Chapter 23: Thanksgiving at Norm's

Thanksgiving at my father's house began with smoke.

"It's the rolls," Norm said, from inside a gray cloud, waving a dish towel at the oven. "The rolls are fine. The smoke is the rolls being fine."

"Dad, the pan is on fire."

"The pan is a little warm."

Ward took the pan out with two oven mitts, carried it to the back steps, and dropped it in the snow.

It hissed.

"Those were my wife's rolls," Norm said sadly.

"Those were charcoal, sir."

"They were my wife's charcoal."

I laughed so hard I had to hold the counter.

Both babies were in the front room, in bouncers set side by side on the rug.

Posy was awake, kicking and staring at the ceiling fan.

Daniel was asleep with one fist up by his ear, his black hair standing straight up.

Every few minutes one of the three of us went and looked at them.

Nobody said why.

We ate at four, at the big table with the leaf in it.

Norm sat at the head, where he had sat when my mother was alive, and he looked at the empty chair at the foot for a moment.

Ward had put the sweet potatoes there.

Norm noticed, and said nothing, and I saw his eyes go bright.

"I'll say grace," Norm said.

We bowed our heads.

"Lord, thank you for the food, and for the hands that burned it."

"Dad."

"Thank you for a roof, and for the ones who found their way under it."

He stopped, and his voice thickened.

"Thank you that nobody got left in the hall this year. Amen."

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