Abide With Me

Before Andrea could answer, the restaurant’s owner, Caroline, arrived with a tray. “Running later than you. As usual. Here’s your decaf and a fresh iced tea for you, Andrea. I’ll keep an eye out for your sister, too,” she teased, then promptly moved to the next table.

Jenny’s frown turned into a grin. “You can’t get away with a thing here, can you? Poor Madge. We’ll have to make sure we put something special on her tombstone…something like, ‘She finally made it on time.’”

Andrea rolled her eyes, relieved that Jenny’s natural good humor had returned. “I don’t even want to think about what you’d put on mine. Or anyone else’s tombstone, for that matter,” she added, if only to divert her thoughts away from the very real possibility that a tombstone was in her own near future. “You know Madge. She had a last minute stop for something. Or a last minute phone call. Or a meandering drive in her new convertible. Or she lost track of time working in her garden.”

Jenny added some cream to her coffee. “Sandra used to get so mad at her. She nearly missed one of her doctor appointments once because Madge was late.”

“Speaking of Madge…” Andrea pointed to the window. “Here she comes.”

By the time Jenny looked out of the window, Madge had pulled into a parallel spot across the street.

Andrea shook her head. “That’s about the…the…”

“The purplest car you ever saw?” Jenny giggled. “Is that even a word? Purplest?”

Andrea nodded and turned her attention back to Jenny. “I suppose it is. She even made Roy, down at the car dealership, write it on the order. The convertible had to be the purplest it could be, despite the fact there was only one possible purple color the factory could use. I guess it just made her feel better to tell them what she wanted.”

“Like the lavender top?”

Andrea chuckled. “No. They wouldn’t even attempt that. The car came with a white top, but Russell made a few calls and found a place to custom order the lavender one before Madge even saw the white one.”

“Well, I like it.”

Andrea shook her head and stirred some artificial sweetener into her fresh tea. Madge had a storybook life: a devoted husband, Russell Stevens, who spoiled her; two successful, grown sons, Drew and Brett, who loved their mother to pieces; a valued place in the community. Madge also had both the time and the money to be as eccentric as she wanted to be, and because she was such a giving soul, most people forgave her most anything.

Andrea wondered what it might be like to have someone in her life to carry the financial burdens, then immediately snipped a tiny ribbon of jealousy that almost wrapped around her thoughts. “The car suits Madge, but honestly, I’m getting a little worried,” Andrea admitted. “She’s a little too obsessed with the color, if you ask me. Did you know when she ordered her annuals for her garden this year, she insisted that every flower had to be purple? She went online, got a list of every flowering plant with purple flowers that would grow in this area and took the list straight to the nursery! And that was after she bought new cushions for her patio furniture, all in purple.”

Jenny took a sip of coffee and let out a sigh. “That’s just her way.”

“Well, it’s harmless enough, I suppose. It’s just odd.”

“Sandra’s favorite color was purple. Remember?”

Startled, Andrea nearly choked on her tea. When she cleared her throat, she looked straight into Jenny’s eyes. “You’re right. I’d…I’d forgotten.”

Jenny offered a warm smile. “I think it makes Madge feel closer to Sandra. They spent an awful lot of time together. It’s been nine months now since Sandra died, and I think it’s Madge’s way of saying, ‘I remember you, Sandra, and I miss you.’ Even if Madge doesn’t realize it herself.”

“What don’t I realize?” Madge asked as she nudged Jenny to move over to make room for her to sit down. She laid a bakery box in the center of the table and slid in beside her younger sister.

“Time. Being on time is important,” Andrea prompted gently, still mothering the sister who was younger by only two years. Old habits die hard.

Jenny stared at the bakery box and squealed. “Spinners! You stopped for Spinners!”

“They were Sandra’s favorite so I thought we should have them today. In her memory,” Madge suggested. Her eyes filled with tears, and she toyed with one of her amethyst earrings, the most recent of the gifts Russell invariably brought home with him from one of his sales trips.

Her words were barely spoken before Caroline appeared with a mug of decaf for Madge and a plate for the Spinners. “Here you go.” She set the mug in front of Madge, opened the bakery box and lined the plate with the Spinners, which were bite-size pieces of sweet dough spun with cinnamon and smothered with either vanilla or chocolate icing or glazed with sugar. “Enjoy. I’ll be back in a minute for your order,” Caroline said, and carried the empty box away with her.

Jenny shook her head. “Caroline’s such a dear. If I take outside food into the hospital cafeteria, they’re ready to call a guard!”

“This is The Diner. She wants her customers to feel at home,” Madge countered.

“Sandra once walked all the way to McAllister’s to get Spinners during a blizzard. Remember?” Andrea took a chocolate Spinner and offered the first “Sandra story,” officially beginning the Sisters’ Breakfast. Tradition called for sharing memories, happy memories—from childhood to adulthood and anything in between.

“But that’s not the whole story,” Madge insisted.

“Walking two miles to anywhere in a blizzard is a story in and of itself,” Andrea insisted.

Madge finished a sugar Spinner and tilted up her chin. “Anyone can walk two miles in a blizzard, but only Sandra would have enough nerve to go around the back of the balcony, climb the stairs to the residence on the second floor, and insist that Mr. McAllister go downstairs and open up the store so she could buy some Spinners.”

Andrea’s eyes widened. With her mouth full, she could not voice a question, but Madge simply patted her arm.

“Sandra was…Sandra. She always knew what she wanted, and she always knew how to get it. Besides, she just didn’t go to the bakery to get some Spinners for herself. The blizzard hit midday, remember?”

Andrea nodded as she tried to swallow the last bite.

“Well, she knew the bakery had been forced to close down without selling out, and she also knew the road crews would be out working all night clearing the streets. So she convinced Mr. McAllister to sell her a few dozen Spinners, along with everything else he had. Then she loaded up her sled, walked down the avenue to the public works garage, dropped off the sweets from the bakery and got herself back home.”

“Just in time for Jeopardy,” Jenny added. Her eyes grew misty.

Andrea took a long sip of iced tea and wrapped her hand around the glass. “You both knew that story. Why didn’t I?”

Jenny shrugged her shoulders.

Madge’s eyes twinkled. “You’re always working. Besides, you don’t know everything, even if you are the old est,” she teased. “That’s why we’re here together, isn’t it? To share our stories?”

Caroline interrupted to take their breakfast orders. Andrea was grateful for the extra time to think of her own Sandra story, and she was ready by the time Caroline left. She glanced at Jenny. “When Sandra left to get married for the first time, how old were you? Three?”

Jenny tilted up her chin. “I was four, thank you. And very mature for my age.”

Andrea grinned. “Then you missed the infamous black slip story.”

Madge’s eyes widened. “You’re telling that story?”

“Of course. I don’t think I can not tell that story.”

“I know all about the black slip,” Jenny insisted. “When she was a teenager, Sandra had a part-time job cleaning for some elderly lady who lived nearby, and she spent every dime on lingerie. Beautiful, expensive lingerie.”

“Mrs. Calloway,” Madge offered, and her eyes lit with a flash of sudden intuition that Andrea did not miss.

“Anyway,” Andrea continued, “Sandra’s black slip just disappeared. She blamed Madge. Madge denied taking it, and from there, a monumental shouting match. Of course, shouting and screaming never resolved anything. Sandra and Madge each held their ground. For weeks after, Sandra would make snide remarks, blaming Madge for the missing black slip, and Madge would play the wounded victim of ‘rash judgment.’” She shook her head. “Then Mother found the black slip when she was housecleaning. The slip was stuck behind Sandra’s bureau, caught between the bureau and the wall. Mother said it looked like the slip had somehow gotten wedged behind the bureau after sliding off the laundry she piled on each of our bureaus on wash day. Sandra was grounded for a month.”

Madge’s cheeks blushed pink. “And she spent even longer apologizing.”

“And well she should have,” Andrea cautioned.

Caroline arrived with plates piled high with steaming hotcakes and browned sausages. After quickly refilling their beverages and removing the now-empty Spinner plate, she left the three sisters to enjoy their breakfasts.

Andrea slathered her stack of hotcakes with butter, cut off a generous piece and savored the bite.