The silver carving knife slipped on the bone of the Easter ham, leaving a thin red line across my thumb that nobody at the table noticed. They were too busy staring at the hallway that led to my empty upstairs bedrooms.
“It is only four steps up from the main landing, Margaret,” Linda Mercer said, her voice dripping with sweet, dramatic tones. She adjusted her heavy silver earrings, the metal clicking against her collarbone. “Frank can manage four steps. He does not need a ranch house yet.”
Frank, her husband, cleared his throat repeatedly before he spoke. His low, gravelly voice seemed to rattle the fine china my late husband had bought me for our twentieth anniversary. “The apartment complex in Dublin is raising our rent by four hundred dollars a month. We have to be out of there by the first of May.”
I rubbed my gold wedding band, sliding it back and forth over my knuckle. The smell of the glazed ham and roasted asparagus suddenly made me feel slightly ill.
“That is exactly six weeks away,” I said, choosing my words slowly and deliberately.
Vanessa, my daughter-in-law, tapped her long, manicured fingernails against the edge of her water glass. The rhythmic clicking sounded like a countdown. “That is why we need to make decisions today, Margaret. It makes perfect sense for Mom and Dad to move in here.”
My son, Daniel, did not look at me. He kept his eyes on his plate, cutting his ham into tiny, identical squares. He checked his watch, a nervous habit he had developed over the last year as his own debts began to climb.
“It is a four-bedroom house, Mom,” Daniel said in a rapid, defensive burst. “You are rattled by the maintenance. Having Frank around to help with the yard would save you money.”
“I have a service for the yard, Daniel,” I said.
“Which costs eighty dollars a week,” Vanessa said, her voice rising to a sharp, high-pitched insistence. “That is money that could go toward your retirement. Or toward helping Daniel with his truck payments.”
“My retirement is secure,” I said, keeping my hands flat on the white linen napkin in my lap. “And this is my home.”
