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Show in my father's house/ 61 stairs to tie flies or read and Aunt Helga's Deanna was curling her hair in the bathroom, I asked,"Who married Daddy first?" You or Mama?" She glanced up. "I did." Her chin lifted. "But Mama is oldest!" I had learned that much long ago. My mother had been eight minutes older, a blue baby. The nurse put her in the oven to keep warm while Aunt Helga was being born. "Well, I married him first." Aunt Helga's voice was far away, as if she spoke from a tower. "If you hadn't married him, Daddy would have married Mama anyway. Wouldn't he?" She smiled tightly, her nostrils flared. "That's a silly question. I did marry him." "Well, he would -- wouldn't he?" She shrugged. "Maybe not. When your father asked for my hand in marriage, my father said if he wanted to marry one of us, he'd have to take the other one, too." As her words sank in, my heart clenched like a fist. I stared at her. "If it hadn't been for me, you probably wouldn't be here," Aunt Helga smiled. She reminded me of the barn-cat licking the milk-pail of its rind of cream. Then she turned back to her scriptures as if I weren't really there after all. My feelings for her changed that day; I no longer took comfort from having |