The Kindest Lie(104)

Ruth stood there, still in slight shock, gazing at her husband and trying to catch up on what was happening. Eli walked in with the kids trailing behind him and slapped Xavier’s back. “Hey, man, let’s watch the game,” he said, and Xavier shrugged at her before disappearing into the living room.

Where did things really stand between them now? She couldn’t be sure. In a way, she understood Mama’s lies but hadn’t fully forgiven them. Had Xavier forgiven hers?



Hours later, after they’d feasted on pork roast, black-eyed peas, and corn bread, she waited for the right moment to pull him aside to talk. But now she found Xavier hunched over Mama’s old record player.

“This is a classic right here, Mama Tuttle.”

Mama rocked back and forth on the recliner until she got enough momentum to stand and move to the buffet table, where he had opened a drawer to reveal stacks of album covers. She nodded permission for Xavier to peruse them.

“Ohh. Temptations, Etta James, Al Green, James Brown. You’re taking me way back now.” He licked his lips and rubbed his hands together. It warmed her to watch him be so easy with her grandmother.

Mama put one hand on her hip. “I think some of these take you back way before you were even born, child.”

“Oh, my folks raised me on the Supremes and Marvin Gaye, all of this. That’s all they played in our house. May I?”

Before Mama had time to answer him, Xavier blew dust off an LP and placed it on the turntable, sliding the needle on the record. Within seconds, the song “My Girl” filled their living room for the first time since Papa died.

“May I?” Xavier asked again. This time, he extended his hand. Ruth watched from her position next to Eli and Cassie on the sofa, the kids on the floor, and Dino on a folding chair pulled from the closet.

Only their fingertips touched at first, and then Mama let her grandson-in-law take her hand and wrap his arm around her back. She stood stiffly in place at first until he crooned in her ear. As if her feet were brand-new and she’d never walked before, she moved into the curve of his arm and swayed woodenly with him to the melody.

Eli called out to her. “You can do better than that, Mama. Show that big-city boy what you working with. Show him how we do it in Ganton.”

Mama shot Eli a look of feigned reproach and then turned her attention back to Xavier. She must have seen what had attracted her granddaughter to the man—his effusive charm, the way he made you feel like the most special person in the world.

A fullness she couldn’t quite describe rose within Ruth, and she regretted not bringing Xavier around her family all these years. But now, when she tried to catch her husband’s eye, he avoided looking at her.

Xavier took both of Mama’s hands in his and gently twirled her, even dipping her twice, and she let him. Only then, when watching their fancy footwork, did Ruth notice her husband’s shoes. The Magnanni leather shoes she’d bought him for Christmas. She’d left them wrapped in a box under the tree. He’d opened her gift and worn the shoes here. That had to mean something. Everyone clapped and catcalled at the end of their dance, encouraging an encore.

“You’re all right now, Mama Tuttle. I like your style,” Xavier said when she sang along with him. “And you can sing, too. I’m impressed.”

“Oh, I do a little something,” she said, taking a stage bow as if she were standing before thousands at Carnegie Hall.

After the others got up to dance, Ruth seized her chance to grab her husband’s hand and lead him away from her family to her childhood bedroom. She cringed imagining how it must have looked through his eyes. Just being alone with him in this room where she’d brought a life into the world unnerved her.

“Look.”

“Hey.”

They spoke at the same time, stumbling over each other’s words. Nervous laughter buzzed between them.

“You go first,” Xavier said.

“I don’t know where to begin or how to begin. We’ve been away from each other for such a long time and so much has happened that I haven’t been able to process it all. I just know . . . I’ve missed you. Really missed you.” She paused and studied his face, hoping for a glimpse behind the mask. “You’re so quiet and it’s scaring me.”

Backing away from her, Xavier knelt over his luggage and pulled out a wooden box. Confused, she asked, “What are you doing?”

Opening the box, he pulled out a piece of yellow folded paper. Taking her hand, he placed it in her palm. It was one of the colorful notes from their gratitude box, she recognized. The last time she’d read what he’d written, their marriage had begun to splinter. Fear squeezed her heart and made her hands tremble. Unfolding the paper slowly, she sucked in a breath and read his neat cursive. Us, Always Us.

“I’ve missed you, too,” he said.

She knew they still had unfinished business and a lot to work through to make things right again. But maybe it wasn’t about going back to some earlier point in time in their marriage. Maybe you just continued wherever you were, wiser from all you knew, stronger from all the burdens you’d carried.

“All right, you lovebirds, get on out here,” Eli called to them. They held each other’s gaze for a moment longer and then rejoined the rest of the family.

Eli rose to get Mama’s good glasses from the cabinet and fill them with eggnog, adding a shot of bourbon, and for once their grandmother didn’t protest. They toasted everything they could think of. Old friends becoming lovers. The new president in all his swagger. And Papa, who was surely looking down and smiling on them all.