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Show Moon - 61 Evenings, James sat in his easy chair, an Old-Fashioned in his hand, his eyes faraway. Caleb tottered over to him, his green eyes begging to be lifted onto his lap, but James would call Anne to take him away. He scolded her when dinner was ready before he'd finished his cocktails, or he yelled if dinner was too late and he'd been forced to drink too many. He yelled at her in the morning when the yolk was broken on one of his eggs, or when the yolks were overcooked, or the whites too runny. At dinnertime, he made Joy drink her milk. She wept, she gagged, she pleaded, but he always won. But then he'd do something to remind her that he loved her, and this was much worse than any unkindness. One evening he came home from work with a candy bar for her. It might have been an O'Henry. She couldn't bring herself to take it from his hand, and this made her ashamed of herself. One morning something wonderful happened. Her mother yelled back at James and pulled the tablecloth off the table. With a splendid crash, the plates bounced across the floor trailing a gooey string of yolk on the carpet. The white China cups shattered, spewing coffee over everything like dark blood. Caleb shrieked from his highchair and no one noticed. James rushed up to her mother and hugged her, crooning, "Anne, Anne, what's wrong?" like he was really noticing her. It was shocking. It was exciting. Being at the table felt better for a while. Joy wished her mother would show that part of herself again: out of the drab everyday goodness, a burst of bright orange wings, a shower of furious light. Always, there was Joy's private world of light and beauty: the hollyhock seeds like little wheels, lilies of the valley in the shadows, daisies in the sunlight. All this, in a garden no one tended. She worked at seeing things more clearly so |