There was silence.

Finally Mrs. O’Brien said, “I might be overstepping. . . .” She licked a finger and rubbed at something on Amelia’s cheek. “Hannah Barnes may be a lovely woman, but she is not your mother.”

Hannah Barnes? Who, Amelia wondered, is Hannah Barnes?

Mrs. O’Brien studied Amelia. “Honey,” she said, “I have no idea what is going on in your head; I haven’t the slightest notion what it is you’re thinking. But you must talk to your father as soon as he gets back.” She paused. “And I haven’t a clue where he went.”

All at once Amelia felt a rush of longing, a deep hollow ache. Fighting tears, she said, as if she were thinking aloud, “So, she’s not my mother.” And she let herself fall into Mrs. O’Brien’s embrace.

An awareness was dawning that her fantasy was not going to happen no matter how much she wanted it to, and for a brief, piercing moment she understood, in a new way, that the most important things in her father’s world did not always, if ever, include her.

23 • Sidestepping

“I don’t understand something,” said Mrs. O’Brien.

“I don’t understand anything,” said Amelia.

“Then let’s sit down and figure this out,” said Mrs. O’Brien. “As best we can,” she added. “Seeing as it really should be your father doing this.”

As soon as they sat at the kitchen table, the phone rang.

“You get it,” said Amelia. “Please.” She didn’t think she could talk to anyone.

Mrs. O’Brien rose, grabbed the receiver of the old-fashioned wall phone with the long, twisty cord, said hello, and then slipped into the pantry and closed the door.

Amelia sensed that it was her father. She could hear Mrs. O’Brien’s muffled voice—rising, rising, then dropping—but she couldn’t understand a single word. When Mrs. O’Brien finally emerged from the pantry, her shoulders were squared and her lips were compressed.

“It was him, wasn’t it?” asked Amelia.

“If you mean your father, yes.”

“What did he say?”

“He said to eat without him. He said he’d be home later. He said he’d talk to you then.”

“Is that all?” Amelia asked timidly.

Apparently Mrs. O’Brien didn’t hear Amelia. Or was she avoiding the question? She looked at Amelia with gentleness and patience. Then she crossed the kitchen to the stove in quick, neat steps. “This sauce is ready,” she said cheerfully. “Let’s make pasta and a salad. We’ll have a nice dinner.”

“Okay,” said Amelia. It was good to have something to focus on, because thinking about talking to her father later made her slightly dizzy.

In fact, her thoughts and feelings were dizzy, contrary, running wildly in all directions. She could feel anger at her father rise up inside her, but then she felt pity for him, too. Pity for a man who, when she saw him on the porch in her mind’s eye, seemed old and confused and who was without his jacket.