The Marriage Portrait

“It’s pot roast.”

He smiled. “I thought so.” She’d made it for him every year on his birthday ever since he could remember.

“It’s a lot of food for just two people,” she said as they stepped into the kitchen. “You should have brought a friend.”

“You’re the only one I want to be with on my birthday, Tessie. You know that.”

She carried the lilacs over to the sink where a cut crystal vase sat on the counter. As she filled the vase with water, she said, “Has it been a nice birthday so far?”

“Yes, I’ve had a very nice day,” he told her, which wasn’t exactly the truth, but it wasn’t a lie, either. Just because he didn’t want to celebrate his birthday didn’t mean he should tell her that. He couldn’t tell her that, not after all the preparations she’d made. “They had a cake for me at the office.”

“I knew they were going to. Tabitha called and said they were going to throw you a surprise party, but I told her that it wouldn’t be a good idea.”

“Thank you for saying that. You know I’m not fond of birthdays.”

She set the flowers on the dining room table. “I know. That’s why I didn’t make a cake. I made pie. Lemon meringue.”

Another of his favorites. “You shouldn’t spoil me.”

She smiled innocently as she walked past him. “You’re fun to spoil. I’m surprised some other woman hasn’t discovered that by now.”

He let the remark slip without commenting. In recent months she’d been mentioning his single status more often. Michael thought it was probably because the older she became, the more she worried about him not having someone to share his life with after she was gone.

As she tied an apron around her waist, he said, “Is there anything I can do to help?”

She gave him a gentle shove toward the dining room. “It’s your birthday. You sit while I dish it up. It won’t take me but a few minutes.”

“But I want to help,” he insisted.

“Then open the wine and pour us each a glass,” she instructed. “There’s a bottle of white zinfandel chilling in the dining room.”

When he walked into the dining room, he saw the wine bucket with the bottle inside. He also noticed that there were not one but two pies cooling on the sideboard. When Tessie carried in a platter of pot roast with potatoes and vegetables, he asked, “Do we each get a pie for dessert?”

“As long as I was making one I thought I might as well make two. You never know when you’ll get unexpected company,” she answered innocently.

“You didn’t invite anyone over tonight, did you?”

“Of course not,” she answered quickly, then disappeared into the kitchen again.

When she returned, she carried the bun warmer and a large bowl of salad. “I think that’s about it,” she said, untying the apron from around her waist. “Shall we sit down?”

He held her chair for her, then after she was settled, took his own spot to her right. Before eating, she reached for his hand and covered it with hers. “I feel very blessed, Michael, to be able to celebrate another birthday with you, although you should be celebrating with someone young and pretty.”

“On this day, it wouldn’t seem right to spend it anywhere but here with you.” He lifted her hands to his lips and brushed a kiss across her knuckles. “I owe you so much.”

“You don’t owe me, Michael. When love is given, it should be given freely, not with expectations of getting something in return. You’ve brought me such great joy….” she paused, as emotion choked her throat. She pulled her hand out of his and reached for the handkerchief in her pocket. “This is a happy occasion, not a sad one,” she said, dabbing at her eyes with the embroidered white linen cloth. “So no more of this schmaltz. Let’s have a nice dinner together and you can tell me what your day was like at the clinic.”

Michael did use his work as dinner conversation, knowing that Tessie loved animals as much as he did. If there was one person who understood his passion for his work, it was Tessie, and she’d always encouraged him to follow his dream of becoming a vet.

It was a nice way to spend one’s birthday and the way he’d spent all of his—or at least the ones he could remember. He’d arrived at the McFerrin home when he was only four. Tessie and her husband had been taking in foster children most of their married life. Shortly before Michael had arrived, they’d decided to put their efforts into doing other types of volunteer work.

But then a friend of Tessie’s had told her about Michael. Only four years old, he needed a place to stay while his mother waited for her trial to begin. As soon as Tessie had taken one look at him, she’d convinced Frank that they should take in one more foster child. When Michael’s mother had been sentenced to a long prison term, Frank agreed with Tessie that they would provide a home for him as long as it was necessary.

Little did anyone know that Michael’s birth mother would die of pneumonia while serving her sentence. When that happened, Tessie convinced Frank to adopt Michael, since there were no other living relatives. Michael had been a McFerrin for less than a year when Frank had a massive coronary and Tessie was left to raise him alone.

“I’d like to propose a toast,” she said, raising her wineglass in the air. “To another year of good health and happiness in your work.” She clinked her glass against his, then took a sip of the wine. “Now, when you’ve finished eating, I have a surprise for you.”

“You weren’t supposed to buy me a birthday present. I don’t need anything but your love,” he said, reaching across to squeeze her hand.

She smiled. “That’s very sweet of you to say, but I happen to disagree.”

He simply returned her smile and decided to graciously accept the shirt and tie she’d probably spent an afternoon finding for him. Only he soon discovered it wasn’t a gift of clothing that she’d purchased for him. When they’d finished eating, she handed him an envelope.

“Go ahead. Open it. It won’t bite,” she teased as he hesitated.

She had such an expectant look of joy on her face, he knew he couldn’t say another word but had to simply open the card and pretend to be thrilled. He guessed it contained a gift certificate to his favorite men’s clothing store.

It didn’t. Inside was an invitation to dinner. Michael glanced at Tessie, who was watching him for his reaction. “Dinner at eight on Saturday?”

She nodded excitedly.

“But with whom?”

“That’s the surprise,” Tessie told him with a gleeful glint in her eye.

“You’ve arranged for me to have dinner with someone,” he repeated the obvious.

“Seven people, actually,” she confessed.

Puzzled, he frowned, trying to figure out what she had planned. Then it hit him. It was probably dinner with seven of the Mums, the ladies his mother met with regularly on the pretext of discussing gardening, but he knew that they were more than a garden club. They were friends. Friends who wanted to help him celebrate his birthday.

A smile slowly spread across his face. “So you are giving me a party, after all,” he said in a knowing tone.

“Oh, no. It’s not a birthday party. It’s a dinner,” she corrected him.

“By any chance is it a dinner with some lovely ladies?” he asked with a sly smile.

“Yes, it is.” She regarded him cautiously. “Did one of the girls let the secret out of the bag? Louella promised me she wouldn’t say anything when she took Toby in for his shots.”

“Louella didn’t say anything,” he reassured her.

“Then how did you know?” Now she was the one looking totally confused.

He reached across the table to pat her hand. “I didn’t. I’m just a good guesser.”

She looked a bit apologetic as she said, “It’s not what you wanted, is it?”

“It’s a lovely surprise.”