The yard made no celebrating sound. Tanya studied her gift bag. Carol Odell said, "Denise," and then did not find the second half of the sentence, and the name hung and fell. Frank found something on his shoe. The radio moved into a commercial for a mattress store, a voice too cheerful for the grass it landed on.
Andre looked at the plate. He understood the size of the slice the way he understood the banner. It was a piece and it was a no. His eyes were still wet. He did not reach. Reaching would finish her sentence for her. Not reaching would also be called something later, waste or attitude, he could not guess which. He stood in the narrow place between them and could not find a third door.
Pearl picked up the plate. Her hand shook. She did not try to hide the shake, and she did not comment on it. She held the thin slice level, as if it were worth the care, and she said to Andre, not to the yard, "Come on over here and sit with me."
He went. He did not make a speech. He did not look back at his mother to see whether going was disobedience. He walked to the folding chairs by the fence, away from the table, and he sat on the edge of the one next to Pearl's empty chair, and when she sat again he let her put the plate in his hands. Both hands. The habit remained. The cake was a small weight.
"You don't have to eat it for me," Pearl said. "But it's yours. I'm sorry it's late. I'm sorry about more than the cake."
He nodded. A tear finally fell, one, and he turned his face a little so the balloon would be what people saw if they were still looking. He ate three bites because she was watching and because the chocolate was sweet and his body was a child's body and sweet was still sweet. Then he stopped. The rest of the sliver sat on the plate, the frosting smeared where his finger had caught it. He did not perform gratitude. He did not perform refusal. He held still, which was the only honest thing he could manage, and Pearl let him hold still. She did not wipe his face with a napkin in front of the neighbors. She did not say look at them. She put her hand on the back of the chair, not on his neck, and she stayed.
Denise remained at the table with the knife. She cut pieces for the guests because a hostess who stops cutting has admitted something, and she was not ready to admit it in a shape Carol could carry next door. The pieces she cut were normal pieces. Sasha got a flower. Renee's boys got pieces that were larger than Andre's, and Renee, to her credit, looked sick about it and said, "We're fine, we'll share," and Denise said, "Don't be silly, there's plenty," and the word plenty sat in the yard like a stone.
Leon finally moved. He moved toward the cooler, which was not toward his son. He put his hands on the ice. The cold hurt in a way he was grateful for, because it was simple. He stayed there long enough that Frank Odell drifted over and said, quietly, "You good?"
"Yeah," Leon said. "Kids. You know how it gets."
Frank did not say that he knew. He said, "Carol's going to talk about this." Then he took a soda and left Leon with the sentence, which was not cruelty, only the truth of a neighbor who did not want to be drafted.