“I find it hard to equate nice hair and jeans to ‘the whole shebang’ when your wife over here is the epitome of elegance and perfect hair.”
“Well, thank you, sweetheart.” Sonia lifts her wine as though to cheers me. “That was a compliment, and I’m taking it.”
“But the longer a woman is single,” Christopher continues. “The more comfortable she becomes in herself. Perhaps, before that point, she felt that pleasing someone of the opposite sex was what is expected. But then she gets a little time by herself…” He grins. “And her beautiful daughter. She learns to love her own company, she doesn’t much care about dressing up for a man anymore.
“Now don’t get me wrong,” he adds when I open my mouth to speak. “That’s not to say she doesn’t do herself up, or that she’s,” he lifts his hands for the finger quotes, “let herself go. But rather, if she does those things, she’s doing them for herself, and no one else. The fuzzy slippers are like a symbol for – Sonia, darling, block your ears.” He looks to her, then back to me. “It’s a symbol to say ‘fuck men, and fuck society. We don’t have to live up to anyone’s expectations anymore’.”
I sit back and study him with wide eyes. “Wow.”
“It’s a symbol for emancipation. For confidence, and the beauty that radiates from the inside.”
“All that from a pair of slippers?”
“Yes.” He picks up his wine and sips. “And the fact your stepfather bought them for you and your mother means he was mocking you, yes, but truly, he was celebrating you. He was acknowledging your independence and beauty, and subconsciously saying that he understands, and he won’t do anything to stomp on those wonderful foundations that you and your mother built before he came along.”
“That’s… like…” I stare into Christopher’s eyes, and fall a little bit in love. “That’s a lot for a pair of slippers to say.”
“And yet, it’s powerful and respectful. The fact your stepfather bought them for you helps put my heart at ease. It means he took care of the girls Sonia and I never got to meet, and he did a fine job of it.”
“I should call my mom.” I bring a hand up and wipe it over my dry cheek. I feel like I might start crying, or perhaps, like I might jump into my car and drive the hour just to hug her. “I wish I’d known. You know, before. I wish I’d been intuitive enough to see that in him.”
“Oh, don’t fret, sweetheart. I’m certain he knew it,” Sonia murmurs. “If he was smart enough to know what the slippers meant, then he was smart enough to understand you, even when you didn’t say the words.”
Contemplatively, Christopher sets his glass down and exhales so his stomach pops forward a little. “I think I’m ready for dessert.”
“Coming right up.” Sonia jumps to her feet and immediately begins plopping plates into a pile.
Since I think I need a minute, I stand too, and follow her around the table to collect used dishes. I pass Christopher, and smile when he winks, and the second I’m in the kitchen and Sonia pulls a fresh apple pie from the oven, I say it. I say the words that can’t be contained any longer.
“I want to see pictures of when you and Christopher married.”
“You…” Stunned, Sonia turns to me and tilts her head to think. “Huh?”
“Pictures.” I storm across the kitchen and snag a framed photograph from a cabinet that holds fancy plates. “I need younger. Do you have something from his twenties?”
“Um… sure.”
Sonia sets the pie on the stove to cool for a moment, and leaves the kitchen. She comes right back with a silver frame with beveled edges. She passes it over, and smiles when I hold it the way a woman might hold a newborn baby.
I turn the frame over and catch a glimpse of their wedding day: a heavy veil sitting atop Sonia’s head, the tulle tickling the bottom of her new husband’s chin. My eyes go to him, naturally, since he was the one I asked about, and I’m not left wanting. Handsome as the devil himself, roguish and, dare I say, a little dangerous.
“He was bad, wasn’t he?” I look up and study my great grandmother’s twinkling eyes. “He was daring and dangerous and kept pushing you out of your comfort zone. Right?”
She smiles and goes back to the pie to begin serving. “Yes. He was a very dangerous man, from a very dangerous time. He fought in the war, Allyson, and he was hurt. He came home to me, but he wasn’t the same. He’d lost some of his innocence, some of his easygoing manner.” She places a slice of steaming pie into one bowl and works on the next. “Christopher was young when he went away. Very, very young. And though we knew each other from school, we were not yet together. Perhaps he was too shy to ask, or maybe he wasn’t sure I returned his feelings. Regardless, he went away to fight, and when he came home a few years later, he was a changed man.”
“That’s really sad.” I clutch the framed photograph, and exhale a sad sigh. “The things he must have seen, and done…”
“Back when I was young, it wasn’t all that proper for young ladies to have an extended education. Rather, we were to be seen and not heard, if you get my drift. But during the war, manufacturing plants still needed to run, so that was the start of a revolution for women. We were allowed to work, and we showed we could work hard. We were strong, and smart. As for me…”
She serves the next slice into a delicate bowl. “Well, I was still young, I had no children yet, unlike most everyone else I knew. So I had spare time when many others did not. I worked during the day, and I studied at night. My career was calling to me, so I pored over textbooks ad nauseam, I studied people around me, I helped women inside those factories when they thought they might go insane from the pressures from all around them. Their husbands were away, and they had no clue if their men would be okay. It was horrible. These women were raising children during a conflict that could have potentially ended the world, and they were working in a sweatbox in the summer, a frozen building in the winter. We worked, and we talked. So by the time Christopher came home, I guess I was more inclined to listen, truly listen when he spoke.”
Sonia places the third and final piece of pie into a bowl, then she moves to the freezer and takes out a tub of ice cream. “I didn’t make this,” she sheepishly admits. “But it’s creamy and delicious.”
“I believe you.”
Smiling, I lean against the counter and study the picture of my great-grandparents. She’s dainty in front of him, small and perfect. And he’s possessive but adoring. He’s large, and holds her close with worn and scarred hands. His eyes glint with danger, but the smirk, the ‘I got her, and I’m never letting her go’ is what makes him personable again.
“So, he came home to you?”
“Yes. I guess he’d had a little time to think things over, so when he came back, he told me we were together, and that unless I had any true objections, we would marry that month.”
“That month!” I clap a hand over my mouth. “He just makes a decision, and that’s that?”
She snickers and shakes her head. “He gave me the out. I could raise an objection. And I did, don’t you worry, I did. Christopher was troubled, his eyes weren’t the same as they were before the war. He had scars that reminded me over and over how close to the end he’d come while away. We… uh….”