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Show 88 the firm potatoes, turning them this way and that with the long curling peels emerging from the scraper while answering Jeanne's questions, was not unpleasant. She wondered suddenly if she would have a daughter of her own some day. She thought she would. She wanted one. What would her daughter be like? Like Jeanne? In some ways, perhaps. Yes: they would spend evenings in the kitchen together; she peeling the potatoes as she was now, while answering the questions of her daughter. Who would be sitting at the table-her table, in her kitchen. It was out there in her future. And in a certain way, here in the present. Although this was not her table, her kitchen. Nor her daughter. For she loved Jeanne, she thought as she finished the last potato. Not as a daughter, exactly. Maybe more like the younger sister that she had never had. She washed the potatoes until they were shiny. Apple of the earth: that was the French name for them. Fruit of the earth. And she could feel the earth in them, the good earth, as she gathered them up in a pan. She put the pan in the refrigerator; now all she would have to do tomorrow when she got home from school was to put them on the stove. As she helped Jeanne with the last problem, Katie's Cadillac sounded on the drive. A moment later Katie stormed into the kitchen: upset, angry, her hair mussed, loose strands flying about. Her eyes were wild, darting about the kitchen. Throwing her purse on the counter, she ordered Sharon to help carry in the groceries. Sharon followed out to the garage. The left fender of the Cadillac was crumpled in, the turn signal smashed out. It was offensive, |