Exactly. Recognition. Good, she said. I can't stand a woman who pretends. She walked past Clare into the kitchen, picked up a wooden spoon, and began successing Marcus' collarded greens without being asked, which was what she did in every kitchen she entered, and which Marcus had come to understand was her primary love language.
Kesha appeared at Marcus's elbow. She looked at Clare. Clare looked at her. "I've heard a lot about you," Kesha said. Not warmly, not coldly, evenly.
I've heard some about you, too, Clare said. Marcus said, "You're the one who called him out when he was being stubborn. " Kesha blinked. "He said that? He said it like it was a good thing. " Clare said that you loved him enough to say the hard thing. Kesha was quiet for a second.
Then she looked at Marcus, then back at Clare. He usually leaves that part out, she said. "He's a little too modest," Clare said. But he listens. Which is the more important thing?
Kesha looked at her for a long moment. Then she said, "The greens smell right. " Miss Jun's improving them, Marcus said. "She always does," Kesha said and walked into the kitchen. Marcus looked at Clare. She raised her eyebrows slightly.
"That's the best I could have hoped for," he exhaled. Dinner happened the way good dinners happen when everyone present has made a private decision to show up as themselves. There were moments of careful navigation. Miss June at one point asked Clare directly how long she'd been widowed and the table went silent for a half second and Clare said 4 years. And Miss June nodded slowly and said, "You know then? " And Clare said, "Yes, ma'am.
I know. " and something passed between those two women that Marcus couldn't fully see but could fail. Some acknowledgement exchanged in the frequency that only people who have lost a spouse can transmit. Darius talked about basketball. Kesha argued with Marcus about whether his cornbread dressing had enough sage. Miss June ate two helpings of the greens she had improved and said nothing.
Was high praise. And Clare sat at Marcus Reed's Thanksgiving table and passed the sweet potatoes and laughed at Darius playbys play of the season's best game and asked Kisha about her work and listened to Miss June's story about the first Thanksgiving after Aliyah was born and she was not performing. She was not trying. She was just there fully genuinely there and the table felt different because of it. Fuller, more complete.
After dinner, while the kids Kesha had brought her daughter, Marcus' 10-year-old niece Maya disappeared into the living room and Kesha and Miss June occupied the kitchen in the way older women occupy kitchens at family gatherings. Marcus and Clare stood on the back porch cold, clear the November sky doing what it does when night comes in early. "How do you feel? " Marcus said. "Like I just ran a marathon," Clare said in a good way. He looked at her.
Miss June doesn't offer second helpings to people she doesn't like. She didn't offer them. She served them without asking. "That's better," Marcus said. Clare smiled, looked at the porch light, "Marcus," she said.