Then, just because I feel relaxed and hopeful, I ask, "Do you read the Bible, Jonas?"

"Oh, yes." He quotes three verses.

All three I recognize from the walls at The Center, especially the one about forgiveness. The forgiveness one will always hit a chord in my heart. "Wow! You've memorized a lot."

"Don't read the letters, Deirdre," he says. "But I hear real good."

I have one more question. "Jonas?"

"Yep."

"Is it hard to forgive people?"

His lips draw together as he squints his eyes. "Forgiveness helps us," he tells me. "Heals the bad feelings so that they don't make us mean."

I don't speak for a minute, and he looks uncomfortable. His feet shuffle and he shifts from side to side. When I do talk, all I can say is, "Jonas, that was very good."

That night the owl doesn't wake me, but a memory does. I am standing in the elevator headed to the first floor of the hospital. Sally is bringing the car to the entrance, and I am going home. The elevator door opens and a couple enters with a baby wrapped in a pink blanket. The man holds the bundle, all warm and soft. Neither he nor the woman takes their eyes off their baby. I assume they are going home, too.

I have just spent five days in the hospital because my fiance crashed his car. He never visited me during my stay, and through the grapevine I learned he has been dating someone else. My future has crashed and evaporated like a puff of smoke. I think it's uncanny that for a brief time in space, this couple and I share the same elevator, getting off at the first floor-to start new lives. Their happiness, my shock and sorrow, all combined in that tiny square, until the doors let us out, and then we share nothing anymore.

twenty-three.

When Jonas delivers the brochures to me four days later, I am astounded. I'm on my deck, looking for the tree the owl cries from. I wonder why I'm so doggedly determined to find and see the owl, the creature whose call I have grown to accept and expect each night.

Impulsively, I hug Jonas.

Sheepishly, he says, "You are happy, Deirdre."

The color brochures are beautiful. They are even on a beige card stock, not just regular twenty-pound computer paper. The photo of the ice cream cake looks clear and tempting.

"How much do I owe you?" I ask. Come to think of it, I have offered him nothing for checking my pipes. Is Aunt Regena Lorraine paying his bill? She told me to hand over any utility bills I get for the cabin because she pays them from a fund my Grandpa set up. Whenever he traveled, she paid his bills for him.

"Zero," replies Jonas. He presses his hands into the pockets of his jeans.

"No, Jonas. I have to pay you."

"The guy at Custom Print owed me money."

"He did? Why?"

"I fixed a leak in his kitchen." Then he laughs, and drawing attention to where he cut his head in my bathroom, he says, "I almost hit my head on a pipe at Custom Print!"

I'm glad to see that his wound from the other day has disappeared. If only all cuts could leave our bodies so quickly and without a trace.

"Let me pay you."

"No." He shoves his hands deeper into his jeans pockets and shakes his head. "Zero."

"I can't do that."

"Well, you will have to."

A moment later he enters my kitchen and bellows, "Got any cake to eat?"

I do three loads of laundry after Jonas leaves. As my clothes spin in the dryer, I admire the fancy lettering, the vivid colors, the texture of the card stock, and the way the photo of the chocolate ice cream cake entices. Chef B would not think the cake is regal enough for the intricate decorating I do, but Jeannie was clever in suggesting this cake be the one for the front of the brochure. This cake speaks of people's everyday lives-brownies and chocolate chip cookies. Not tiers of frosted cake layered with unpronounceable orange filling.

I feel a bit foolish for thinking that Jonas wouldn't get the job done. I'm sure I'm not the first one to doubt his capabilities. Before he left in his truck, I thanked him again. He just smiled and said I should start making cakes.

Giovanni barks as my aunt knocks on the door. I yell for her to come on in, which she and the dog do. Today my aunt has on a bright yellow dress with two big pockets below the waist. But she is not feeling bright today and immediately upon seeing me at the dining room table, cries, "I'm sorry, Deena."

"For what?"

"You'll have to excuse me for coming in here so often. I know you don't need your old aunt barging in every day."

"That's okay. Want me to put water on for tea?" I look at the clock and see I need to leave for my cooking class in ten minutes.

As Giovanni relaxes on the rug by the sliding glass door, Regena Lorraine finds room on the couch. Her face is blotchy; her eyes are rimmed in red. She moistens her lips, starts to speak, and then looks longingly around the living room. "It's just that..."

"Yes?" I sit in the chair across from her.

"Well..." She takes in a long breath and lets it out like air being released from a bottle of soda. "This cabin is filled with memories."

I join her in glancing from wall to ceiling to floor.

A tear runs down her cheek. "I miss him."

A gentle feeling eases over me. My aunt is missing her daddy. "I wish I'd known him better," I say.

"Yes, well. Well, yes." She considers saying something else, stops. Finally, "Families. They often don't see eye-to-eye. You know, how it can be. Your mother..."

"Never liked Dad's relatives?" I complete the sentence for her.

She dabs at a tear that rolls from under the bottom rim of her designer leopard-spotted glasses.

"True, right?"

My aunt lets another tear follow the first. "True." Then quickly, "And Ernest traveled a lot. He was often gone to some foreign place, especially after Mother died. So he wasn't around to make those visits that probably made your mother turn up her nose."

I laugh. Turn up her nose. Turn up her nose. Yes, that is what my mother does when she doesn't like or approve of something or someone. My aunt knows her well. Yes, that is what my mother does when she doesn't like or approve of something or someone. My aunt knows her well.

Regena Lorraine blows her nose into a pink tissue she takes from her bosom. "I miss so much about Ernest. He was a good father."

I look at my aunt with her reddened cheeks and sad expression and think she has never looked more endearing.

Suddenly a thought comes to me. "Do you know anything about a raccoon bowl?"

"Raccoon bowl?" Removing her glasses, she wipes both eyes. "Yes. I gave it to Ernest when he was harassed by hungry raccoons a few years ago."

"Where is it?"

This time my aunt laughs.

Although she confuses me, I allow her this indulgence. Anyone who has just cried deserves to laugh.

"I came in and stole it."

Is she telling the truth? "Really?"

"Yes. I'm a regular thief. Shortly after he died, I saw it on the counter. I recalled that time three raccoons surrounded him. That was some story!" She glances at me. "Have I told you?"

"No, you haven't."

Clapping her hands together, she begins. "Well, he was carrying a bag of potatoes and had to lift it over his head so that the raccoons wouldn't be able to reach it. Then he ran inside. I was in my car in the driveway. I laughed so hard. Once the raccoons left, I went into his cabin and we laughed together." She takes a deep breath. "When I eat my bran cereal out of that silly bowl every morning, I can hear his laughter."

I decide then that I will not ask for the bowl so that I can get the best effects from my grandpa's peanut soup. Perhaps I will never be able to taste all the flavors. Yet Jonas tasted every single one and I served the soup to him in a white ceramic bowl. Ordinary people think that the dishes we serve our food in don't matter. However, early on, Chef B taught me that the plates and silverware we use to present our works of art must compliment the food. "Never serve mint curried chicken in dark bowl. See? Its color is dark, so to present it well, place it in a light bowl, white or cream in the color. See?"

I did see. I have tried to follow his instructions. My grandfather Ernest must have realized the importance of serving food in the appropriate dishes, as well. If he were here, I know he and I could have some amusing conversations. Especially if I got the chance to tell him about the family gravy bowl that is so ugly I once considered purposely knocking it off the counter onto the kitchen floor.

My aunt stands, and I catch the scent of her perfume. She makes her way toward the door. "Gotta go." Giovanni stretches, shakes his massive frame, and prepares to leave with her.

Quickly, I say, "No, you don't. I have to get to class. But you take your time sitting here... and remembering."

She looks surprised that I would let her stay while I'm out. Then she sits back on the couch, relaxes, and crosses one heavy ankle over the other.

Again I note the kimono picture hanging on the wall-that half-covered face of the woman, hiding-hiding behind the opened ornate fan. Suddenly, I'm hit with the thought that my aunt has been hiding from me her sorrow over the loss of her own father. How much like me she is. We really are from the same gene pool.

"Help yourself to cake," I tell her, as I load the ingredients I need for today's lesson-blueberry muffins-into my Whole Foods bag. "Jonas ate a slice earlier, but I think there's a little left."

"You're a godsend," she breathes as she rests against the quilt on the couch. "Did I ever tell you about the time Jo-Jen saved me from a depression?"

"No, you haven't done that yet."

She fingers her Minnie Mouse watch. "It was after my mother died. And now, you are helping me, Deena."

"I am?" I can't believe what she's saying. Me? Not too long ago I was in a hospital bed, wishing I would have died in the accident.

"Your being here in this cabin has done wonders for me.

You bring life to this place."

At times like these, I'm not sure what to say.

"I was married once," my aunt says as she looks through the sliding glass door, somewhere over and beyond the edge of the visible mountain.

I make my voice soft. "I didn't know that."

"Men are... Well. Just make sure you know that no one can possess you."

I do know that. "I know," I say with force. I think of Lucas for a second and suppress the urge to scream.

My aunt glances toward the windows in the ceiling that are letting in an array of light. "Did you know that Katharine Hepburn said that plain women know more about men than beautiful ones do?" she asks the ceiling.

That, I didn't know.

"My husband, Charlie-he appreciated gambling more than he did me."

When she looks at me, I want to say something but no words come.

"He grew up in a home without hope. No one gave him any. I tried. I really gave it my best, Shug, but I guess it wasn't enough."

My sorrow is about to explode in my chest. Now I think I recall Mom saying something about how Regena Lorraine used to be married, but that her husband left one day for Vegas and never came back.

Her smile surprises me. "That which doesn' kill us makes us stronger."

That line I have heard many times since my accident. I wonder if my aunt would have preferred death to becoming a pillar of strength. My guess is that she might have looked around her and wondered why other women's husbands stayed, offering happiness and fulfilling relationships. My guess is that she might have woken on many lonely nights to ask the age-old question, "Why me?!"

She catches me off guard when she comments, "You are like a lemon in the fridge."

A lemon in the where? Could this be another of her entourage of quotes? Who said this one? "What about lemons?"

She lets out a slight laugh. "Ernest always believed that a lemon in the fridge is a good sign. He told me as a little girl that a lemon just sitting on a shelf in a refrigerator is a symbol of hope and contentment. It's a long story. I know you have to go."

I tell her I'll see her later and head out the door.

My mother never cared much for Dad's side of the family- this is true. Growing up, I recall that her parents, her siblings, and her siblings' kids visited us often on our farm. As far as dad's relatives in Pennsylvania and North Carolina, we rarely saw them.

Yet Grandpa Ernest didn't let my mother's coolness stop him from putting me in his will. Sometimes family has to persevere in spite of the obstacles in the way.

My aunt was thoughtful and parked her truck beside my Jeep instead of behind it, leaving me room to back out without much trouble. The driveway, being so close to the edge of the mountain, still makes me nervous, but I am getting a little more used to it and learning how to maneuver in and out.

I drive down the steep road, grateful for my father's father. Sometimes life's biggest blessings come in the wrapped packages that you never expected and didn't choose. They are just there for you with your name on the card, waiting to be opened.

And appreciated.