Adam lifted his face to the crisp autumn breeze blowing through the graveyard, willing away the residual fatigue of just two hours' sleep. He hadn't slept well since the beginning of the month. His insomnia was mostly a result of the melancholia that descended on him every November, but the current changes in his life were contributing as well, especially the situation with his father. He'd been trying to reconcile himself to his dad's new relationship but a childish part of him insisted on maintaining his resistance.

"What am I going to do about Dad?" he asked his mom as he absently ran his fingers through the grass. He had been sitting Indian-style beside his mother's headstone for the last half-hour, wishing she could solve the problem for him. "I guess the real question is what am I going to do about me. Jane says to give it time. I'll get used to the idea of Dad being with someone else soon enough. She's probably right, but it's hurting him now. I hate hurting him."

Sighing, Adam began shredding grass blades. "I suppose she's nice enough. She's a cosmetology teacher. Wears practically no makeup but her hair is always beautiful. She doesn't look anything like you. She's short with blondish-gray hair. She reminds me of Rose on The Golden Girls. Did Dad tell you this already? Do you know? Do you care?" The question brought him up short. Did she care? She'd been gone for so long. Maybe she was just happy that Carl had found someone to share his life with. Maybe she'd moved on and didn't even know what was going on with them. Either possibility meant that Adam was holding on—no, clinging—to something that had nothing to do with his mom and everything to do with wanting the impossible—his mom back. In both cases, he was being a jerk.

"Let's talk about something else," he said, not wanting to ponder the questions he suddenly had. "Jane's in full wedding-planning mode. It's kinda cute and really scary at the same time. Every time I've seen her for the last month, she has her hair up in a messy twist with at least two pencils stuck in it and a pair of reading glasses on her nose, which she doesn't need. She won't let me see them, but I've heard that she has lists with jobs for everybody. Everybody but me, that is. Whenever I ask what she wants me to do, she says she has it under control and to focus on Dad and getting set up in Arcadia. I'm not sure if she's being considerate or if she's afraid I'll mess up whatever she asked me to do. Then again, maybe I'm lucky she hasn't given me anything to do. Everybody's calling her the General. I'm pretty sure they're justified."

He fell silent again, letting the idea of Joan and the upcoming wedding fill his thoughts. This was easier than thinking about his family. Despite his "emotional breakthrough" this summer, Adam still wasn't accustomed to dealing with his feelings about his family. He'd spent so much of his life compartmentalizing them that he wasn't entirely sure what to do with them now that they were constantly cropping up at the forefront of his life.

"I'm sorry to dump all this on you. I didn't want our visit to be a pity session. It's just . . ." Adam's watch alarm beeped. His time was up. "Looks like I have to go now. I'm meeting Grace and Jane at the house." Reluctantly, Adam got to his feet, then hesitated. He didn't want to leave yet; he'd missed his talks with his mom. But he knew he was stalling. It's not that big a deal, he told himself.

Shrugging off his lack of enthusiasm as another part of his November sadness, he leaned down and tucked the sculpture he'd made more securely against the base of her gravestone. "I love you, Mom. Happy birthday."

"What bride in her right mind volunteers to clean her future father-in-law's attic in the middle of planning the wedding?" Grace asked as she drove toward the Rove house.

With a sarcastic laugh, Joan replied, "There's no such thing as a bride in her right mind, apparently."

"Okay. I'll give you that. But how did I get roped into helping?"

"How am I supposed to know?" Joan asked. "You never tell me anything. All I know for sure is that you didn't have a date today and you'll do just about anything for Adam."

Grace scoffed. "That's not true."

"Right," Joan offered with a smirk. "Maybe you're just getting soft in your old age."

"Shut it, General."

Grimacing in Grace's direction (she really hated the family's new nickname for her), Joan turned her attention back to the road. She'd successfully avoided the question, but found herself searching for an answer. Clean out Carl's attic. That was God' s latest edict. She hadn't seen Him since the night of the art show and, when He does show up, He tells her to clean an attic. He's still recovering and shouldn't take on such a large job himself. While she agreed, she didn't see why she should do it especially with everything else going on. But just in case she was meant to prevent a tragic house fire, she'd mentioned it to Adam, who said he'd clean it out over the weekend. Next thing she knew, both she and Grace were signed on to help. The Three Amigos, together again.

Silently, Grace pulled her battered Jeep Wrangler up in front of the Rove house and climbed out, Joan straggling along behind her. She was not looking forward to today's task but had no idea what daunted her about it.

She'd just made it to the porch when Adam opened the door. "Hey," he greeted quietly. "Dad's still sleeping. Follow me."

He led the way upstairs, Joan lagging behind. When she saw the dusty disarray of the Rove attic, she stopped wondering at her unwillingness. There were at least five decades of family artifacts cluttering the huge space. If nothing else, she was going to end the day hot, dirty, and exhausted.

"Geez, Rove," Grace commented, looking at the haphazard piles of boxes and furniture. "Were you guys blindfolded with one arm tied behind your backs when you did this?"

"No. We just don't like to stay up here for long."

"Are you afraid?" Grace asked. She had ventured further into the room and gingerly picked up a ratty, ancient trench coat. "Because you should be. Very, very afraid."

"Let's just get started," Joan said tersely. She ignored their perplexed looks and shifted her weight from one foot to the other. She didn't know what she expected, but she felt that something major was going to happen up here. Something major always came out of God's little assignments. All she wanted was to get it over with, so she wouldn't feel so unsteady.

With a final questioning look, Adam pointed out different areas of the attic as he spoke. "I figured we'd each take a section of the room: I'll take the left, Jane's in the middle, and you're on the right, Grace."

Grace shrugged indifferently. "Sounds like a plan."

"I got us some gloves and trash bags. Most of this stuff can be given away, I guess. We're never going to use it again. The rest can be thrown out."

Joan rubbed her hands over her arms, wondering why she was so weirded out by Adam's attic. "Is there anything special we should look out for? Something you don't want thrown out?" she asked quietly.

He shook his head and rubbed his hand over her back. "Are you okay?" he whispered as Grace waded into her part of the mess.

"I'm fine," Joan answered, trying to turn away and get to work.

Adam wouldn't let her go. "Jane, you don't have to do this if you don't want to."

"It's not that."

"Then what is it?" he asked gently.

She shrugged. "I just feel a weird vibe up here. That's all, really. I'm okay."

"You're sure?"

"Yes."

Adam stared at her for a moment as if he were gauging how honest she was being with him. Finally, he sighed and nodded. "Okay. Put these on," he instructed, handing her a pair of work gloves.

Slipping on her gloves, she was about to head off into her section when his hand on her elbow stopped her. She turned toward him, eyebrows raised in question. "Thanks for doing this," he said, moving closer to her.

"You're welcome."

"I know you really don't want to."

She tried to come up with a way to deny that without lying and came up empty.

He smiled at her and bent so that his lips were next to her ears. "I don't want to either."

Joan chuckled.

"I'm positive Grace doesn't."

She began laughing despite the lingering creeped-out feeling.

"Maybe I'll give her a fruit basket for helping."

"A fruit basket?" Joan asked, incredulous. When he nodded, she put a fist on her hip and glared up at him. "And what do I get?"

Adam bent down and gave her a soft, lingering kiss. "How's that?"

"I don't know," she said. "How big a fruit basket are you thinking of giving her?"

With a laugh, he took her lips in another long kiss. She wrapped her arms around his neck and held him close. He stroked his thumb across the small of her back and she moaned.

"Are you two going to play tonsil hockey all day or help me?"

Reluctantly ending the kiss, Adam hugged Joan to him a minute longer. "Her fruit basket just got smaller," he said before disappearing into the junk on his side of the attic.

Biting her lip to keep from laughing, Joan dug into her section feeling better than she had all morning.

By mid-afternoon, Adam was hot, tired, and heartsick. Cleaning the attic was a trip down memory lane that he didn't want to take right now. Every box seemed to hold yet another reminder of his mother: a book of poetry here, a waft of perfume there. For the last fifteen minutes, he'd been staring at an old photograph of the two of them. He'd been about ten years old at the time. She had hoisted him in the air by his waist and spun him around until they were both dizzy and laughing. They'd collapsed in a cozy, happy heap in the backyard. It had been a good day.

He traced his finger over her glowing face: her cheeks full like his, her chin cleft, her rosebud mouth open in laughter like his. Were you happy that day? he wondered. Or were you just pretending for my sake? Slipping the photo in his back pocket, Adam got up and stretched the ache out of his muscles. "Jane? Grace?"

"Yeah," they answered in unison, their heads popping up through the debris like gophers on a golf course.

"I'm going to go get something to drink? Want me to bring something back?"

"Water," they chorused. He stifled a smile and headed for the stairs. They'd been together too long.

As he descended the stairs, he felt the weight of his memories ease. By the time he reached the first floor, the tension had left his neck and shoulders. Sunlight streamed into the living room and Adam realized how late it was. He hadn't seen his father all day. Thinking he'd be on the porch, Adam headed for the front door, but the sound of ice hitting glass drew him to the kitchen.

He was surprised to find Sharon filling three tall glasses with ice and setting them on a tray. Hoping she hadn't noticed him, Adam began to back out of the room.

"Good afternoon, Adam," she said without looking up from her task.

He paused and straightened to his full height. "Hi, Sharon."

Sharon took a pitcher of tea out of the refrigerator and began to fill the glasses. "You three have been working awfully hard today. How's it coming along?" She dropped a fresh lemon wedge in each glass.

Wondering when they'd gotten lemons, he said, "It's fine. We're making progress."

"Do you think you'll finish today?"

"No, ma'am."

Nodding, Sharon put the pitcher back. "Well, I thought you all would be ready for a break. You've been up there all day without taking a single break."

"You've been here all day?"

"I came to keep your father company."

"Oh." He didn't know what he'd expected, for his dad to sit by himself until . . . what? What did he expect his dad to do while he was immersed in his own life? Standing awkwardly by the counter watching Sharon bustle about the kitchen, Adam realized he didn't like this self-centered side of himself at all.

"I've been wanting to talk to you, Adam." Sharon's tone was that of a mother preparing to lecture her child and he felt his hackles rise.

"About?"

She turned to face him, one hand resting lightly on the counter while the other sat on her hip. "My relationship with your father." When he didn't say anything, Sharon forged on. "I know you have problems with it. I understand this is the first time you've had to deal with your father having a relationship and that this must be difficult for you to accept. But your father's a grown man. He doesn't need to get your permission to live his life anymore than you need to get his."

Through clenched teeth, Adam said, "Okay." He folded his arms across his chest as if holding himself back as well as together. He didn't know what it was about Sharon, but he always felt like a petulant teenager around her instead of the adult that he was.

"That said, it isn't my intention to come between you two. He loves you and he wants you to be happy."

"I know," he answered, resisting the urge to kick at the floor like a five-year-old. "I want him to be happy, too."

"He isn't and he hasn't been for some time."

"I'm trying. There's just a lot going on, okay, and I'm . . . I'm trying."

Sharon didn't respond. She simply watched him, determining some unknown equation before she decided what to say next. He found it disturbing the way being around her unsettled him. Finally, she said, "Okay."

"Okay?"

"Okay." She opened a loaf of bread and began making sandwiches. "I want you to know that I do care about him. He's a good man—kind, gentle. I hear the same thing about you. He insists that you'll come around. I hope he's right. Carl said you're not too fond of mayonnaise; what about your friends?"

The abrupt change of topic caught him off-guard. "I'm sorry?"

"Mayonnaise—do Joan and Grace like mayonnaise on their sandwiches?"

"Uh, yes, ma'am, they do."

"And turkey's okay, right?"

Adam just nodded.

"Good." She picked up two of the glasses of tea and handed them to Adam before taking a sip out of the third one. At his inquiring look, she said, "I just decided to make the sandwiches and realized that the tea would be watery by the time I finished. Your father's on the porch."

"Okay," he said, turning to leave. "Um, the girls wanted water."

"I'll make a pitcher."

"Thank you," he said, leaving before she changed the subject again.

"You're welcome, Adam."

Carefully keeping his mind blank—he didn't want to think about the talk he'd just had with Sharon, confusing and uncomfortable as it had been—he made his way out to the porch. His father sat in his usual chair bundled up in a heavy overcoat, reading the paper.

"Um, hi, Dad," Adam said. He handed his father one of the frosty glasses. When his father lifted an eyebrow in question, he shrugged and said, "Sharon decided to make sandwiches."

"Ah," Carl replied as if the explanation made sense. "Thanks."

Adam set down his glass next to his dad's discarded one and leaned against the porch rail. He wrapped his arms around himself, huddling slightly to ward off the cold.

"You shouldn't be out here without a coat, son."

"I know." Adam watched Carl. He knew something was on his father's mind; he could tell but the slight frown on his face. Whatever it was, he hoped it wasn't anything too heavy though he was certain it was. "What is it?"

"I was wondering if you'd like to go see your mom with me tonight," Carl said softly. "I've gotten in the habit of visiting her at sunset."

"I went already." He smiled ruefully at his father. "At sunrise."

"Her favorite times of the day."

"Yeah." Father and son fell silent. Adam felt the chasm between them temporarily shrink as they thought about Elizabeth. It would sadden her to see them like this: awkward, unsure, dancing around each other's feelings. It saddened him, too. "I'll go."

Carl shook his head, waving off his son's offer. "You don't have to. You went already."

"But it'd be nice if we went together. We haven't done that in a long time."

"Are you sure you'll have time?"

Though he knew it wasn't his father's intention, Adam suddenly felt guilty. He'd been spending a great deal of time away from the house. Most of it was legitimate: he had been meeting with various art dealers in Baltimore and D. C., trying to find someone he'd be comfortable with. But the rest, the nights he spent with Grace and Joan and her family, were merely avoidance tactics—a feeble, selfish attempt to distract himself from the changes going on in his life. If he were completely honest with himself, he'd also been sulking. He still felt kind of useless around the house with Sharon's continued housekeeping efforts. Now he realized he'd let his volatile emotions blind him to the fact that his dad just wanted to spend time with him. "I'll have time."

Nodding, Carl started to stand. Adam stepped forward to help when Carl waved him back. "I'm only getting out of a chair. You two are going to have to let me do things on my own if I'm going to get better," he admonished.

He backed off and watched his father slowly get to his feet.

Carl stared at him for a moment before smiling and patting Adam's cheek. "You're a good man."

"So are you, Dad."

"I hate to interrupt," Sharon's voice said from the doorway, "but I finished the sandwiches. I added some cookies, too."

"Thanks." He opened the screen door for her, letting her come out before going in. "Hey, Dad? I'll be ready in about an hour. Is that good for you?"

"That'll be fine."

Taking the heavily loaded tray off of the kitchen counter, Adam took his time going back up to the attic. He figured they'd call it quits for the day and have lunch together before Joan and Grace left and he got ready to go to the cemetery with his dad. He was halfway up the attic steps when he heard Joan's voice.

"Look at this."

Adam stretched so he could see her. She stood in the middle of the attic holding an ivory silk dress with a bodice embroidered in gold leaves up against her so that Grace could see it.

"This dress is gorgeous," Joan said, swaying side to side. The skirt swirled around her legs.

"I remember that," Grace said, sounding surprised. "She wore it for an anniversary or something like that. Rove and I were hanging out in the living room and she comes in wearing it. She asked if she should wear her hair up or down."

"Up," Joan answered.

Grace nodded, a nostalgic smile flirting at the corner of her mouth. "That what's Rove and I said. Next thing I knew, we'd been recruited to help her get ready: choosing jewelry, makeup, hair clips and shoes."

"You helped?" Joan asked. Adam smiled at the disbelief in her voice.

"Yeah, well," Grace shrugged, "Mrs. Rove had a way of making even girly things seem fun and exciting instead of the excruciating bore they really are. Anyway, when we're done, she stands and models for us. Rove's just sitting there looking at her like she's the Madonna come back to Earth. So, Mrs. Rove turns to me and says 'Do you think Mr. Rove will like it?' I nodded and said I was sure he would."

Joan smiled. "How old were you guys?"

"Eleven or twelve." Grace propped her chin in her hand and wandered deeper into the memory. "She looked so pretty. Believe it or not, Rove looks a lot like her. Not to say that he's a pretty boy or anything, but he's definitely his mother's son."

"Sorry it took me so long," Adam said loudly as he continued up the stairs. With a smile pasted firmly on his lips, he noticed Joan hurriedly stuff the dress in a nearby box while Grace sprang up from her position on the floor. "Sharon was making a tray for us and got a little carried away."

"That was nice of her," Joan said, watching him set the tray on a box. "Wow. I hadn't realized how hungry I am until just now. I'm going to go wash my hands."

"I'll come with you," Grace said. The pair fled down the stairs.

Adam stared after them for a moment; he knew they felt awkward about talking about his mom. With a sigh, he sat down facing the stairs and waited.

A minute later, they made their way up the stairs, hesitating when they saw him sitting behind the box.

"We should eat," he said. "Come on."

Cautiously, they went and sat down facing him. They ate in silence. Finally, the uncomfortable silence became too much for him. "We need to talk."

"We're not going to finish the attic today," Joan said.

Grace rolled her eyes at her roommate. "That was a given. You saw this place when we got here. It was worse than a disaster site."

"I meant," Adam began, enunciating each word, "we need to talk about this." He pulled the picture he'd found out of his back pocket and laid it in the middle of the tray so they could see it.

"Grace, I've known you all my life. You're my oldest friend. Jane, I'm in love with you. I plan to spend the rest of my life with you. If there's anybody in the world I should be able to talk to about my mom, it's you two and my dad. And you should feel comfortable talking about her around me."

"But you don't talk about her, Rove."

"She's right," Joan chimed in. "In all the time we were together, you only told me a few things. It was always so painful for you. It just seemed kinder not to talk about her."

"I get that. But the three of us should be past secrets now. The big ones, anyway."

"Your mom isn't a secret," Joan said quietly.

"Maybe not to Grace, but did you know that my mom loved literature, especially plays and poetry? In the fall and winter, she'd read Marlowe and Shakespeare and Shaw to me. She'd do all the voices and explain things to me when I didn't understand. Then we'd do the scenes over together. Sometimes she'd read me poetry for months on end, mostly the Romantics and the Victorian poets. She said they had a passion for life that was unparalleled, but that their fatal flaw was their inability to find a happy medium. 'Constantly being in the throes of passion or the depths of despair takes its toll on the body and the mind. If one lives like that for too long, one begins to crave absolute peace and quiet at any cost despite the consequences. Learn to live, but find your middle ground so that your highs and lows won't drag you under.'"

Adam fell silent as the three wondered if that was what happened to Elizabeth, if she'd failed to take her own advice. He took a sip of water before continuing. "In the summer, we'd open the windows in the living room, turn out all the lights and camp out. She had this thing about actual camping—said the possibility of bugs and worms crawling on her while she slept freaked her out. But in the living room, we'd tell each other ghost stories with flashlights and sound effects and try to toast marshmallows over candles. On the weekends, we'd go roller-skating or people-watching in the park or to the zoo. Once we convinced Grace to come with us and . . ."

"If you finish that sentence, I swear I'll tell Joan about that time in third grade when Melissa Warren told the whole school you . . ."

"Okay, okay. No need to go there," Adam exclaimed, holding his hands up.

"But your mom was really cool about the whole zoo thing," Grace added with a small smile.

Joan looked from one to the other and said, "You do realize you two just had a whole conversation that I didn't understand." When neither Grace nor Adam seemed inclined to explain, she threw up her hands and pouted. "Fine, don't tell me."

Smiling at Joan's dramatics, he said, "Sometimes my mom would just watch me. One day—I was eleven at the time—I asked her why she did that and she said she was looking for herself in me. I didn't really know what she meant but Dad gave her this odd look, one of his 'Lizzie-honey-are-you-all-right?' looks. She ignored it and sat on the floor across from me. We spent the next fifteen minutes comparing ourselves to each other and to Dad. It seems I have his nose and eyes."

"You do," Grace said. Joan just smiled.

"She used to call me her darling boy," he said softly. "I'm telling you all this because, yeah, some of my memories of my mom are bittersweet and some just hurt. But most of them are really good. They're happy memories. They're a part of me and I don't want you to think that you have to always tiptoe around it or me." With that, Adam picked up the picture and put it back in his pocket. Then, he wrapped his uneaten sandwich in a napkin, stood and picked up his glass of water. "I promised Dad I'd go see Mom with him at sunset so I should go get cleaned up."

He pressed a kiss to Joan's cheek and headed for the stairs. When he reached them, Joan called his name. "Yeah?" he said, turning toward her.

"Can I come with you? On the eleventh, not tonight."

"I tend to visit her at sunrise," he warned.

Joan crinkled her nose at the time. She did not like getting up that early, but she nodded and said, "I have to get up for work anyway."

"Are you sure?"

"Mm-hmm."

"I'd like that." He started to turn back to the stairs when the expression on Grace's face caught his attention. It was shuttered, the look she got when she was feeling particularly vulnerable and didn't know how to deal with the emotion. "You're coming with us, right, Grace?"

She stuck her hands in the back pockets of her jeans. "Uh, I don't know."

"You should. I want you to." He gave her a fond smile. "You visit her every year anyway; you may as well come with us."

"How did you know that?" Grace asked, clearly shocked. She'd never told him that she sometimes visited his mom.

Adam shrugged. "I know you." He'd trotted halfway down the stirs before calling over his shoulder, "And you can have the dress, Jane. It'd look good on you."