Chapter 4

It's always an adventure seeing what my family will wear to church. My wardrobe is simple – shirts and jeans, and the church shirts are different from my everyday shirts only in that they're prettier. Cecelia likes to embroider western symbols on the yoke, which for my church shirts she usually makes white, while below the yoke the fabric is all sorts of bright colors – electric blue, royal purple, neon yellow, like that. By now people are used to it, but the first time I wore one of the church shirts Cecelia had made for me I got looks; they weren't used to me being so bright and pretty.

But Cecelia and Darlia are, for all their athleticism, fully feminine people, and they love their clothes. That Sunday morning I was waiting in the living room – I get ready a lot faster than they do, even though neither one uses makeup or agonizes over which dress to wear – for them to come out and dazzle me. And that's exactly what they did.

Cecelia was in an Indian outfit, one which she'd told me, while she was making it, they call salwar kameez in India. There's an American style that's similar, but Cecelia, working from pictures as she frequently does, had made this come out subtly different. The outfit was a knee-length tunic, two or three sizes too large as is her custom, over a pair of baggy heel-length pants. She'd used a sky blue fabric, and had embroidered hummingbirds in brilliant colors around the hem of the tunic, using some sort of metallic looking thread for the patches of glitter at the birds' throats. The neckline was a bit lower than she usually wears, so that I could see the knobs of her collar bones, and she'd lifted out the proposal necklace I'd given her back in 1995 so that the ruby glowed against the cloth of the tunic. There were probably several appropriate responses, but the one I used seemed to work – I wolf whistled.

Cecelia smiled at me, the gentle smile that I swear conveys more of her heart than any other. "I'm gratified that you approve, my husband. This is my first experiment with this style, and I find that I am completely comfortable in it."

"And completely beautiful, too," I said.

"Speaking of beautiful," she told me, "I have a child here who desires your opinion." And Darlia stepped out into the living room.

She was a complete contrast to Cecelia. She was wearing a floor length white dress, with ribbons that curled gently down the front, and over that a short open vest of a brocaded material that was somewhere between blue and purple depending on how the light hit it, and with the accents in gold and bronze. She'd put her hair in the temple braids that she loves, but over that she'd slipped a headband made of the same brocade as the vest. She looked like a wild Norse maiden, risen from the fjords to steal some man's heart away.

And she stole mine in that moment. I got off the sofa and went over to my daughter and hugged her tightly. "You know something, Weightlifter?" I asked. "I think that this time you're even more beautiful than your mother."

"Really?" Darlia's husky voice had even more of a rasp in it, a common thing when she experiences an emotional surge.

"Really."

She looked up at Cecelia. "You were right, Mommy! You said Daddy would look at me more and you were right!"

"I was," she said, and reached down to pull me up. It was no feat for her – she's as strong as an ox from all her weightlifting. "You see, Darlia, your father needs to realize that he has two wonderful women in his family, not just one."

I looked at Cecelia. "I know it already, Cecelia. I've known it since Darlia was born. But how did you achieve that effect?"

"I simply strove for barbaric luxury, for a sort of savage glory. Did I succeed?"

"Did you succeed! I swear, C, she looks ready to tear Grendel's arm off and eat it, and then turn the head of every prince in 20 kingdoms."

"She is not quite ready to choose from among princes, Darvin – but when she is ready, I know that they will cluster round her." Cecelia leaned forward and, holding onto my shoulder, whispered in my ear. "Our daughter will be a woman before we know it. And today I know what she will be like when she is."

I turned my head and kissed my wife's hand, and then reached up and plucked it off my shoulder, and held onto it. Darlia was looking up at us, and in addition to her usual imperial dignity there was something else in her bearing – a bit of maturity perhaps – which if I hadn't known better could nearly have persuaded me that she wasn't a child, but a fully grown woman, a little person ready to marry. "Darlia," I said, and my voice sounded strange in my ears, "I'm not sure that you can appreciate how beautiful you are today. But you are beautiful, and we're going to prove it to you one day."

"Is today a picture day?"

"Yeah, it is – you and Mommy both. Y'all are like peacocks today, and I'm just an ordinary old pigeon happy to hang around with y'all."

"'Witch yawl, ' Darvin?" Cecelia's smile was enormous. "Your pronunciation would do a redneck proud."

"Naw, I'm from California – we ain't got no accents out there."

"If you are a fair sample of California's offspring, I have great compassion for the place."

"Okay, okay," I said laughing. "I'll quit before I get any further behind." I gave Cecelia a quick kiss. "Lemme grab our Bibles, and we'll head outta here."

On Sunday we go in Cecelia's car, an arrest-me-red Mazda she bought three or four years ago. I got into the passenger seat, and Darlia took her usual station behind the driver's seat. I watched Cecelia as she backed out of the driveway – with my study where the garage used to be, she parks outside now just like I do – and steered us toward the church building. She's thin, stick thin, but I loved watching her legs in the pants she was wearing, and her arms in the sleeves of her tunic. Sitting down in that outfit she didn't seem so skinny, and though I knew her figure by heart I could almost believe that she'd gained some weight. Of course if gaining weight meant getting out of shape I'd prefer that she stay skinny; I don't want to wind up married to one of those women who weigh about 52 pounds, none of it muscle.