Free Some Kind of Happiness by Claire Legrand Page B

make sure I am sitting as straight as she is.
    You look like her, you know.
    What an odd thing to say. Grandma is old and has white hair. I am young and have blond hair. Grandma wears just the right shade of lipstick. I do not know what forks to use. How could I possibly look like her?
    She starts humming the song we were listening to in the car. I want to say something, but I don’t know what. Then I blurt, “Ray Charles?”
    Grandma stops humming to look at me. “Pardon me?”
    â€œUm. Ray Charles.” My cheeks feel sunburned even though we are safely in the shade. “Isn’t that what you were singing?”
    â€œNo, actually, that was Jimmy Reed. Are you a fan of the blues?”
    â€œI don’t think so. I’m not sure. I mean, I don’t know a lot of the songs.”
    â€œAh.”
    We sit there, staring at each other. I know I should say something, but I don’t know what. I am distracted by Grandma’s sharp blue eyes.
    What does she see when she looks at me?
    I tuck some hair behind my ear. I should have combed it better this morning. Grandma’s is in a soft, neat bun.
    â€œDad says all of you listened to Ray Charles. When he was growing up.”
    Out of everything to say, I have to bring up Dad.
    Grandma’s mouth twists into a funny shape, like she has heard something strange and does not know what to make of it.
    â€œHe said that, did he?” Grandma straightens the stack of flyers for the seventh time today. “Well, yes, we did do that.”
    I wipe my palms on my pants. It occurs to me that most people are probably not this terrified of their grandmothers.
    But do most grandmothers avoid talking about their sons at dinner?
    Do most grandmothers keep secrets, like why their granddaughter has never visited?
    Then Grandma says, “We had so many parties, in the summer especially.” She pauses; a group of children laugh, chasing one another through the parking lot. She folds her hands on the table, puts them in her lap, returns them to the table.
    â€œNot big parties,” she says, “not with anyone else. Just family. We would open the windows and string up lights on the patio. Your grandfather grilled burgers, and we’d turn up Ray Charles and Jimmy Reed and Bessie Smith and B. B. King. The girls would put their hair in rollers, wear face masks and old dresses from the attic. They’d do it to feel fancy. Old-fashioned Hollywood glamour.”
    Grandma smiles, her voice quiet. “There’d be fireflies in the azaleas, and we would dance and eat for hours, and the music would fill up the woods. We only went inside late, when the mosquitoes got bad. Sometimes not even then.”
    My heart is in a race with itself. I can see it so clearly that it is like I was there, years ago: Aunt Bridget, Aunt Dee, Stick. Kids like me, all of them short and small. Dad, with his floppy hair. Our photo albums at home have some pictures of him looking like that—but they are always pictures of him alone. No sisters. No parents.
    Grandma stares at her hands. “I miss him, Finley.”
    I feel like I am standing on the edge of a cliff. “You mean . . . Dad?”
    â€œWe did what we had to do. I thought your father could understand, but . . . I never wanted him to stay away. He chose that. Not me. He decided we weren’t good enough for him. Do you understand?”
    Have her hands been shaking this whole time? Or have they just started?
    â€œYes,” I whisper, although I understand nothing. What did she have to do?Why did Dad stay away? Why did he keep me away?
    Grandma turns to look at me, and I feel like I am actually seeing her now. Like what she has shown me before is a Grandma mask, and this is what lies beneath.
    I open my mouth to say one of several possible things:
    Grandma, what has happened to your face? Your makeup suddenly looks all wrong on it.
    Grandma, what did Dad do? Was it something