“They smell good, don’t they?” Aunt Ruth says, slipping on two oven mitts and pulling the pan out of the oven as Mama walks into the kitchen. “Would you like to come with me and your dad to take them to the Robisons?”
Mama takes a few steps toward the oven. “It’s so cold outside, Ruth. And icy. You let Arthur and me take the rolls over.”
“Grandma made those,” Evie says, folding tinfoil around the edges of the bowl filled with white icing.
Mama and Aunt Ruth look at each other the way they did when Evie wore Aunt Eve’s dress to school.
“Yes,” Aunt Ruth says. “Grandma makes the best cinnamon rolls. I can never get the dough so nice.” Aunt Ruth sets the hot pan on the table in front of Evie’s spot on the counter. Thick sugary steam rises up. “We’ll tell Mrs. Robison that Grandma made these.”
“Please, Ruth. Let us take the rolls. You need your rest. You and Elisabeth.”
“I should go,” Ruth says, wrapping her belly with both hands. “I really need to pay my respects.”
“Cinnamon rolls won’t make them feel better,” Evie says.
“Yes, Evie,” Mama says, pressing her lips together in a way that means Evie should stop talking. “You’re probably right about that.”
Evie hops off the counter. “I want to come, too,” she says.
Someone definitely needs to tell Julianne’s mom that Grandma Reesa made these rolls, not Aunt Ruth.
The pan of rolls is still warm on Ruth’s lap when Arthur parks in front of the Robisons’ house. Everyone else in town would have paid their respects yesterday after the funeral, but the Scott family didn’t make it because they had a run-in with Ray. Ruth pulls on her mittens, cradles the pan with one hand and takes the frosting from Evie. Both Ruth and Arthur had decided that Mary Robison’s house wasn’t the place for Evie. She would be too much of a reminder. No sense stirring up more tears with Evie’s blond braids and blue eyes. Before crawling out of the truck, Ruth looks back at Arthur, thinking she should say something, but not certain what that should be. He is staring straight ahead, lost in some thought. He turns. His eyelids are heavy, as if he can’t quite hold them up. He looks tired, and suddenly so much older. He looks like Father.
“We’ll probably visit a bit,” Ruth says, sliding across the bench seat toward the door. “You two will be warm enough out here?”
He nods. “Go on and take your time. And watch the ice. Sidewalk’ll be slippery.”
Ruth holds tight to the truck’s doorframe, steps onto the newly shoveled sidewalks, and walks toward the Robisons’ house.
Celia hangs up the telephone, sits at the kitchen table and lays both hands flat on the vinyl tablecloth. She presses each finger into the table, holding on for a moment. After one final deep breath, she calls out.
“Daniel.”
The house is silent.
“Daniel, come on out.”
Daniel’s bedroom door swings open and he steps into his threshold. His hair is matted on one side and his shirt is misbuttoned.
“Sorry if I woke you,” Celia says.
Daniel glances at the telephone and at Celia.
“Come have a seat. I have some news, Danny. Some sad news.”
Ruth’s shoulder isn’t so sore anymore but still she favors it by balancing the dish on one hip. Someone has shoveled the sidewalk for the Robisons this morning, probably one of the men from church. Surely they didn’t do it themselves. Even so, it’s icy in spots. Ruth shuffles her feet, taking small steps and, at the bottom of the stairs leading to the Robisons’ porch, she stares up at the black door. For a moment, she remembers being on the other side. A different house, a different day, a different death, but otherwise the same. Church ladies brought casseroles in porcelain dishes and biscuits wrapped in tinfoil. They tried to gather around Mother, to comfort her with hugs and gentle words, but Mother wouldn’t have it. She sat them all down, served them coffee and crumb cake. The shirts that Father and Arthur wore that day smelled of starch and the cigars that the men brought and smoked on the back porch. Orville Robison is a smoker. The sweet smell meets Ruth at the top of the stairs. She breathes it in, raises her hand and knocks.
Celia pulls her hands off the vinyl tablecloth and lays them in her lap when Daniel walks from his bedroom into the kitchen. He has to duck now when he walks under the heavy beam that runs through the house.
“Have a seat,” she says, gesturing toward the chair opposite her.
As Daniel sits, quickly at first and more slowly when he looks into Celia’s face, the back door opens and Jonathon walks in. The sound of him coming home brings Elaine out of her room. They both walk into the kitchen and, like Daniel, they seem to feel that something is wrong. Celia motions to them and they both sit. She doesn’t look at Jonathon or Elaine, just at Daniel. She reaches across the table and takes his hands.
Ruth knocks, lightly because she doesn’t really want them to hear her. On the other side of the closed door, a set of footsteps approaches. The doorknob rattles. The door opens.
“Ruth,” Mary Robison says. “Lord in heaven. What brings you out in this cold?”
Ruth lifts her pan. “Mother made them. For you.”
“Her rolls?”
“Yes. She let them rise twice. Evie made extra icing. We’re all so sorry for your loss.”
“You’re cold out there?”
Ruth shakes her head because the cold doesn’t matter. “We’re all so very sorry,” Ruth says, raising the pan again so Mary Robison can see it. “They’re still warm,” she says, though the pan has gone cold. “Would you like them in the kitchen?”
“Yes,” Mary says. “Thank you.” Then she steps back, ushering Ruth inside.
Mama’s fingers are cold. Usually they’re warm. Every other time, they’ve been warm. Daniel lets her hold his hands, but he doesn’t hold back, and he wonders how he knows. Even before she tells him. By the look in her eye, or the sound of the phone ringing late in the day, or the smell in the air. He knows. He looks at Jonathon and Elaine. They don’t understand. They don’t see it or hear it or smell it. But Daniel does.
“That was Gene Bucher on the phone,” Mama says.
Daniel nods. Yes, he already knew that.
“Ian has been ill, Daniel. Did you know? He’s always been, well, fragile.”
Mama thinks Daniel knows about Ian being sickly, but now she isn’t sure. Yes, he already knew that.
“Daniel,” Mama says, exchanging a glance with Jonathon and Elaine. “Ian didn’t wake up yesterday morning. They expected it would happen. Eventually. Maybe it was this cold. Maybe it was too much for him. But he didn’t wake up.”
Daniel nods. Ian was more blue. Almost by the day. And shrinking away. He never got to be a pusher or shoot pheasant. He never found Jack Mayer’s tracks or stared into the whites of his eyes. He said Aunt Eve died in the shed, bloody and murdered, and then he fell backward, off the cafeteria table, blood spilling down his chin and into the creases in his neck. Yes, Daniel already knew that.
“I thought they’d find her sooner,” Mary Robison says.
After first laying a dish towel across the kitchen counter, Ruth sets down the rolls and puts the icing in the refrigerator. She is surprised to find it empty. When Eve died, Mother defrosted casseroles for weeks. She said not a single dish would go to waste. Waste was another invitation from the devil. Closing the refrigerator, Ruth steps to the sink, pushes open the curtains and raises the shade. She blinks at the late day light that spills into the room. Maybe folks weren’t bringing food because Julianne first disappeared so long ago. Maybe they thought Mary Robison had had time enough for grieving.