“How you likin’ that fancy new house of yours?” Buddy asks.
“Oh, I’m just getting used to it,” I say. “My daughter and I were exploring and I found an old tree house out in the woods behind the house. My father mentioned something about it being a place you used to—”
“That ol’ thing still up there?” Buddy asks. “Don’t you go climbin’ it, sweetheart. Do you know how old that thing is? I haven’t seen it in … I don’t know … prob’ly forty years, you think, Ellie?” He looks at his sister, who has completely lost whatever smile she had.
“It should come down,” she says. “Seriously.” She looks at me. “You should have someone take it down.”
“I think it’s totally safe and solid,” I say. “My husband replaced some of the old boards and built new steps going up to it.”
“Don’t know why anyone’d want to build a house in them woods anyhow,” Buddy mutters. I have the feeling he’s not talking about the tree house any longer. He means my house.
Ellie looks down at the bag of za’atar in her hand and for a moment the only sound in the room is the voice of the game show host. The silence isn’t benign, though. There’s something going on in this room I don’t understand. Awkwardly, I speak up.
“I’ve been thinking about your offer to practice yoga with me,” I say to Ellie. “I’d really like that. I think I can use it.”
She doesn’t answer. She stares at me and I see the wheels turning in her head; I just don’t know why. “Do you have time with your work and your daughter and fixing up your house?” she asks. She doesn’t sound enthusiastic. As a matter of fact, all in all, she is a different woman than she was the first time I met her when she’d warmly invited me into her kitchen for tea and conversation.
“I can make time,” I say. “I need to do something physical. And peaceful. But I understand if you’re too busy,” I add. I soften my voice. “I know you have your hands full.”
“She ain’t too busy,” Buddy says from the couch. “And she needs someone to talk to besides me and Mama, don’t you, Ellie?”
Ellie’s lips form a tight line. “Let’s go out front,” she says to me, walking toward the door.
I nod. “Goodbye, Mrs. Hockley,” I call, but the old woman doesn’t seem to hear me. I smile down at Buddy. “Bye-bye.”
“You tell your daddy ‘hey’ from me,” Buddy says. “He was a good mayor. Not like that girl we got now.”
“I’ll tell him,” I say, and I follow Ellie outside.
On the porch, she turns to face me. “I’m afraid I might have spoken too soon about the yoga,” she says. She looks through the screen door as if she can see her brother and mother in the living room, but all I can see is the square light of the TV. “Mama is in worse shape than I thought … mentally, and my brother’s going downhill faster than I anticipated,” she says. “Hospice is involved now, but I worry about leaving them alone for too long. And I’ve gotten busy with some other projects. Doing a bit of writing and keeping in touch with a couple of organizations back in San Francisco. Helping them out.”
“Oh, I understand,” I say, but there’s something weird going on here. Maybe she’s already grieving her brother and mother. Her only family. I remember how I felt that last month of my mother’s life as Daddy and I journeyed with her toward the inevitable. I didn’t know night from day back then. The faraway look I see now in Ellie’s eyes had been in my own during those last few weeks. I was never quite in the present, but rather in that place that hovered between hope and reality. “I’m sorry for what you’re going through,” I say. “Please let me know if there’s any way I can help.”
“Well”—she holds the za’atar in the air—“you already have. Mama won’t eat it but Buddy and I will both enjoy this.” She looks down Shadow Ridge Lane toward my house. “Is the lake still back there?” Her tone is casual, but something in her face tells me the question is loaded.
“Ugh, yes,” I say. “Jackson—my husband—and some of his friends cleared a trail that goes in a big loop through the woods behind our house. It doesn’t quite reach the lake, but you can see the water from the trail. There’s all these vines and probably poison ivy and snakes you’d have to go through to get to the lake, and the water doesn’t look … It looks gross, at least from where I was standing.”