A Song for the Road

pine trees seemed to whisper, “Be bold, Sassafras.”
Letting the locket fall, Miriam squared her shoulders and strode back along the road toward the highway.

 7
April, one year earlier
Atlanta, Georgia
ON THE LAST DAY Miriam ever spent with Teo, he brought her flowers.
She hadn’t slept well the night before. Not with Talia’s words rattling in her brain: “Are you cheating on Dad?”
It wasn’t the accusation; Miriam knew her own innocence. It was the fact that Talia even thought it possible.
Teo, of course, had slept fine. Teenage drama always slid off his back; he’d been singing Argentine folk songs all morning. They’d set aside this day for home improvements: touching up the paint on the wraparound porch, nailing down a board that had sprung free over the winter, and installing landscaping stones.
It was a lot to accomplish before Teo and the kids caught a late-afternoon flight to San Francisco. Tomorrow the twins would rehearse with their competition accompanists, and on Sunday they would compete for ten-thousand-dollar scholarships—the final round of a competition they’d been working their way through all school year.
Miriam had her own list of things to do. Practicing the concerto she was to perform with the local symphony this weekend, for starters. Double-checking the kids’ suitcases, to make sure they hadn’t forgotten anything. And squeezing in as much of the camping gear as possible, so that when she joined them on Monday for their low-budget vacation, they wouldn’t have to rent too much equipment.
When she got inside, she found the breakfast dishes piled haphazardly by the sink. “Teenagers,” Miriam muttered. She opened the dishwasher only to discover it hadn’t been emptied. She washed her hands and started putting plates in the cabinet.
She felt Teo’s presence behind her before he touched her—the warmth, the smell of dirt and sweat. He pressed his body into her back and put his arms around her. “Hey, beautiful.”
“Stop it, Teo. I’m gross. And you’re dropping dirt clods all over the floor.”
“I’ll clean it up.” He lifted her ponytail and kissed the juncture of her neck and shoulder. “Come on, Mira. How often do we get a day off work together without the kids around?”
Her body wanted to respond, but she really wasn’t in the mood. Even so, her lips curved upward. “It’s the wrong time of the month for that, unless you want another kid.”
He chuckled. “I know. Doesn’t mean we can’t have a little fun.” His hands went exploring, and Miriam’s knees went weak.
She maneuvered her shoulder up and shoved him away. “Cut it out, Teo. I still have work to do. And so do you.”
But she couldn’t mask her smile, and as he retreated, she heard him chuckling. Miriam wanted to be annoyed, but it seemed stupid to cling to negativity if she had the choice.
When Teo came home a couple hours later, after picking up Talia and Blaise, he brought with him a bunch of wildflowers he’d picked from the ditch in front of the school. He presented them to Miriam, wrapped gently in his coat, like Juan Diego before the bishop.
It wasn’t eagerness Miriam saw in his eyes—they were far beyond that; he no longer expected her to respond like a woman being wooed. It was simply devotion, devoid of expectation.
And as she’d stood there, her lips forming a tolerant query about how many bugs he’d just brought into the house, she caught Talia’s eye. Her daughter stood at the sink, running a glass of water and glaring at her. The air between them thrummed with the previous night’s parting shot. “You can’t fight with someone who has no heart.”
Talia was right. The thought came like a sucker punch to the gut. Miriam had fallen into a pattern of negativity, and no matter what Teo did, he couldn’t break it.
But there was barely time to have the thought, let alone ponder it.
“Talia, you left your backpack on the piano bench again!” Blaise called from the front room, and Talia dropped her cup in the sink and tore from the room, screaming: “Don’t you dare throw it on the floor—it has my iPad in it!” Followed soon thereafter by “Where’s my charger?” and “Who took my purse! I need my license for airport security!” And then even Blaise was showing his nerves, his normally placid demeanor dissolving into a cutting remark that caused his sister to burst into tears. Miriam snapped at her son, and he flung himself onto the piano bench and launched into Beethoven’s Tempest sonata with the fury only a persecuted seventeen-year-old could summon.
And then Talia was dragging her to the piano for one last run-through of Grieg, and snapping at her about tempos. “I’m doing that on purpose,” Miriam said. “You don’t know what your competition accompanist might do. You have to be ready.” Talia mumbled something Miriam chose not to hear. And Teo was shoving microwaved burritos at them and interrupting half a dozen times to ask about things she’d packed hours ago.
By the time Teo got the suitcases and the music satchels and Talia’s computer bag and the cello loaded in the van, Miriam was ready to wash her hands of them. Let Teo deal with the teenage hormones for a couple of days.
“Let’s go! We’ve got a flight to catch!” he bellowed from the doorway, and a minor stampede ensued.
Miriam walked them to the security gate at the airport. Blaise went first, his flighty kiss burning her cheek. Talia rushed past with barely a glance, only to be stopped by Teo. “Hey,” he said. “What do you think you’re doing, leaving without giving your mother a kiss?”
Talia’s eyes flashed, but she never argued with Teo. She turned back and gave Miriam the most thin-lipped, least satisfying peck on the cheek ever.
Teo sighed as Talia glided forward, nose in the air, all poise and grace, and handed her boarding pass and driver’s license to the TSA agent. “I’m sorry, Mira,” he said. “It’s just nerves. It’ll be better after the competition.”
It wasn’t, and it wouldn’t, and they both