Daddy Set a Thanksgiving Place for Everyone but His Own Little Girl

NORA'S POV

I stood on my tiptoes and set the last silver fork beside the last white plate.

Twenty-two settings. I'd counted them twice while I polished each one, rubbing until I could see my own face stretched long and funny in the backs of the spoons. My fingers still smelled like dish soap, and the skin around my nails had gone pink and wrinkly.

From the kitchen, the smell of roast turkey drifted out, all butter and sage and crispy skin. My stomach growled so loud I pressed both hands over it, like that would make it stop.

I'd been running since seven that morning. Carrying chairs. Wiping glasses. Folding napkins into the little fan shapes Veronica liked.

Now I walked around the table one more time, touching each chair as I passed.

Grandma Ruth. Uncle Phil. The Petersons. Daddy at the head. Mason right beside him.

Twenty-two chairs. Twenty-two place cards. Only one card was blank, and when I picked it up, I saw it wasn't for me. Veronica had just forgotten to write a guest's name.

There was no chair for me.

I set the card down carefully, exactly where it had been.

When Mommy was alive, she used to put a little cushion on the chair next to hers every Thanksgiving so I could reach the table. It had pumpkins stitched on it. She'd pat it and say, "No matter how many people come to this house, Nora-bug, you always get a seat."

After the funeral, Daddy said the same thing. He promised.

"Mommy said there would always be a chair for me," I whispered to nobody.

The bread basket sat in the middle of the table, warm rolls tucked under a cloth. I didn't even let myself look at it too long.

"Oh, Mason, sweetie, look at you!"

Veronica swept into the dining room in a green silk dress that swished when she walked. She bent down and fixed Mason's little bow tie, then kissed the top of his head.

"So handsome. Everyone's going to say you're the best-dressed man here."

Mason grinned. He was six, a year younger than me, and he had juice on his chin already.

Then Veronica straightened up and saw me by the table. Her smile stayed on her mouth, but her eyebrows pinched together.

"Nora. Why are you just standing there?"

"I finished the forks."

"Then go finish the roasting pans. They're still in the sink." She looked at Mason's empty glass. "Actually, pour your brother some apple juice first."

He wasn't really my brother, but I didn't say that. I poured the juice, slow, so it wouldn't spill. Mason bumped my arm anyway, and a splash landed on his napkin.

"She got it on me!" he yelled.

"I'm sorry," I said quickly.

Veronica sighed like I was very tiring.

The doorbell had been ringing all afternoon, and now the dining room was filling up with grown-ups in sweaters and nice shoes. My stomach made that noise again. I looked at the bread basket.

"Veronica?" I said quietly. "I didn't have breakfast. Could I have one roll? Just a small one?"

I reached toward the basket.

She didn't slap my hand. She just put out one finger, a long red nail, and pushed my hand away from the bread. Gently. Like moving a fly.

"The guests eat first, Nora. Good girls don't complain."

Then she turned to the room and laughed a bright, pretty laugh. "This one is my little helper. She just loves to pitch in, don't you, honey?"

Mrs. Peterson put a hand on her heart. "Veronica, you're a saint. Taking on another woman's child and raising her like your own."

"Oh, stop," Veronica said. "She's family."

Mason climbed into the chair right next to Daddy. Someone set a whole plate of glazed ham in front of him. He looked at me over it and stuck out his tongue.

My plate wasn't on the table. It wasn't even out of the cabinet.

Last week, I'd taken one slice of cheese from the fridge because my stomach hurt, and Veronica found the wrapper. I didn't get dinner that night. Yesterday, Mason threw half a turkey sandwich straight into the trash because the bread was "too crunchy." Nobody said anything.

I went into the kitchen and stuck my hands in the dishwater. It was still warm. That was the nicest thing that happened all day.

I waited a long time.

I listened to forks clinking and grown-ups laughing and Daddy's big voice telling a story about a golf trip. I waited until Veronica carried the turkey platter back into the kitchen. There was nothing left on it but bones and a puddle of gravy.

So I went back out to the dining room and stood next to Daddy's chair.

He was laughing at something Uncle Phil said. His shirt sleeve had a shiny gold cufflink shaped like a little square, and I pulled on the cuff right next to it.

"Daddy?"

He didn't look down.

"Daddy," I said again, a little louder. "Is there any turkey left? Just a tiny piece?"

This time he looked at me. Not long. Just enough for his face to go tight.

"Nora," he said, low, through his teeth. "Don't embarrass me in front of everyone."

"I'm not trying to." I held onto his sleeve. "Could I sit by you? Just for pie? It's the first real Thanksgiving since Mommy—"

"There's leftover mashed potatoes in the kitchen."

Veronica was behind me. I hadn't heard her come back. She put her hand on my shoulder, and to everybody else it probably looked nice.

"Plenty for her," she said. "Isn't that right, Ethan?"

I looked up at Daddy. I waited for him to say no. To scoot his chair over. To pull another one from the wall.

He nodded.

Then he looked around the table, at all the faces watching us, and said it loud enough for all of them to hear.

"You should be grateful you have food at all."

A couple of the grown-ups chuckled, like it was a joke about kids today. Mrs. Peterson shook her head fondly.

Across the table, Mason was scooping a second slice of pumpkin pie onto his plate, whipped cream sliding off the side.

At Mommy's funeral, Daddy picked me up even though I was too big, and he held me so tight my ribs hurt. He said, "You'll never be alone, Nora. I swear." His tears got in my hair.

Now he was ten steps away from me, and he wouldn't give me a chair.

I didn't cry. Crying made Veronica's face go hard later, when nobody was around.

I just said, "Okay," and went back to the kitchen.

The mashed potatoes were in a little dish by the stove, the kind you put butter in. They'd gone cold, with a stiff yellow skin across the top. I took the dish and a spoon and climbed onto the wooden stool against the wall. One of its legs was broken shorter than the others, so someone had wedged a flat piece of wood under it. It wobbled anyway.

I ate two bites. They tasted like the fridge.

Then I stopped.

Tomorrow I had to clean Veronica's bedroom and the guest bathrooms, and if I missed a spot, there might not be dinner. There wasn't dinner last time.

So I took a paper napkin off the counter and spooned the rest of the potatoes into the middle. I folded it into a little square, the way you wrap a present. Grease soaked through right away and turned the paper see-through. I tucked it deep into my apron pocket and patted it flat.

"Hey there."

I jumped, and the stool rocked.

A man stood in the kitchen doorway holding an empty glass. He was tall, with gray at the sides of his dark hair, and he wore a navy sweater instead of a suit. Mr. Elias. Daddy's business partner. He'd come to the house a few times, but he'd never talked to me before.

"Didn't mean to scare you," he said. "Just looking for water."

He walked to the sink. Then he stopped, his eyes on my apron, on the dark grease spot spreading through the cloth.

"You didn't finish your food?"

I shook my head.

"Why are you saving your dinner, sweetheart?"

I thought about it, because he asked like he really wanted to know.

"Because I don't know if I'll get dinner tomorrow," I said. "I have to help Veronica clean. If I don't do it right, sometimes I don't get to eat. So I'm saving some. Just in case."

His hand was resting on the counter next to his glass. I watched his fingers curl in, slowly, until his knuckles went white.

He crouched down so his eyes were level with mine. When he spoke, his voice went very quiet.

I waited for him to tell me not to be greedy. That's what Daddy would say.

But he didn't say that.

He didn't say anything at all for a long moment. He just stood back up, slowly, and turned toward the open kitchen door.

Through it, I could see the dining room. The candles. The crystal glasses. Daddy at the head of the table, smiling, lifting his wine for a toast.

Mr. Elias looked straight at him.

"Ethan," he called, loud enough to cut through every voice in the room, "why is your daughter saving food because she's afraid you won't feed her tomorrow?"