Blueberry Hill: a Sister's Story(23)

Before we leave I have a chance to talk with Debi, and I say it’s good that her dad didn’t bring his wife. Debi, who in many ways has grown to be like Donna, frowns.

“Are you kidding?” she says. “I told Daddy that if Cyndi Lou shows up anywhere near the wedding, I’d have him thrown out!”

I hug my niece to my chest and whisper, “Thank you.” I want to say Bless your heart, honey, you’re just like Donna, but I don’t because it sounds too much like Mama.





When the Leaves Fall




All too soon the summer is gone and other than Debi getting married, little has changed. This life of hoping for change is painful in more ways than it is possible to count. I think it is because our expectations have risen. During the months prior to the wedding and even for a short while afterward, Donna seemed somehow better. More alive. Happier. But with the coming of winter, that happiness has waned.

A month or so after I have packed away my summer dresses and thoughts of warm sunny days, I get a telephone call from Debi.

“Hi, Aunt Bette,” she says. Her voice is exceptionally cheerful.

“You sound happy,” I say.

“I am,” she answers. “You’re going to be a great aunt.”

Not immediately catching the inference of what she’s said I laugh. “I thought I already was a great aunt.”

“No.” Debi stretches the word out, slowing the conversation. “I mean you are going to be a Great Aunt!”

When she puts emphasis on the word “great” I suddenly catch on. “Oh my goodness! You’re having a baby?”

“Yes,” she giggles.

The usual barrage of questions follows: When is the baby due? Do you know if it’s a boy or girl? And most importantly, does your mom know? When Debi and I talk, my sister becomes her mom.

Debi laughs. “Of course Mom knows. Jim and I went down this weekend and told her.”

“She must be so excited.”

“Excited is hardly the word for it. We went shopping, and she bought a whole bunch of yarn so she could start crocheting a baby blanket.”

We talk for a while, and before I hang up I realize this will not be a terrible winter.



Donna only knows how to crochet one thing: granny squares. I imagine by this time she has ten, maybe twelve squares waiting to be hooked together. That same afternoon I call her, and I talk for almost twenty minutes with her tapping out answers. When I ask how many squares she has made she taps out the number, but there are so many taps I lose count.

“Eleven?” I guess.

Tap, tap.

“More?”

Tap.

“Fourteen?”

Tap, tap.

We continue through this game until I hit seventeen, and then I get a single tap. “You’ve got seventeen squares done?” I laugh. “You can slow down, the baby’s not due until April.”

I hear the chuff of her laughter.

When we finally hang up I feel the surge of expectation returning. Once again I believe something good will happen. I believe my sister will get well. Maybe not the dancing, drinking, partying woman she once was but well enough to have this chunk of metal removed from her throat. Donna can do it, I tell myself. She’s strong, she’s tough, and she’s going to be a grandma.



That Christmas we celebrate like never before. The whole family comes to our house. They arrive on Christmas Eve and stay until the day after Christmas. Mama and Donna drive up from Maryland, and this time Floyd comes even though there will be a crowd.

“Don’t expect he’ll answer anything you ask,” Mama says, “because he’s not wearing his hearing aid.”

When we sit down to dinner on Christmas Eve Donna sits next to Debi, who is now full and round. Dick says grace, and we thank the Lord for all he has given us. I take the words Dick says and place them inside my heart along with the hope that we will soon hear Donna speak again. She looks good, and she is eating better than she has in a long time. The gauntness has left her face, and when she smiles it is like the years have rolled back.

Beneath the tree sits a mountain of presents. Many of them are small things: a pair of socks, a box of notepaper, a bottle of nail polish. The joy of this night does not come from the value of the gift; it comes from the fun of being together, giving and getting small surprises.

Our baby sister, Geri, has gone overboard in being creative. She arrives with stockings filled with gifts for everyone, and this is the year of the walnut. There are two or three walnuts in every stocking. Some have been pulled open, the nutmeat scooped out, a small trinket placed inside, and then glued back together.

Donna, the practical joker in our family, is this night the butt of the walnut jokes. As we one by one pry open the walnuts, I shout, “Oh, wow, I got a key chain!”

Mama shouts, “Mine has a dollar bill inside!”

As Donna pries open her walnut and shows it to us, she mouths the words, My walnut is just a walnut.

We laugh. Then we move to the next round and the next. It is always the same; Donna’s walnut is nothing more than a walnut. We all understand that this way of joking with Donna is our way of making her feel normal, of making her feel we have no need to tiptoe around her silence.

Donna can’t speak and Floyd can’t hear, but we are together. We are a family, and we are happy.