Hallie lets her sons watch TV and play video games. They eat processed sugar and drink nonorganic milk. My mom’s afraid I’ll be corrupted. She hates it when I go over to that house. My dad’s waiting for me in the driveway. He doesn’t like to come in because he says my mom always starts a fight.
“Call me if you want to come home early,” says my mom. She opens the door and watches me leave.
“Hey, you,” says my dad with a smile. He backs out the driveway and heads to the parkway. He’s in a big hurry. “The boys can’t wait to see you. They’ve challenged us to a Ping-Pong tournament.”
I sincerely doubt this, but I don’t say anything.
Hallie’s house is a big white farmhouse near Chain Bridge. It’s one of the oldest houses around, with an attic and a root cellar and a little closet in the kitchen called a larder that’s for things like onions and carrots. Everything is dirty in the right way, like a sprinkle of crumbs on the cutting board and flowers spilling petals from a vase on the windowsill.
She doesn’t mind if you spill your juice because she only has things that can’t be ruined.
“After all, I have boys,” she says, “and a hairy old dog.”
My mom’s house is totally different. We have lots of special things. Most of them are very old. Antiquities, to be exact. My mom started collecting them before I was born. We have mummy beads and urns, coins, oil lamps, a tiny alabaster Venus, and three pomegranates carved from stone. Each one is in a little case because they are so delicate and rare that even the dust shouldn’t touch them.
Downstairs in the basement, the boys, my father, and I are having the tournament. The boys slam the ball back and forth. They know how to use topspin and make tricky shots. Zeke dashes to the side of the table and taps the ball just over the net so it’s impossible to return. He almost has dreadlocks. Anders’s hair is straight. My dad and I are ahead because he makes the most shots.
Dad bought them the Ping-Pong table and turned the basement into his office. He has a tiny desk for his computer, a two-drawer file cabinet, and a few shelves of books. He used to work all the time when he lived with us. He stacked books in every room—on the dining table, the floor near his bed, the kitchen counter, and the coffee table. He took a laptop to bed every night. When he moved in with Hallie, he stopped stacking books and gave up his laptop.
Anders serves me an easy shot, which I return, but of course I miss the next, and the next, and the next. I can’t do anything with a ball, no matter what size it is. The boys pull ahead, and my dad starts missing shots, on purpose, I think. I stop even trying. Anders and Zeke lose interest. They turn on the PlayStation and huddle over the controls. I guess the tournament is over.
“Can we do something else?” I ask.
Upstairs in the kitchen, Hallie is making bread. She gives me an apron and shows me how to dust the top of the dough with flour so it doesn’t stick when you knead it. There’s always a project when I come over, like baking, or making jewelry, or sewing tote bags out of old fabric she bought at a flea market. She set up her loom in the guest bedroom, the room where I sleep, and she’s promised to teach me how to weave a blanket.
“That’s good,” she says as I fold the dough over on itself. She has Zeke’s curly hair—tight blond ringlets that start at her scalp and loosen at the ends. She’s wearing white yoga pants and a white long-sleeve T-shirt. A tiny gold Buddha dangles from a cord around her neck. A bracelet of rose quartz wraps around her wrist. Lark would say she’s too limber from all that yoga.
“You better strengthen your core,” I tell her.
“Think so?” she asks.
Then she jumps into a whole new topic.
“Your dad says you’re still home from school.”
I start kneading with more enthusiasm. I sprinkle flour and fold and push and fold. If I do everything right, Hallie might drop the subject.
She greases two bowls with a stick of butter. “He says you talk to the girl who died.”
I throw the dough on the breadboard and slap it a few times.
“Her name was Lark, right?”
I toss the dough from one hand to the other. It’s smooth and elastic, and I can smell the yeast.
“I talk to my therapist about Lark,” I tell her.
“Good,” says Hallie. “It must be awful to know someone who died in such a terrible way.”
“I try not to think about it,” I lie.
I watch her divide and smooth the dough into two halves. She puts each one in a buttered bowl and covers them with tea towels.
“Now what?” I ask.
“Now we wait. You’ll see. They’ll double in size.”
I lift the towels for one last look. It’s hard to believe the dough will rise to the towel, but two hours later it has. And then we punch it down and knead it some more, and then it rises again, and then we bake it. I can’t wait for it to cool, so Hallie lets me cut one loaf even though you shouldn’t cut warm bread. The butter melts as soon as I spread it. It runs between my fingers as I take my first bite. The taste is full and rich, a little salty sweet. It’s like I am eating a world of cottages and water mills, wildflowers and deer that come out of the forest to eat from my hand. Hallie watches me and smiles, and for a moment I almost forget where I am.