9 min read · 1,702 words
I thought my sister wanted Mom’s recipe box because I’d asked for it first, and I didn’t notice what she was really asking for until it was almost packed.
Mom had been gone three weeks when June and I started sorting the kitchen. We were doing it at her house, with a box from the grocery store between us and a roll of tape that kept sticking to my sleeve. Neither of us was crying much by then. We were tired, and there were only so many times you can decide whether a chipped mug is worth keeping.
I’m older by four years. I’m also the one who took over when Mom started getting sick. I set out her pills, called the pharmacy, and told June when there was something she needed to come see. I thought I was being helpful. I didn’t ask if June wanted to help in the kitchen. I just did it faster myself.
The recipe box was on the counter. I picked it up and said, “I want this, if that’s okay.”
June looked at it, then at the old kitchen timer beside the stove.
“I want the timer,” she said.
I thought she was annoyed that I’d picked first. “You can have both.”
“No. I want the timer.”
It wasn’t an expensive timer. Cream-colored plastic, one cracked corner, a red dial that didn’t always land exactly on the number. Mom used to keep it in the drawer with the dish towels. June had used it a lot when we were kids, or so I thought.
I handed it to her. She turned the dial with her thumb, once, then set it down. I didn’t know what else to say, so I started sorting the recipe cards.
That was how I found the handwriting.
The first few days after Mom died were full of little jobs. The funeral home needed a form. The church ladies wanted the casserole dishes back. I kept making lists because lists were easier than calling June to ask how she was. When she did come over, we talked about the furnace and the sale of the house, and whether the old curtains could go to the church rummage sale.
We didn’t talk much about Mom.
June was quieter than I expected. She didn’t make a scene when I took the good mixing bowl, and she didn’t argue when I said I’d keep Mom’s handwritten recipe for apple cake. I took that as proof she was fine with how things were going.
I should say I liked being the competent one. I liked knowing where the bills were and what needed doing. When June asked a question, I’d answer before she finished asking it. I’ve told myself for years that this was just how our family worked.
Mom had a way of correcting people while they were still doing something. If June put in a level cup of flour, Mom would say, “That looks a little heavy.” If June stirred too hard, Mom would say, “You’re going to toughen it.” If June reached for the salt, Mom would tell her to wait.
I got corrected too, of course. But I was the one Mom sent to fetch things. I knew which cabinet held the measuring spoons. I learned how to keep her from getting irritated.
June laughed it off back then. “I’m not allowed near the stove,” she’d say.
“You’re allowed,” Mom would answer. “You just have to listen.”
I remember that line because I heard it so many times. I didn’t remember how June’s face looked when Mom said it.
When we were sorting the kitchen, June touched the timer again. “Mom gave me this when I was twelve,” she said.
“Did she?”
“She let me make the lemon bars by myself.”
I looked up from the box. “I thought you made those with her.”
“No. She went to the store. She said, ‘You know what you’re doing.’”
June’s voice was ordinary, almost casual. I put the card I was holding into the box and told her that was nice. I didn’t ask why she’d remembered it so clearly. I guess I didn’t want to find out that a thing I barely noticed had mattered more than all the things I remembered.
The timer clicked under her thumb. It made a small dry sound, like the end of a pen.
“Do you remember how she corrected every recipe?” June asked.
“Mom corrected everything.”
“She didn’t correct that one.”
I gave a little laugh, the kind people do when they want a conversation to stay easy. “Well, I guess she trusted you.”
June looked at me. “For one afternoon.”
I didn’t answer. I was busy, or pretending to be. I wrapped the mixing bowl in newspaper, even though it wasn’t going anywhere.
We went through more cards. Mom’s handwriting was neat and upright, with the measurements written in the same blue pen she kept by the phone. June’s was rounder, and she crossed her sevens. I knew that because she used to leave notes on the fridge when she was in high school. I just hadn’t thought about it in years.
Then I found a card for lemon bars in June’s handwriting.
The recipe was written on the back of a church bulletin. A little flour was stuck in the fold, and one corner had a brown mark from something spilled. June leaned over when she saw it.
“That’s mine,” she said.
“I can tell.”
She pressed a finger against the edge. “Mom kept it?”
I shrugged. “Looks like it.”
I was about to put it back in the box when June said, “Read the bottom.”
I thought she meant the last line of the recipe. I turned it over and saw Mom’s handwriting below the ingredients, cramped near the edge. I could tell she’d written it later because the ink was darker than the rest.
I stopped moving.
“Read it,” June said.
There was something in her voice then. Not anger, exactly. More like she’d been waiting and didn’t want to wait anymore.
I read the first few words silently. Then I read them out loud.
“June made these alone. I didn’t correct her.”
June pulled the timer closer to herself.
I kept reading. “They came out better than mine. I should have told her.”
Nobody said anything for a second. I could hear the tape roll slipping off the edge of the box.
The note wasn’t long. At the bottom, Mom had added, “Let her trust her own hands.”
I read it twice, though there wasn’t any other way to read it.
June sat down. “She wrote that?”
“I think so.”
“Did she ever tell you?”
“No.”
June rubbed the cracked corner of the timer with her thumb. “I thought maybe she didn’t even remember.”
I wanted to say Mom had loved her. I wanted to say Mom had been hard on both of us, that she didn’t mean anything by it, that June was reading too much into a note written years ago. I’ve said versions of all those things before.
Instead, I said, “I’m sorry.”
June didn’t look up. “For what?”
That was fair. I had a list of answers and none of them felt big enough. For not seeing it. For thinking she was being difficult when she asked to do things her own way. For taking over while telling myself I was helping.
“I don’t know,” I said. “For acting like I knew what mattered to you.”
She folded the card along the old crease. “You always knew what Mom wanted.”
I started to say that wasn’t true. Then I stopped. I had known when Mom wanted the pills, or the tea, or someone to sit nearby while she watched the news. I hadn’t known what June wanted. I’d mistaken being useful for paying attention.
I tried to hand her the recipe card.
She didn’t take it right away.
“Do you want the box?” I asked.
“I wanted the timer.”
“I know.”
“I’m taking the card too.”
“Okay.”
She took it, then slipped it into the box. I could have told her the card belonged with the recipes, which was what I’d been doing all afternoon. I didn’t.
We finished packing the kitchen without saying much. June took the timer and the box of recipe cards. I kept the mixing bowl, Mom’s apple cake card, and a stack of old dish towels. It seemed like a fair split, though I know fairness wasn’t the point.
At the door, June paused with the timer tucked under her arm.
“Mom really wrote that?” she asked.
“I saw her handwriting.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
I couldn’t give her more than I had. “I don’t know when she wrote it.”
June nodded. She didn’t say whether that was enough.
When I got home, I found one of Mom’s recipe cards in my coat pocket. Apple cake, blue ink, the bottom corner bent from being carried around. I’d put it there without thinking. I could’ve called June and told her I’d found it. Instead, I left it on the kitchen counter.
I keep thinking about that note. Not because it fixed anything. It didn’t. I can’t tell whether Mom wrote it as an apology, or as a reminder to herself, or because she meant to say it out loud and never did.
I still have the apple cake card. June has the timer, and the lemon bar recipe is in the box with her. I haven’t asked if she’s baked them.