The Sweetness of Forgetting (9)

I swallow back a lump as I ring the doorbell beside her name: Rose McKenna. I can hear her shuffling around inside, probably getting up from her recliner with some effort, moving toward the door with the cane she’s been using since she fell and broke her hip two years ago.

The door opens, and I resist the urge to throw myself into her arms for a hug, the way I used to do when I was a little girl. Up until this moment, I’d thought I’d come here for her, but now I realize it’s for me. I need this. I need to see someone who loves me, even if it’s an imperfect love.

“Hello,” Mamie says, smiling at me. Her hair looks whiter than the last time I saw her, the lines in her face deeper. But as always, she’s wearing her burgundy lipstick, and her eyes are rimmed in kohl and mascara. “What a surprise, dear.”

Her words are tinged with the hint of a French accent that has all but disappeared. She’s been in the United States since the early 1940s, but the traces of her long-ago past still shroud her words like one of the feather-light French scarves she almost always has wrapped around her neck.

I reach forward to hug her. When I was younger, she was solid and strong. Now, as she leans into the embrace, I can feel the bones of her spine, the sharpness of her shoulders.

“Hi, Mamie,” I say softly, blinking back tears as I pull away.

She stares at me through gray eyes that are clouded over. “You will have to forgive me,” she says. “I get a little forgetful sometimes. Which one are you, dear? I know I should remember.”

I swallow hard. “I’m Hope, Mamie. Your granddaughter.”

“Of course.” She smiles at me, but her gray eyes are foggy. “I knew that. I just need a reminder sometimes. Please, come in.”

I follow her inside her dimly lit apartment, where she leads me to the living room window.

“I was just watching the sunset, my dear,” she says. “In a moment, we’ll be able to see the evening star.”





Chapter Three



North Star Vanilla Cupcakes



CUPCAKES

INGREDIENTS

1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature

1 1/2 cups granulated sugar





4 large eggs


1 tsp. pure vanilla extract





3 cups flour


3 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. salt

1/2 cup milk

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line 24 muffin cups with paper liners.

2. In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar using electric mixer. Beat until light and fluffy, then beat in eggs one at a time. Beat in vanilla extract and mix well.

3. Sift together flour, baking powder and salt, and add to the butter mixture, about a cup at a time, alternating with milk.

4. Fill muffin cups about halfway. Bake for 15–20 minutes, or just until a knife inserted through the top of a cupcake comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes in pan, then move to wire rack to cool completely.

5. Wait until they’ve cooled completely, then frost with pink icing (recipe below).

PINK ICING

INGREDIENTS

1 cup unsalted butter, slightly softened

4 cups confectioners’ sugar

1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

1 tsp. milk

1–3 drops red food coloring

DIRECTIONS

1. Beat the butter in a medium bowl with an electric mixer until light and fluffy.

2. Gradually add the sugar and beat until well blended.

3. Add the vanilla and milk and continue to beat until well blended.

4. Add one drop of red food coloring and beat well to incorporate. If you’d like the icing to be a deeper pink, add one or two drops more, and beat after each drop to incorporate. Spread on cupcakes, as directed above.





Rose

Rose gazed out the window, searching, as she always did, for the first star on the horizon. She knew it would appear, as twinkling and brilliant as an eternal flame, just after the setting sun painted the sky in ribbons of fire and light. When she was a girl, they’d called this twilight l’heure bleue, the blue hour, the time when the earth was neither completely light nor completely dark. Rose had always found comfort in this middle ground.

The evening star, which appeared each night during the deep velvet twilight, had always been her favorite, although it wasn’t a star at all; it was the planet Venus, the planet named after the goddess of love. She had learned that long ago, but it hadn’t changed anything, not really; here on earth, it was hard to tell what was a star and what wasn’t. For years, she had counted all the stars she could see in the night sky. She was always searching for something, but she hadn’t found it yet. She didn’t deserve to, she knew, and that made her sad. A lot of things made her sad these days. But sometimes, from one day to the next, she couldn’t remember what she was crying for.

Alzheimer’s. She knew she had it. She heard the whispers in the halls. She had watched her neighbors in the home come and go, their memories slipping further with each passing day. She knew that the same thing was happening to her, and it scared her for reasons no one would understand. She dared not speak them aloud. It was too late.

Rose knew that the girl with the glistening brown hair, the familiar features, and the beautifully sad eyes had just told her who she was, but she had already forgotten. A familiar panic rose in her throat. She wished she could grab the memories like lifelines and hold on before she went under. But she found them slippery, impossible to grasp. So she cleared her throat, forced a smile, and hazarded her best guess.