Eat Cake: A Novel by Jeanne Ray Page A

been twenty-five years. I was a teacher—”
    But he wasn’t interested. “You understand my point. A little more chicken please.”
    I cut off another bite and fed it to him.
    “So Dad doesn’t have to work anymore?” Camille said. She seemed genuinely interested in the conversation now that it was clear we weren’t going to Iowa. I could tell she was listening when she stopped twirling her hair through her fingers.
    “Of course I’m going to work again, honey. Your grandpa is just saying that it’s important to think things through.”
    “That’s right.” My father nodded in support.
    “So what if you don’t go to work again anytime soon? What if it takes you a long time to find yourself or whatever it is you’re doing? Where do we get money until then?” Camille’s voice was shaking a little and I couldn’t tell if she was frightened or angry at the thought of not being supported.
    “Why is the money always the man’s responsibility?” my father said. “Why is that Sam’s burden? Isn’t it enough that he’s provided for you all these years? When I was your age I had been supporting myself for years. I didn’t ask anyone else to take care of me.”
    “Your grandfather was hatched alone on a beach,” my mother explained to Camille. “He kicked his way free, ate his own shell, and then slithered off to conquer the world without a moment’s assistance from another reptile.”
    My parents had a remarkable ability to simply not hear one another most of the time. It was as if they both spoke in a frequency that the other one was incapable of registering. “Don’t you think you’re old enough to get a job?” my father said to Camille.
    “Um,” Camille said, looking down at her plate. “I guess. I don’t know.”
    “Do you think she should drop out of high school? Start washing cars?” my mother said. “Stop giving that old man food. Look at you. You’re a fine one to be giving lectures on independence and self-reliance. You can’t wipe your own mouth.”
    “At least I had a dream,” my father said. “At least I didn’t play the piano like I had never stepped foot outside a Methodist church my entire life.”
    Suddenly they heard each other.
    “Here we go. You think you play the piano better than I do. That’s where your superiority comes from. You think just because you’re banging it out in some smoky gin joint, you’re making art, and because I’m playing in a school with children, I’m the drudge, the talentless drone. But I’ll tell you something, Guy, you were never half the pianist that I am, and if you had any wrists I’d prove it to you right now!” My mother was standing up, leaning over the table toward my father.
    “I’d play with my toes!” my father roared. “If you want a competition I could beat you without my hands.”
    Camille sat with her mouth open, looking from one side of the table to the other as if she were watching a tennis match.
    Bang it out? Gin joint? Toes? Who were these people who claimed to be related to me, and what were they doing living in my house? My nerves were shot. I imagined my kitchen a crime scene, the neighbors coming in and finding all of us torn apart as if a pack of angry wolverines had broken in through the back door. People could not live like this, not for the amount of time it took bones to heal. Someone, something, needed to restore order to our lives.
    “Cake,” I said.
    “Cake?” Sam said.
    “What kind of cake?” my father asked.
    “Apple spice.”
    “When did you make a cake?” my mother said. “I didn’t see you make a cake.”
    “Mom,” Camille moaned, but I raised my hand to stop her.
    I got up and took the cake out from under its cake-shaped cover. I had made it at three o’clock in the morning in a desperate attempt to comfort myself. And it was an enormous comfort, standing alone in the kitchen in my nightgown, sifting fresh ground nutmeg with allspice and cloves by the little light over the sink. I