Midnight Vows

The first time I saw her, she was standing in my mother's kitchen holding a cast-iron skillet like she was born with it.

That's the thing about my mother. She doesn't introduce people. She arranges them into your life like furniture and waits to see if you'll sit down.

"Marcus." Mom didn't turn from the stove. "This is Simone. She's staying for dinner."

Simone looked at me. Not through me, not past me. At me. Her eyes were the color of dark honey and they didn't flinch. She was maybe five-eight, five-nine in the flat sandals she wore, with skin the color of toasted pecan and a head of hair that had been pressed and curled into something that looked effortless but probably wasn't. She wore a sundress the color of mustard greens, and her arms were toned in a way that suggested she did something physical for a living.

"Hi," I said.

"Hey." Her voice was low, a little smoky. She didn't smile. She just looked at me like she was taking inventory.

I was twenty-six years old and I'd been home from Atlanta for three weeks. Three weeks of sleeping in my childhood bedroom, of my mother asking me every morning if I'd eaten, of the silence between us that had been there since my father died two years ago. I'd come back because I'd lost my job, because my lease was up, because I had nowhere else to go. That's the truth of it.

My mother had other plans.

"Dinner's at seven," Mom said. "Simone, you can set the table. Marcus, go wash up. You look like you've been sleeping in your car."

I hadn't been sleeping in my car. But I had been sleeping until noon, and my mother noticed everything.

I went to the bathroom and looked at myself in the mirror. Same face I'd always had: brown skin, close-cropped hair, a jaw that my father used to say was too soft for a man. I splashed water on my face and tried to figure out what was happening.

When I came back to the kitchen, Simone was folding napkins into triangles. My mother was stirring something that smelled like garlic and thyme. Neither of them was talking, but it wasn't awkward. It was like they'd already had whatever conversation they needed to have.

"So," I said, sitting down at the table. "How do you know my mother?"

Simone looked up. "She's my godmother."

I blinked. "What?"

"Your mother and my mother were best friends since they were kids. I've known her my whole life." She set the last napkin down. "You don't remember me."

I didn't. Or maybe I did, somewhere in the back of my mind, a memory of a girl with braids at a family reunion, a girl who'd been taller than me for one summer and then shorter the next. But that was a long time ago and I'd spent most of my adult life trying not to remember anything about this house.

"I was at your father's funeral," Simone said. "You didn't see me."

The air changed. My mother's spoon stopped moving for half a second, then started again. I felt the familiar tightness in my chest, the one that showed up whenever someone mentioned my father.

"I'm sorry," I said. "I wasn't..."

"I know." Simone's voice was soft. "You don't have to explain."

Dinner was roast chicken, rice and beans, and a salad with tomatoes from my mother's garden. Simone ate like someone who'd been raised right, which she had, apparently. She didn't talk much, but when she did, it was about things that mattered. Her job at a physical therapy clinic. Her apartment in Decatur. Her plan to open her own practice within five years.

My mother watched us both like a director watching a scene she'd already written.

After dinner, Mom sent me to the store for vanilla ice cream. "Simone likes it with her peach cobbler," she said, like that was a fact I should've already known.

I drove to the Kroger on Cascade Road with the windows down. It was early September in Atlanta, still hot enough to sweat through your shirt, and the air smelled like cut grass and car exhaust. I thought about Simone. About the way she'd looked at me. About the way she hadn't smiled.

When I got back, my mother was sitting alone on the porch.

"Simone went home," she said. "She has an early shift tomorrow."

I handed her the ice cream and sat down in the chair next to her. The porch light was on, and moths were throwing themselves against it like they had nowhere else to go.

"She's beautiful," I said.

"Yes."

"You didn't tell me she was coming."

"I didn't think I needed to." My mother rocked slowly in her chair. "Her mother and I made a promise, years ago. Before you were born. Before she was born."

I felt something cold in my stomach. "What kind of promise?"

"We promised that if we had children, and if they were the right age, and if they were both... available... we'd bring them together."

I stared at her. "You're talking about an arranged marriage."

"I'm talking about an introduction." She didn't look at me. "The rest is up to you."

"Mom."

"Her mother died three years ago, Marcus. Cancer. Simone's been alone since then. She's got no family left. No one to look after her."

"She's a grown woman. She doesn't need looking after."

My mother finally turned to me. Her eyes were tired, and there was something in them I hadn't seen before. Fear. Not for herself. For me.

"You came home with nothing," she said. "No job. No plan. You think I don't know about the drinking? The way you've been sleeping all day? I'm not blind."

I opened my mouth to argue, but nothing came out.

"I'm not trying to marry you off," she said. "I'm trying to give you something to hold onto. Simone is good. She's solid. She's been through hell and she's still standing. You need someone like that."

"You don't get to decide that for me."

"No." She stood up, slow, her knees creaking. "But I can introduce you. And I can hope."

She went inside. I stayed on the porch for a long time, listening to the crickets and the occasional car passing by. I thought about Simone's eyes. About the way she'd said "You don't have to explain" like she already knew everything there was to know about me.

I didn't want an arranged marriage. I didn't want my mother making decisions about my life. But I also didn't want to go back inside and face the empty bedroom that still smelled like my father's cologne.

So I stayed outside and I thought about Simone's hands on that skillet, the way she'd held it like it was an extension of her arm. I thought about her voice, low and steady. I thought about the way she'd looked at me, like she was deciding something.

I didn't know what she'd decided. But I knew I wanted to find out.

The next morning, my mother handed me a piece of paper with an address on it.

"She works at a clinic on Ponce," she said. "She gets off at five. You should bring her flowers."

"Mom."

"Not roses. She doesn't like roses. Get her sunflowers."

I took the paper. I told myself I was just going to drop by, just to say hello, just to see if maybe there was something there. I told myself I wasn't doing this because my mother wanted me to. I told myself I was doing it because I wanted to.

But I stood in the flower shop for twenty minutes trying to decide between sunflowers and tulips, and I realized I didn't know the first thing about what Simone liked.

That was the problem. That had always been the problem.

I bought the sunflowers. I drove to Ponce. I sat in the parking lot for ten minutes with the engine running, watching the door.

And then she walked out, wearing scrubs and a ponytail, and she saw me through the windshield. She stopped. She looked at the flowers on the passenger seat. She looked at me.

Then she walked over, opened the door, and got in.

"Sunflowers," she said.

"Yeah."

"My mother used to grow them in the backyard." She took the bouquet and held it in her lap. "How'd you know?"

I didn't. My mother knew. But I didn't say that.

"Lucky guess," I said.

Simone looked at me for a long moment. Then she did something I hadn't seen her do yet.

She smiled.

"Drive," she said. "I'm hungry."