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fork.
    “This is a very important dinner,” she said. “Brother Jones has returned, and he’s brought his son along with him. If you cannot be civil, you will excuse yourself.”
    She didn’t say it harshly, but she said it with undeniable clarity.
    “I don’t like chicken,” Grandpa Samuel repeated meekly one last time.
    “Then eat vegetables instead. Take some corn, some salad, and some peas.”
    Grandpa Samuel surveyed the food on the table, his focus darting from bowl to bowl. He seemed overwhelmed by the task set for him.
    “May I be excused?” he asked.
    “You haven’t said a word to Jones.”
    He worked his jaw and nervously rubbed the stumps of his missing fingers. “At night,” he said to me with a whiff of conspiracy, “if you listen carefully, you can hear her dancing.”
    “That’ll be enough of that, Daddy,” Serena said sharply. “You know what it does to your blood pressure.”
    “You can hear footsteps,” Grandpa Samuel whispered.
    “Daddy!”
    He stopped. Serena glared at him, and he didn’t dare speak.
    “You can hear who dancing?” my father asked pointedly.
    Grandpa Samuel glanced at Serena; he looked down at his plate.
    “It’s the rain,” he said. “You can hear the rain.”
    “ Who can you hear dancing?” my father demanded.
    Grandpa Samuel didn’t reply. My father looked to Serena, but she ignored him.
    “You can read it to him, if you can’t remember,” Serena said to GrandpaSamuel after a moment. “Read what you’ve written. You worked on it so hard.”
    My grandfather seemed confused; my father, frustrated.
    “In your pocket,” Serena suggested.
    Grandpa Samuel felt his pants pocket. He produced a slip of paper and grew calm. He read the paper to himself. Then he looked at my father.
    “I’ve missed you,” he said. He glanced at the paper again. “I regret that it’s been so long. I’m happy to see you and to meet Trevor.”
    He looked down at his paper, and tears filled his eyes but did not overflow.
    “Read all of it,” Serena said.
    “I hope that you can forgive me for my transgressions,” Grandpa Samuel read. He quickly folded the paper, returned it to his pocket, and swiped at his eyes with the back of his hand. “My transgressions,” he repeated. “It means things I’ve done wrong.”
    My father scowled. “Is this for real?” he asked Serena.
    “Of course it is.”
    “May I go to my barn now?” Grandpa Samuel asked. “I’d like to go to my barn.”
    “You may,” Serena replied. “But don’t stay late. And turn on the lights so you don’t hurt your eyes. Sometimes he forgets to turn on the lights and I find him working in the dark!”
    Grandpa Samuel nodded and shuffled out the back door of the kitchen.
    “What the hell was that?” my father demanded after Grandpa Samuel had gone.
    Serena sighed heavily and got up from the table.
    “I’m so sorry,” she said, obviously disappointed. “He knows exactly which buttons to push with me. I shouldn’t have reacted. I’d hoped our reunion dinner would have been more pleasant.”
    She gestured to the myriad plates and dishes of food spread across the table.
    “A written apology?” my father asked.
    “He wanted to apologize to you. He asked me to help him with it. I don’t think you fully comprehend the extent of his condition. It’s not easy living with him.”
    She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and exhaled, swinging her arms in an arc over her head, like a dancer or a yoga instructor.
    “Do you like pie?” she asked me with forced cheer. “I have a blackberry cobbler for dessert.”
    “Yes, please.”
    “Of course, a cobbler isn’t technically a pie,” she said, removing a pie tin from the oven and setting it on the counter. “But my cobbler has a biscuit topping I think you’ll like. These are last year’s berries; it’s too early for this year. Tomorrow, I’ll show you where they grow and you can keep an eye on them for me. Once they ripen, we have to