Page 66 of Good Days Bad Days

“Let’s sit down,” I say, patting her arm.

“Oh, yes. Yes.” She opens her eyes and with some help settles into a spot on the cast-iron bench. I cover her legs with the quilt I’ve been carrying over my arm like a maître d’.

“Thank you.” A perplexed look comes over her face as I sit beside her. “I’m sorry, I forgot your name.”

“Charlie,” I say, watching for a sign of recognition and glad when it doesn’t come. I don’t tell her I’m her daughter or use my nickname; that seems too risky.

“You are very pretty.” It’s a common comment from sweet Betty. She’s always full of compliments my mother never would’ve given me.

“So are you. Like a flower.”

“What a funny thing to say.” She giggles, not remembering she’s the author of the simile. “My husband brings me flowers.”

“That’s sweet.” I think of the times my father would come home with armfuls of wildflowers he’d picked from the patch outside of his shop. My mother would bury her face in them and arrange bouquets that’d sit in clusters until they dried into stiff vestiges of their former beauty. She never threw them away, piling them in one of the spare bedrooms until the hall stunk of the sickly-sweet rotting corpses of flowers. At some point Dad stopped bringing home flowers, and eventually, the smell dissipated, and I wondered if my mom missed the surprise bouquets from her husband.

“Do you have a husband?” she asks me.

“Y-yes.” I stutter as I answer, not sure if I really do after last night.

“That’s nice. My husband isn’t here today. He’s probably at work,” she says, smoothing the blanket over her legs, the plain wedding band on her left hand scratched and faded, reflecting the midmorning sun. Which reminds me ...

I take the picture from my sweatshirt’s large front pocket and hold it in front of Betty.

“Look what I found,” I say, pointing at the smiling picture of my mom in her wedding dress. She saw it a few weeks ago but she treats the photograph as new.

“Oh, she’s beautiful.” She caresses the image.

“Do you know who that is?” I ask, slowly, kindly, trying not to be greedy or selfish.

“Do I know her?”

“Yes,” I say, pointing to the young woman’s face. “That’s you.”

“Me?” She laughs and covers her mouth. “Are you sure?”

“Yes. That’s you on your wedding day.”

“Oh?” she says, picking up the portrait and holding it close to her eyes.

“Do you remember that? Marrying Da—” I almost say “Dad” but stop myself. “Your husband?”

“Oh! Oh, yes.” She runs her fingertips down the picture slowly and then again like she’s tickling a deeply buried memory.

“I made my dress,” she says.

“And your flowers?” I ask, pointing to the fabric flowers in the image, remembering the silk flower segment fromThe Classy Homemakerepisode.

“Make flowers? I can’t make flowers ...”

“They’re pretend—the flowers. You made the arrangement. Do you remember how you used to make things?”

“I think so,” she says, the information prickling the edges of her mind. I wait, hoping more details will surface if I’m patient. “My husband didn’t like them, though. So we threw them out.”

Threw them out? I’d never seen my father throw out a single one of my mother’s treasures before she moved into Shore Path. Maybe that’s what she means, that he’s throwing them out now. It must be part of hoarder Betty leaking through.

“Your ring is so pretty,” I say, gesturing to the large diamond and thick gold band in the image.

“My ring?” She inspects the black-and-white photograph but can’t seem to see it clearly. I take a picture with my phone and zoom it in so she can see it better. She holds up her hand and then gasps. “I ... I lost it.”