Eleanor updated them on the Jacksons’ pool—apparently the permit situation had escalated to a city council agenda item, which Eleanor had attended because Eleanor attended everything. Letty mentioned that her granddaughter wasvisiting from Portland next month and she needed restaurant recommendations, and Vivian said “not the new place on Forest, the portions are an insult” and Eleanor said “the portions are fine, you just don’t like the owner” and Vivian said “I don’t like the ownerandthe portions are an insult, those are separate issues.”
Margo drank her wine and listened and laughed where there was a need. She ate one of Nadine’s crackers, which were obviously from Whole Foods and obviously not homemade, and she didn’t say so because nobody ever said so.
Letty refilled her glass and sat back down beside her.
“You’re quiet tonight,” Letty said.
“I’m always quiet.”
“You’re usually quiet with opinions. Tonight you’re quiet without them.”
Margo looked at her wine. She turned the glass on the arm of the chair the way she turned her coffee cup at the Shack—slowly, a quarter turn, thinking.
“Bernie said something,” she said.
The room didn’t go completely still. That wasn’t how the Circle worked. Vivian kept sipping. Nadine kept eating. Eleanor, across the room, tilted her head a fraction of an inch. The ocean came through the cracked door, steady and low. But Margo could feel the attention gather—not a sound, just the air shifting.
“What did he say?” Letty asked.
“He said he’d had a good evening. And that it wasn’t about the chicken.”
“What chicken?” Vivian asked.
“I made him his mother’s chicken. He’d mentioned it weeks ago and I made it and brought it over and we watched a movie and he said—” She stopped. She was doing it again. Saying more than she meant to. The flamingo cards and the pickles all over again.
“You watched a movie?” Eleanor asked.
“Yes, on his couch.”
“You sat on his couch?”
“I sat on the couch. He sat in the recliner. We watched a movie. It was black and white. He had ice cream. Where else was I supposed to sit?”
“Margo,” Eleanor said, setting down her glass. “You made a man his mother’s recipe from memory, drove to his house, sat on his couch, watched a movie, ate ice cream, and he told you the evening was wonderful, and wasn’t about the chicken.”
“That’s what I said.”
“And you’re asking us what that means?”
“I’m not asking what it means. I’m asking if I’m imagining it.”
Letty put her hand on the arm of Margo’s chair. Not on Margo’s arm—on the chair. Close enough.
“You go over there four times a week,” Letty said gently.
Margo turned her glass a quarter inch. “Three. And he had surgery.”
“The surgery was weeks ago.”
Margo took a sip. She didn’t have a response to that. She’d been telling herself the same thing.
“You’re not imagining it,” Nadine said from her corner.
Everyone looked at Nadine. Nadine rarely spoke in full sentences at Circle. When she did, people listened.
“You’re not imagining anything,” Nadine said. She picked up another cracker. “You’re just slow.”
Vivian almost choked on her wine.
