“Judith still insists homemade is better,” she whispered.
“I know.”
“So I took it out of the store box before we came.”
I laughed.
“I did that last Thanksgiving.”
For a few minutes, we were simply two daughters-in-law surviving another Foster dinner.
Then Judith called everyone to the table.
Chicken soup came first.
Six bowls steamed in front of us.
After that would come pot roast, potatoes, carrots, rolls, and pie.
“I forgot the crackers,” Judith said.
“I’ll get them,” Mark replied immediately.
Too immediately.
Then, for reasons that made sense only minutes later, he picked up my bowl.
“My bowl?” I asked.
“You like extra pepper.”
He smiled again.
That same wrong smile.
Something inside me tightened.
“I’m going to wash my hands.”
Nobody paid attention when I left the dining room.
Instead of walking straight to the bathroom, I slowed beside the kitchen entrance.
That was when I saw him.
Mark stood with his back partly toward me.
He removed a small folded packet from his pocket.
He opened it.
Then emptied a fine white substance into my soup.
He stirred twice.
My heart began pounding.
And suddenly, the previous six months of my life rearranged themselves in my mind.
The dizziness.
The headaches.
Walking into rooms and forgetting why.
Losing words halfway through sentences.
Falling asleep unusually early.
Feeling clumsy.
Feeling foggy.
Mark always had explanations.
“You didn’t eat enough.”
“You’re stressed.”
“You work too much.”
“You’re fifty, Diane. People change.”
Once, after I became confused while driving to a grocery store I had visited for years, I pulled into a parking lot and cried.
When I told Mark later, he smiled gently.
“Welcome to getting older.”
Even my doctor had struggled to explain everything.
Standing outside Judith’s kitchen, I suddenly wondered whether the explanation had been beside me all along.
Mark carried the bowl back to the table.
“There you go.”
“Thanks.”
I sat down.
He sat beside me.
His knee bounced beneath the table.
Everyone began talking.
Judith discussed Thanksgiving plans.
Harold told an old story.
Steve corrected him.
Karen laughed.
Everything looked painfully normal.
I stared at the soup in front of me.
Steam curled upward.
Rosemary.
Thyme.
Chicken stock.
Home.
Family.
And something that should not have been there.
For a moment, I tried to convince myself I had misunderstood.
Maybe it was harmless.
Maybe there was an explanation.
