Tatevik’s Reviews > Clock Dance > Status Update

She sees herself as a tiny skirted figure like the silhouette on a ladies' room door, skimming the curve of the earth as it sails through space.

In her new life, she will rent a room somewhere. Or she will live in Mrs. Minton's house, or find herself an apartment with a swimming pool Cheryl can visit. She will teach English to Ben's refu-gees, or Spanish to Cheryl's classmates. Or she might try something new that she hasn't even imagined yet. There is no limit to the possibilities.

Would they remember their childhoods fondly, or were they storing up grudges against her? She had tried her best to be a good mother-which to her meant a predictable mother. She had promised herself that her children would never have to worry what sort of mood she was in; they would never peek into her bedroom in the morning to see how their day was going to go.

Some of her friends were uncomfortable with death and pretended it hadn't happened, which filled her with a perverse desire to mention Derek's name at every opportunity…

Some were oversolicitous, telephoning too often and treating her like an invalid who needed dutiful tending. But she knew it was important to maintain her social connec-tions. Or so she had been told.

When she was a child she used to imagine that her mother might painlessly die somehow and her father would marry a lovely, serene woman who would sit at Willa's bedside when she had a bad dream and lay a cool palm on her forehead. Willa had pictured this woman in layers of flowing white chiffon, for some reason. Her name would be something like Clara, or Claire. Something calm.

"Reverend Sands came to call at the house and asked if I would reconsider. Not reconsider my disbelief, he said, but reconsider my resignation. He said, Many of your fellow members probably don't believe, either, but at least in church you put yourself in position for belief. Otherwise you reduce the possibility'"

Did all these kids come from perfectly happy families? Weren't any of them hiding something that was going on at home? They didn't seem to be. They didn't seem to have a thing on their minds but lunch and friends and lipstick.

When she grew up she was going to marry a man who came from a big, close, jolly family. He would get along with all of them—he'd be the same kind of man her father was, friendly and easygoing—and all of them would love Willa and treat her like one of their own.
She would have either six children or eight children, half of them girls and half boys, and they would grow up playing with their multitude of cousins.

Grilled cheese sandwiches were all he knew how to make. He fried them over high heat and they gave off a sharp, salty smell that Willa had learned to associate with their mother's absences-her sick headaches and her play rehearsals and the times she slammed out of the house.