Waltz of Her Life

Hayley jumped up and down with glee when she found out that they would be staying in and ordering pizza. If it had been up to her, she would have eaten pizza every day of the year.

When she thought about it more, it made sense that Stephen would choose pizza. It was Hayley's special day, after all, and she should be able to eat what she liked. Stephen changed into an old golf shirt and slacks, further cementing the deal. Hayley came down in her little Lady Bug blouse with the wheat corduroy pants she loved. Linda followed suit and changed into a pink and white striped maternity romper and slippers.

Stephen and Hayley took up residence on the couch and brought out the Nintendo machine and the stack of game cartridges. They put in the Super Mario brothers one first, with Stephen saying "I'll bet I can get to a higher level than you can." Linda never could "get" video games whether it was hungry little yellow circles devouring dots or space ships blowing up asteroid chunks. To her it seemed like a waste of time, but Stephen and Hayley loved them. Instead, Linda prepared plates and towels, paid the pizza delivery man when he arrived and brought neat slices of pizza to them as they played.

While she sat alone in the kitchen, she reflected that she could not share the day's supernatural event with Stephen, either. He would have listened carefully and patiently to her story before speaking to her in soft, slow modulating tones, saying "Honey, there has to be a logical explanation. You've been under a lot of strain, what with the baby coming and your work pressures and all." This time it had to be something else, however.

She could call her mother. Mom would want to speak with her granddaughter after her first day of school, anyway. Excitedly, Linda reached for the cordless phone and dialed the same number at her house that they'd had since the 1960s. Her mother answered, delighted to hear from her since she and her father had been empty nesters for awhile now. As always, she said "How are things?"

"Fine. Listen, mom. I need to talk to you about something really important."

"What is it? Is Stephen okay? How about Hayley?"

"They're both fine, mom. They're in the other room playing their little games. This is about something else." She told her the whole story about Lauren appearing in the wedding picture.

"My word," her mother said, after Linda had revealed the last detail. "That is amazing."