Mommy’s Favorite

As I stood at the kitchen sink, handwashing dishes, I could hear the urgency in my daughter’s movements.  She was attempting to finish her plate, the fork clanking in quick succession.  Then the squeal of the backward chair, and the patter of her bare feet.  She placed the dish and fork on the counter to my left.

“Thanks, Daddy,” Ella said sweetly before slinking away.

After finishing the dishes, I went back to the table, staring at my own half-eaten dinner congealing on the plate. Ella had said something off-color, and I instantly lost my appetite. It was then I had stepped away to wash dishes. There was half a napkin near my plate. She had torn hers just as I had taught her months ago, leaving the other half for me. We did what was necessary to cut costs. I was thankful she hadn’t given any pushback, as I knew how it could be with teenagers, especially one in the throes of puberty and having recently lost her mother. But we managed, just the two of us, and had for four months since Whit’s passing. How much of a napkin did it truly require to wipe one’s mouth? For years I had griped to Whit about paper waste. It seemed like only last month we had had our most recent spat over the overuse of toilet paper (Ella) and napkins (Whit).

Then Whit was gone.

When Ella went to sleep and the apartment grew quiet, each night was different for me. Unlike some of the people I knew who had lost a spouse, it wasn’t a repetitive trudging and hollow existence. Some nights, my mind went one way, headstrong and hopeful, while the others dealt a complete reversal, and turmoil would force me to the wine. Most of the time I popped a sleeping pill and read until the words on the page chose warped new meanings.

“It isn’t pretty at times, but we get by well enough.”

Those were the masked words I used on a regular basis. Because they could never know about us. They weren’t allowed to know.

It had been my daughter’s idea to come to the local thrift store on our pronounced “no phones day.” By her standards, once a month we needed time together without those immediate distractions. She was far more precocious than many her age. And while she played off thrift store visits as her attempt at being stylish, I knew it also had to do with budgeting.

“Mommy wouldn’t like that on you,” Ella said when I held a flannel shirt to my chest. “She hates red on you.”

“I knew you’d say something like that.”

“But you know it’s true.”

“It’s true. Your mother did hate red.”

“Especially on you.”

I looked away toward a ridiculous lampshade on a cluttered shelf.

“I wonder why she didn’t like red on you. Did you ever know?”

My eyes crinkled. It was true we’d never told our daughter the story. There had indeed been a history with the color red—in particular, a specific article of clothing that had shaped Whit’s disdain. It was many years ago, long before we had gotten married, long before Ella was born. On our first date, and subsequently Whit’s birthday, I had worn a red sweater that an ex-girlfriend had gifted me. It was a fantastic sweater, pricy, and indescribably comfortable. But Whit had seen it differently. To her, it was a slight. We had argued over it here and there until one night I threw it into the fireplace at a swanky restaurant on Valentine’s Night. To the appalled faces in the dining room I had said, “Just trying to brighten the Valentine’s spirit. There’s nothing like the color red over a fire.” While I knew the comment made no sense, I had owned it like a mad scientist. Whit, to my great relief, immediately ordered another bottle of wine and looked at me enviably, “Well, now you’ve done it. Right when I thought I couldn’t fall more in love with you.”

“Where are we going?” Ella said as we sped along the highway.

“That inescapable question.”

“Please don’t start again, Daddy.”

“What am I starting?”

When I glanced over, she had a pleading look.

“Okay, sorry,” I said, knowing.

“We’re not looking too far ahead, understand?”

“Yes, sir!”

“Daddy, stop.”

“Stop what? The car?”

She sniffled. When I glanced over again, she was weeping. My attempt to joke past Whit’s significance had hurt her. Heat rose to my face. I took the next off-ramp and pulled into the nearest parking lot. By then she had smudged the tears over her face so that it glistened.  I looked at her and felt intense heartache rush in. I motioned her toward me. She unbuckled her seatbelt and plunged into my arms. I held her a long time, through her next wave of tears, nurturing my daughter with gritted teeth.

Every day was still a process, even after four months of Whit’s absence. Neither of us had a clue how long this undertaking would last before the ground beneath us might finally smooth, and the color would return to the sky, no longer a faded sheet, no longer dimensionless.

“I promise I won’t do that anymore,” I said to the top of her head, my lips on her hair.

“It just hurts. I miss Mommy.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

Then I gave a great sigh, and she withdrew from me. She sniffled, wiping her face.

“Huh,” I said, distracted by something outside the car.

“What’s wrong?”

Ella followed my eyes. She gasped. Thirty feet away stood my wife’s favorite cookie shop. I looked at my daughter, and she back at me.

“A cookie sounds good right about now,” I said.

“Sounds better than good, sounds perfect. Do you think they’ll have Mommy’s favorite?”

I squeezed her hand. “It’s almost a certainty.”

Mark Sumioka is second-generation Japanese. His work has appeared in various literary journals, including Birmingham Arts Journal, Litbreak Magazine, and a series in Scholars and Rogues Literary Journal. He was also republished in The Wall Street Journal Online. He resides in San Diego.