The Birthday Lunch Read Online Free PDF

candle. No longer in a birthday mood, Lily blows out the candle without making a wish and licks the cupcake clean, prompting Laverne to ask if Lily remembers eating the icing off their mother’s birthday cake. “How could I forget when you remind me every year,” Lily says. “And it wasn’t me. Stinker ate the icing because you refused to talk to Tinker.” Tinker was the obliging elf under the table who ate whatever Lily didn’t want to eat. Stinker was the mischievous elf who hid Mrs. Roper’s false teeth, knotted her stockings and mussed up her bed. Mrs. Roper was the crabby housekeeper their father hired when their mother was upstairs dying of cancer.
    Apart from pretending to teach school on the veranda where, more often than not, Lily was her only student, Laverne had never liked to pretend. With pretending she could never be sure what would happen. It wasn’t that she lacked imagination, rather that she resisted the thought of losing herself in a story that was imaginary and therefore could not be trusted. Laverne wasn’t interested in imagining lives different from herown. She was interested in what she could touch and see: the amber window, the portrait of the burgomeister, the flush of green on the opposite wall.
    Leaving the table, Laverne goes into her bedroom where Lily’s birthday present is drying. Balancing the painting between her palms, she carries it to the table. “Happy Birthday,” she says, and is rewarded by Lily’s wide, all-or-nothing smile.
    “Is this the painting you began years ago when Hal and I lived at Fox Hill and Alan Harrington showed up in the meadow?”
    “It is, and I have been working on it every weekend for the past month,” Laverne says. “I only finished it yesterday.”
    “Well, you’ve done a fine job and have certainly captured the view from the bottom of the meadow,” Lily says.
    “I’m pleased you think so.”
    “I especially like the willows along the river. The shadings of silvery green look so real.” Lily reaches out a hand.
    “Don’t touch it,” Laverne says, more sharply than intended. “The paint isn’t quite dry. I suggest you leave it down here for a day or two.”
    “All right. That will give me time to figure out how to make room for it upstairs.” Lily feigns a sigh of regret. “I’ll have to take something down. Should I take down the etching of
The Death of General Wolfe
or the droopy sunflowers?” It is not the first time Lily has joked about the assortment of pictures on the upstairs walls: pictures of Blue Boy and Pink Lady, the
Bluenose
and the
Titanic
, folksy interiors by Norman Rockwell, leftovers Hal has picked up at estate sales and auctions. “At last,” Lily says, “we will have an original painting hanging on the wall.”
    Laverne offers her sister more wine.
    “No more for me,” Lily says. “I have to fetch my purse. It’s time we left for the hospital.”
    Now that the tow truck is on its way, Hal accepts Sharon’s offer of iced tea and cheese-and-pickle sandwiches, which they eat in a patch of shade on the back veranda. He glances at his watch: 1:45. Lily will be on her way to the hospital and the tow truck is on its way here. By the time the Impala has been towed back to town and he has picked up the rented Dodge, Lily will be waiting for him at home. Hal estimates he’ll be home by three o’clock, three-thirty at the latest and there’ll be plenty of time for him to change into the dress shirt, tie and blazer before they leave for Saint John. Mindful of having inconvenienced Sharon, Hal has already decided it would be too pushy to mention building lawn chairs or birdhouses and he will make the offer another day.
    A few minutes later he hears the tow truck groaning and clanking its way up the steep hill. Leaving the half-eaten sandwich behind, Hal follows the paving stone path to the front of the house and watches as Ralph backs the truck within a foot of the Impala before jumping down. Hal asks if he wants