“I never got to meet you, so forgive me for talking to a ceiling,” my wife said. “Do not let him tell you he is fine. He says it fast, like his father, so nobody looks closer. Make him iron his own shirts. I taught him, and he will pretend he forgot.” A soft laugh moved through the ballroom, wet and grateful. “So I am asking you to take my place for one song. Not to replace me. To finish what I started.” My son took his bride’s hand without a word, and a melody I had not heard in nine years began to play.
She used to hum that song over the sink the winter she got her news, and I had never told our boy. I watched them move across the floor, his jaw finally loose, his forehead against hers. Near the end her voice came back once more. “Tell my boy his mother is not afraid, and that she is proud of the shirt.” He had ironed it himself that morning. I knew because years ago he had asked me how she folded the cuffs.
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