorce,” Beatrice told her.

“Your dog?”

“Our little dog Flopsy Doodle.”

Rebecca looked at Will. He swallowed. “I didn’t kidnap her,” he said. “I only… borrowed her. I happened to be upset.”