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Timber Grove

Erin Clarke

I scampered up the steps to the patched as she clanked her spoon on her glass. "I have an

screen door, giggling as the hinges groaned with announcement to make," she began, "The

the nudge of my fuchsia mittens. My Donald Duck developer's offer came through. We'll be moving

boots scuffed across the faded Astroturf carpet of in March."

the porch where, that summer, my friends and I March. The word thudded onto the table,

had clamored to the watermelon-laden picnic table, sticking in my throat like a dry piece of turkey. I

dripping pool water over its peeling green paint. I stared down at the globs of gravy beginning to

could still sniff the trace of charred burgers in the obscure the pattern on my plate, the prelude to tears
bitter December wind as Mom and Dad guided me stinging my eyes. As I mechanically finished my

past the rusting chaise to the worn welcome mat. supper, I barely even heard the argument brewing

The door slid open to reveal the warmth of as my grandfather discovered that it was
the dining room and Grandma poised in the door- Shakespeare who had penned his expression. So,
way, her arms spread wide to draw me into her when someone finally suggested that we move to
flour-spattered apron. I could taste the savory per- the living room to open packages, I leapt from my
fume of turkey, stuffing and black( ened) walnut seat, anxious to forget the frightful news.

cookies wafting from the tiny kitchen where, as a I scrambled across the carpet to the white

toddler, I had sat with her, sipping Constant Com- tile fireplace, curling up on the hearth as aunts and
ment and nibbling a very brown English muffin as uncles clamored to the cowering couches. The
we watched the sun rise over the cornfields, framed packages tumbled form under the tree, the room
in the yellow and orange checks of the curtains. erupting in a frenzy of golds and reds and shim-
As my parents disappeared into the living room to mering blues. There were sweets to distribute-
set down their bundles of packages, my grand- dietetic candies, pistachios, rhubarb preserves.
mother busied me with filling the ice bucket, then Here was a sweatshirt for Grant, indigo and or-
scuttled back to her bird, brandishing her electric ange like a Sesame Street castoff. There was a
carving knife. The rattle of the ice cubes, min- bottle of fixer for Greg's darkroom. And beneath
gling with the clatter of pans and chatter of family it all, one unopened package with my name
saturated the entire house with the fervor of the scrawled in familiar script across the paper.
season. And as Grandma poked her head down-
I pounced upon the package, clawing at the
stairs and hollered, "Dinner!" the grumbling about Courier and Ives print in my haste to expose the
. poor calls and poor plays clomped up the stairs, present nestled within its nest of tissue paper and
overtaking the dining room.
cardboard. Pawing through it, I uncovered the

Grampa assumed his place at the head of graceful, articulate curving neckline and accurate
the table, a veritable pulpit from which he would angles of the applique collar. The green fabric,
profess his opinions until someone consulted the like a miniature pine, tapered in precise pleats to a
Britannica to prove him wrong. Even then he might simple empire waist. She would have spent weeks
contend that the encyclopedia lied. As I helped making it, bent over the aging Singer in the base-
myself to the mashed potatoes, I heard him pro- ment where so often I had played to the whirring
claiming to my uncles that he had first coined the rhythm of the needle. I remembered laundry day
expression "one fell swoop" back during the war. and sitting at her feet on the grey carpet strewn
At the other end of the table, my mother and aunt with the contents of a Barrel O'Monkeys as she

had crouched around Grandma and were whisper- read Richard Scarry to me. And in that instant,
ing about something in conspiratorial tones. Sud- recalling the flapping of the sun-dried sheets, I
denly, my grandmother stood up, clearing her throat began to wave good-bye.