Blue Cotton Work Shirts Stitched Together for a Spring Dance
“I must have misplaced it during the boiler clean-out last week,” he said, his raspy whisper barely reaching across the table.
“You have had that chain since you started at the high school,” I said. “You never misplace your tools.”
He did not look at me, instead reaching into his shirt pocket for his small paper notepad. “What color did you say your graduation gown was going to be, Nicole?”
“It is royal blue,” I said, “but we have to pay the rental deposit by Friday.”
“I will talk to Principal Bradley about the deposit,” he said, his eyes staying on the blank page of his notepad.
He reached into the small drawer of the kitchen table and pulled out a thick silver needle and a spool of black thread.
I watched his trembling fingers attempt to thread a thick silver needle under the dim kitchen lamp.
He missed the eye of the needle twice, the thread splitting against the metal, before he finally set the silver needle down on the oilcloth.
Three weeks later, the smell of rubbing alcohol and old vinyl chairs replaced the familiar scent of our kitchen.
