She didn’t want it.
I insisted.
“I asked if you could work,” she said, “not whether you could pay.”
“And I’m telling you I can do both.”
She took the check.
She put it in the shoebox.
I don’t think she’s ever cashed one.
I still cook on Thursdays.
Samuel comes.
His wife comes.
Officer Benning — Captain Benning — comes when she’s off shift, and the young couple from the garden come with their new baby, whom they named Marjorie, without asking me, and told me afterward, and I had to go out to the porch for a while.
Last Thursday there were nine of us at a table built for six.
Pot roast.
Her late husband’s recipe.
Dorothy sat at the head of the table in the navy dress and watched us pass the rolls and didn’t say much.
That’s how she is.
She asks one question and then she lets you answer it for the rest of your life.
