Dinner at Jack's

Chapter 4: Everything-but-the-Kitchen-Sink Minestrone-2

As I knew she would be, Mary Beth was more concerned about the state of the bedroom I would occupy than over making something for dinner. She was sweating when I pulled up in the driveway, still clutching an armload of teenage girl clothes under one arm while she opened the front door with the other. “Big brother!” she shrieked. The clothes dropped to the front stoop as she held out her arms.

Smiling, I went into them and had to admit that it was good to feel her hug. It was too hard and too tight, and for the first time, I felt I was home.

I helped her gather up the clothes, noticing their petite size and the predominance of fuchsia, which validated my initial impression that these were my niece’s clothes and not my sister’s, who favored flattering plus-size tights and sweaters and sweatshirts. Mary Beth led me inside.

My brother-in-law, Brad, sat in front of the big-screen in the living room in a corduroy-clad recliner, a glass of red wine in his hand. I could hear the news, out of KDKA in Pittsburgh. Brad grunted at me and sort of half raised his glass, which, for Brad, qualified as a warm welcome.

“How you doin’, Brad?” I followed my sister through the living room and down a short hallway to what I assumed was Grace’s room.

It was immaculate. If there had been Justin Bieber posters on the wall, Mary Beth had removed them. If there had been a ruffled bedspread, she had managed to get rid of that too in the short time elapsed between our phone call and my driving out here. Now the double bed was covered in a white duvet with a bright red Hudson Bay wool blanket lying across the foot of it. The vinyl mini-blinds at the room’s single window were drawn up, and in the dusky light outside, I could see that I hadn’t sacrificed a nice view when I left the Panorama. The window looked out on a forested ravine. Between the black silhouettes of maples and pines, the sun was just setting, pulling oranges, cobalt, gray, and purple with it as it descended.

“Nice view.” I nodded toward the ravine.

Mary Beth looked, almost as though she didn’t realize it was there. “Oh. Yeah. We worry Grace sneaks out that window.”

She fussed, fluffing pillows. “I cleaned out one of her drawers for you, and let me tell you, that was no easy task. Between living in horror of what I might discover—birth control pills, crack, her Young Republicans ID card—and simply finding any available space, I was fit to be tied.” She eyed me after opening the single drawer I had been allotted and giggled. “She’s not really a Republican.”

I breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank God for that. Crack and promiscuity we can deal with.”

Mary Beth opened the closet door. “I tried, big brother, I really tried to get you some closet space for hanging, but good luck with that.”

The closet was jam-packed with clothes so tightly, I wondered first how my niece managed to find anything and then find anything that wasn’t wrinkled. The shelves above were crowded with shoe boxes and a couple of American Girl dolls. Below, more shoes and stacks of Lucite storage boxes. God only knew what was in those.

I wouldn’t snoop.

“Where will Ruth sleep?” I asked my sister. “Is it okay if she’s in here with me?”

Mary Beth c****d her head. “Ruth?”

“Yeah. She’s in the car.”

Mary Beth let loose a short titter and then shook her head. She scratched at an eyebrow. “Ruth, huh. Does this mean you’ve turned? Playing for the other team now, are we?”

I glanced down sheepishly at the thick-pile beige carpeting and then looked back up at my sister. “What can I say? Sometimes you fall in love and gender just doesn’t matter.”

“Really?” Mary Beth, for once, was speechless.

“I should go bring her in.”

“I’m dying to meet her.”

I headed back outside, thinking I really should have kept in better touch with my family.

Mary Beth stood at the front door, arms crossed, waiting. I opened the car door, and Ruth immediately hopped out. She took a quick look around, circled, then deposited a large pile on my sister’s front lawn.

“She’s adorable,” Mary Beth called from the front door. “Just what I would have picked out for you.”