The Lavender Dress Went to the Party

Dinner

We sat at a table near the front with my second cousins from Clark. Mom ate the prime rib. She ate the baked potato and the green beans almondine and a roll with butter. She chatted with the cousins about their grandkids and the rain they were getting and how the lilacs had been so good this year.

People kept coming over to the table. “Evelyn! Look at you!” “Evelyn, that color is beautiful on you.” “Dennis said you weren’t coming!”

“Dennis didn’t think I could stay up this late,” Mom said each time, pleasantly. “I’m here as Janet’s date.”

My brother did not come over. He sat at the head table with Patty and kept looking at us. Patty, bless her, came over during the salad and kissed Mom on the cheek and said, “Oh, Evelyn, I’m so glad you came. He told me you didn’t want to.”

Mom patted her hand and said, “Patty, you have always been a good daughter to me.” Patty did not know. I could see it on her face. She did not know any of it.

I could hardly eat. I kept watching Mom for signs, the gray color around her mouth that she gets, the little catch in her breath. Nothing. She was pink and bright and having, as far as I could tell, a very nice time.

“Mom,” I whispered, while the waitress cleared plates. “Are you all right?”

“I’m having a lovely evening,” she said. “Aren’t you?”

The toast

After dinner, Dennis’s best friend Ron Pfeiffer got up with a microphone. Ron farms west of town and has known Dennis since they were in Cub Scouts together. He is a big, easy man with a voice that does not need a microphone, and he told stories about Dennis that had everybody roaring.

He told about the time Dennis rolled a used Allis-Chalmers into the creek trying to show it off to a buyer. He told about Dennis’s first date with Patty, at the drive-in in Watertown, when he ran out of gas on the way home.

He told about Dennis staying up all night with a farmer’s broken-down combine during harvest of 2009 so the man could finish his beans before the snow. Everybody laughed. Dennis laughed too, but I could see his eyes going to our table.

Then Ron said, “Now. Before the band starts. Does anybody else want to say a few words to the birthday boy?”

A couple of people did. His shop foreman. One of his old customers. Patty, who cried a little and said she loved him.

And then Ron’s eyes landed on our table. “Well, we’ve got somebody special here tonight,” he said. “Somebody who knew Dennis before any of us did. Evelyn! Come on, Evelyn, you’ve got to say something about your boy.”

The whole room turned. A hundred and twenty people. Somebody started clapping, and then everybody was clapping. At the head table, my brother put his drink down very carefully and folded his hands.

Ron came over and held out the microphone. Mom set her purse on the table. She reached up behind her neck and touched the little tag from Lund’s, the way she had in front of the mirror. Then she put her hand on my shoulder and stood up.

She took the microphone from Ron. She was not used to them. She held it too close, and her first word came out loud, and everybody laughed kindly.

“Well,” she said. “Happy birthday, Dennis.”

People clapped again. “I want to thank Patty for this beautiful party. This is the best prime rib I’ve had in years. And I want to say I am so glad to see my funeral money is being put to such good use.” She smiled at the whole room. “While I’m still here to enjoy it.”