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" In the sandwich shop, Kath tells Maura that she has the perfect setting in mind: that field in East Concord near the country club, with Mount Kearsarge in the background. The portrait was Maura&amp;#039;s idea, something memorable for their mother&amp;#039;s 67th birthday. But as usual, Kath wants to take the whole thing over. &amp;quot;I was thinking we could use Carter&amp;#039;s backyard,&amp;quot; Maura says. Carter, Maura&amp;#039;s boyfriend, or significant other, or whatever he is, rents the bottom half of an old house near downtown, and his backyard has gravel paths, a fountain, and massive old rhododendrons at the far edges. It&amp;#039;s an elegant garden left over from long ago. &amp;quot;Carter&amp;#039;s not part of our family,&amp;quot; Kath says. &amp;quot;Close enough,&amp;quot; Maura says. &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;ll just confuse Mom. She&amp;#039;ll look at the picture and wonder, Who&amp;#039;s that guy standing next to Maura, and where&amp;#039;s Webb?&amp;quot; &amp;quot;Mom knows perfectly well who Carter is.&amp;quot; Maura draws a slow breath. She doesn&amp;#039;t want to start a fight in the Sandwich Depot, but Kath always exaggerates, twisting reality to make her worries sound more reasonable. &amp;quot;And Mom won&amp;#039;t be looking for Webb. It&amp;#039;s been five years, Kath. Webb has a whole other family now. Why don&amp;#039;t we include Webb and Marissa and the baby in our picture, and see if that confuses Mom?&amp;quot; &amp;quot;Three times,&amp;quot; Kath says, ignoring Maura&amp;#039;s sarcasm. &amp;quot;That&amp;#039;s three times that I know of.&amp;quot; According to Kath, their mom has been calling out friendly hellos to strangers. &amp;quot;Like when she came with us to the science museum,&amp;quot; Kath says. &amp;quot;She&amp;#039;s greeting people inappropriately, and she doesn&amp;#039;t even realize it. You&amp;#039;d see it, too, if you spent more time with her.&amp;quot; &amp;quot;I see her as much as you do,&amp;quot; Maura says. Of course she&amp;#039;s noticed Mom&amp;#039;s blips of forgetfulness, but they seem like normal blips. Heck, Maura forgets things, too; two nights ago she left the hose running so that by morning her side yard had turned into a muddy pond. But she hasn&amp;#039;t seen any inappropriate greetings. That&amp;#039;s just Kath, exaggerating as usual. Kath picks up her phone, tapping her calendar open. &amp;quot;Mom has an appointment with the endocrinologist coming up. Would you \u2014&amp;quot; &amp;quot;I&amp;#039;ll take her,&amp;quot; Maura says, before Kath can start in on how worried she is about Mom&amp;#039;s prediabetes and how, with that on top of her memory loss, it probably isn&amp;#039;t safe for her to leave the house alone. &amp;quot;That would be great,&amp;quot; Kath says. &amp;quot;I&amp;#039;ll call the photographer.&amp;quot; A few nights later, Mom enters Maura&amp;#039;s little kitchen exclaiming over her granddaughter&amp;#039;s stellar driving skills. Ellie, Maura&amp;#039;s older daughter, got her license two weeks ago, and tonight she drove to the South End and fetched her grandmother. Ellie beams at her grandmother, showing her dimples and flipping her long hair, then disappears upstairs. Maura&amp;#039;s two daughters are so pretty, with their green eyes, glossy hair, and beautiful skin, and she wonders how this can be, since she was a frizzy-haired, slouchy mess through her teens. Now Mom sets a quart jug of maple syrup on the counter and frowns at it. &amp;quot;What&amp;#039;s with the syrup, and why now?&amp;quot; Maura asks, mixing salad for their cookout. &amp;quot;Oh, someone brought it to me, someone whose family has a sugar house, oh, you know....&amp;quot; She pauses, then lets out a sigh. &amp;quot;Well, thanks,&amp;quot; Maura says. &amp;quot;You must mean Lydia Thompson, right?&amp;quot; Mom&amp;#039;s friend Lydia grew up in the North Country, and Lydia&amp;#039;s brothers still run a commercial sugaring operation up there. &amp;quot;Right, of course.&amp;quot; Mom smacks her palm against her forehead. Her coral lipstick bleeds into the fine tracery of lines above her lip. If Kath were here, she&amp;#039;d grab her lipliner pencil, then walk Mom to the bathroom to show her how to use it, but Maura knows when to leave well enough alone, and she hands Mom a glass of wine. &amp;quot;I got some wild salmon on special, and Carter&amp;#039;s out back getting the grill ready.&amp;quot; She keeps her eyes on Mom, to see if Carter&amp;#039;s name confuses her. But Mom only smiles, eyebrows raised in anticipation. &amp;quot;Well, how fancy,&amp;quot; she says. &amp;quot;I&amp;#039;ll go tell him hello.&amp;quot; She trundles out the back door to the deck. Maura hasn&amp;#039;t yet found the right moment to mention the family portrait to Carter. The portrait \u2014 that is, the idea of including Carter in the portrait \u2014 seems to suggest something beyond the fact they&amp;#039;ve been seeing each other for two years. The truth is, she has jitters about the possibility of getting married again. Carter&amp;#039;s first marriage lasted only three years, and he doesn&amp;#039;t have kids of his own. His reticence on the subject feels like a problem, a wedge between them. She imagines the two of them starting to fight the way she and Webb once did, dragging themselves to the marriage counselor only to fume and pout and interrupt each other until Carter, like Webb, would at last reveal that he was interested in someone else: someone younger, funnier, more accomplished. Maura doesn&amp;#039;t want to go through any of that ever again. She wishes she could hash out her confusion with Kath, the way they used to. But Kath would only respond with unhelpful platitudes about sticking it out, or planning date nights, like Kath does with Mark every month. Carter teaches studio art and art history at the private school in Manchester, but he has a kind of passion for his other work, these miniature buildings he makes, and he wants to cut back his teaching to give more time to them. Maura makes more money than Carter does \u2014 not much more; she&amp;#039;s a guidance counselor at Concord High School \u2014 but it bothers her that he&amp;#039;s considering making even less money than he makes now. Still, his tiny buildings: The first time she saw them, they enchanted her so, she almost burst into tears. It was their second date, an opening reception at a Concord gallery. Carter&amp;#039;s part of the exhibit took up the gallery&amp;#039;s back room, each little artwork an architectural model, like the decrepit Daniel Webster Motel up on Route 4 in Boscawen and the square, wood-framed Esso station down on 3A. Carter has a thing for falling-down places on New Hampshire&amp;#039;s frost-heaved back roads, 200-year-old barns with caved-in roofs; ugly little IGA markets; the abandoned lodge at the old King Ridge ski area. He takes photos of these places, then builds their replicas, shaping tiny old-fashioned gas pumps out of aluminum, the thinnest clapboards from balsa wood. He adds the rust and peeling paint that the real buildings show, avoiding anything picturesque &amp;amp;amp;mash; no stately farmhouses, no lovely white Congregational churches. Back when she and Carter first got together, Maura felt such relief to be with someone who knew nothing about billable hours, who would talk about art and the teenage brain and school issues for as long as she wanted. Someone who wore dungarees instead of khakis when they went out to dinner. In the two years since the show, Carter&amp;#039;s sold seven of his models, one of them for $3,000, and he thinks he could make more of a living from them. Maura has her doubts, and those doubts have made her pick at Carter, even though she knows better. At dinner, Maura&amp;#039;s daughters, Ellie and Janie, eat quickly, then slip away, back to their bedrooms and their laptop screens, while Maura, Carter, and Mom linger at the kitchen table. &amp;quot;The Boston &amp;amp;amp; Maine Railroad Station,&amp;quot; Carter says, referring to the old Concord train station that was torn down 30 years ago. &amp;quot;I had some of my students do their spring architecture project on it, and they found some great old photos. Arches, domes, turrets, slate roof. All gone, all for the sake of that stupid shopping center.&amp;quot; Mom nods. &amp;quot;That&amp;#039;s how we went to Boston when I was a girl,&amp;quot; she says. &amp;quot;I remember sitting in that waiting room, looking up at the ceiling with all the stars on it,&amp;quot; she says. &amp;quot;And the man next to me spat something right on the floor next to my patent leather shoe. Chewing tobacco, I guess.&amp;quot; &amp;quot;That would have been the late forties? Early fifties?&amp;quot; Carter asks. Maura loves this about Carter \u2014 the way he engages Mom, deftly steering the conversation when she repeats one of her tedious old stories. &amp;quot;Mm-hmm,&amp;quot; Mom says. &amp;quot;But by the time you kids were born, people had stopped taking the train, and the rail yards had gone all to hell. That poor old station \u2014 no one was sorry to see it go.&amp;quot; &amp;quot;Yup,&amp;quot; Carter says, leaning back in his chair, hands clasped behind his head. &amp;quot;The U.S. Interstate rules the nation,&amp;quot; he intones. Mom smiles at Carter, though Maura can see she&amp;#039;s puzzled by his odd Interstate comment. But Mom&amp;#039;s doing fine \u2014 Kath is overreacting about Mom&amp;#039;s memory. And Mom likes Carter. There&amp;#039;s no way she&amp;#039;d be confused by seeing Carter in their family photo. A week later, Maura sits with Mom in the endocrinologist&amp;#039;s waiting room. Mom is complaining about the wild raspberry canes that have gotten out of hand in her backyard beds. &amp;quot;I can help you pull those out,&amp;quot; Maura says. &amp;quot;They&amp;#039;re prickly, but they have shallow roots.&amp;quot; &amp;quot;Wonderful,&amp;quot; Mom says, then looks down at her magazine. Maura does the same, flipping pages and smelling the scent strips, enjoying this period of enforced nothingness. A few minutes later, Maura sees Mom lifting her hand to wave at someone standing at the receptionist&amp;#039;s window, a woman about Maura&amp;#039;s age, with improbable yellow hair and ridiculous tiny shorts like Maura&amp;#039;s daughters wear. &amp;quot;Oh! Hi there!&amp;quot; Mom calls, her eyes crinkling at the edges as she smiles at the woman. The woman smiles back, then squints, head tilted, trying to place them \u2014 how do I know you, heavy older mother with a not-so-young daughter? Work? Definitely not the gym. Friend of my parents? This woman has no idea who Mom is, Maura slowly sees. Her heart does a funny flip. &amp;quot;Mom?&amp;quot; Maura says. &amp;quot;I think maybe you don&amp;#039;t know her.&amp;quot; &amp;quot;Ohhh. Right.&amp;quot; Mom drops her head, looks at her lap, and closes her eyes for a second. She starts to hum a high-pitched little tune. Maura shrugs an apology to the woman, who presses her lips together and sits down on the far side of the waiting room. Hey, she didn&amp;#039;t do you any harm by saying hello, Maura wants to say. She wishes Kath were here, because she doesn&amp;#039;t know what to do now. &amp;quot;Mom?&amp;quot; she says. &amp;quot;Mmm-hmm?&amp;quot; Mom says, pleasantly. She&amp;#039;s leafing through her magazine again, as if everything&amp;#039;s just fine. Maura is so rattled by Mom&amp;#039;s strange hello to the yellow-haired woman that she takes in only half of what the endocrinologist says about staving off diabetes. She takes notes on a receipt from Concord Tire and Auto, because she forgot her notepad. When she gets home after dropping off Mom, she can hardly read her own writing. At Carter&amp;#039;s house late that afternoon, Maura perches on his kitchen counter while he washes the blueberries she&amp;#039;s brought over \u2014 a silent peace offering, for all the secret doubts she&amp;#039;s harbored lately. &amp;quot;Anyway, it was just strange,&amp;quot; she says, about Mom&amp;#039;s odd hello in the doctor&amp;#039;s office. She takes the handful of blueberries he holds out for her. &amp;quot;And then the way she started humming \u2014 that was weird, too.&amp;quot; &amp;quot;So what did the doctor say about it?&amp;quot; he asks. &amp;quot;The doctor?&amp;quot; Oh, God, why didn&amp;#039;t she mention it to the doctor? What is wrong with her? He shrugs, gives a half-smile. &amp;quot;But like you said, it&amp;#039;s probably nothing. Everybody does weird things sometimes.&amp;quot; In her agitation she starts blabbering about the portrait, how it could serve as a memory aid for Mom, and how they used to do family pictures every summer up in Ogunquit. &amp;quot;And I want you to be in it,&amp;quot; she says, too quickly. &amp;quot;Huh\u2014you don&amp;#039;t seem like that kind of family,&amp;quot; he says. &amp;quot;What kind of family?&amp;quot; &amp;quot;The kind of family that has a photographer take pictures every year.&amp;quot; &amp;quot;Well, maybe we were,&amp;quot; she says, stung by his comment. &amp;quot;I just meant that your family isn&amp;#039;t all prep schools and summer houses, that kind of thing.&amp;quot; He turns up his collar and lifts an eyebrow at her \u2014 his impression of Steff, the obnoxious preppy in Pretty in Pink, which they had watched on cable a few weeks ago. &amp;quot;Right,&amp;quot; she says. &amp;quot;Well, usually Dad took the picture, not a photographer.&amp;quot; Dad would set the timer on the camera and race over to them, Mom, Kath and Maura down on the sand and laughing because sometimes the camera caught him half out of the frame. One summer Mom hired a professional photographer, who had them dress in jeans and white shirts and who took shots of all four of them, then Kath and Maura, barefoot at the water&amp;#039;s edge. The photos turned out poorly, Mom trying too hard with her smile, Dad looking rigid, and Maura&amp;#039;s and Kath&amp;#039;s foreheads and chins too shiny. That same summer she and Kath went out most nights for dollar drafts, talking about everything in the world and making up outrageous stories whenever a guy approached. But that had also been a lifetime ago: Eleven years since Dad&amp;#039;s heart attack, five years since the end of Maura&amp;#039;s marriage, and God only knew how long since Kath had turned disapproving, cranky, overly cautious. She couldn&amp;#039;t have predicted any of it, standing on the beach with her big hair and rolled-up jeans or sitting in a noisy bar with Kath. &amp;quot;I don&amp;#039;t think it&amp;#039;s a good idea, Maura,&amp;quot; Carter says now. He dumps the blueberries into a bowl and then backs up toward the basement door, which means he&amp;#039;s itching to get to work on his latest model, in his basement workshop. &amp;quot;What, the portrait?&amp;quot; &amp;quot;No, me being in the portrait. I mean\u2014&amp;quot; &amp;quot;Right,&amp;quot; she says, not wanting to hear his reasons. She hops down from the counter and heads for the side door. &amp;quot;I&amp;#039;ll see you tomorrow.&amp;quot; Maura tries to push Carter&amp;#039;s refusal from her mind, tries to focus on Mom. She should have mentioned Mom&amp;#039;s strange hello to the endocrinologist, although what would an endocrinologist know about Mom&amp;#039;s brain? About Mom&amp;#039;s possible dementia, as Kath has begun to call it? Kath has sent her links to scary Web pages, like &amp;quot;Diagnosing and treating mild to moderate dementia,&amp;quot; and &amp;quot;Early symptoms of Alzheimer&amp;#039;s.&amp;quot; And, most ominous: &amp;quot;What new caregivers need to know.&amp;quot; Still, whenever Maura phones her mom, it&amp;#039;s like it always has been. Mom telling Maura about the darling new priest, how smart he is, or the endless details of her parish women&amp;#039;s meetings. Mom, Irish-Yankee-frugal, reminding her about a special on flank steak at Market Basket. Mom, remembering to ask about Ellie&amp;#039;s lacrosse and Janie&amp;#039;s rowing. Maura&amp;#039;s fairly sure Mom doesn&amp;#039;t forget to turn off the stove, or where to put the milk and bread, or even what her purpose is, living alone in her little house. People with dementia forget their purpose, she knows; they walk out of their houses in the middle of the night, looking for their purpose. That isn&amp;#039;t Mom, Maura&amp;#039;s pretty certain. The day they settle on for the portrait turns out to be a perfect late-July afternoon, clear sky and a hint of a breeze. Like a beach day, Maura thinks. For some reason, Kath has let go of her vision for the portrait, agreeing that Carter&amp;#039;s backyard would make a better setting than that unmowed field, and she&amp;#039;s let Maura know with her tone that she&amp;#039;s being a good sport. Well, Maura&amp;#039;s being a good sport, too: She&amp;#039;s refrained from starting a stupid fight with Carter over his decision to stay out of the portrait. &amp;quot;Maybe next year?&amp;quot; he&amp;#039;d said, and she&amp;#039;d nodded, then asked if he&amp;#039;d mind taking the picture, and he&amp;#039;d said he&amp;#039;d love to do that. Carter sets up his tripod while they all mill around, Maura&amp;#039;s girls self-conscious in their silky sundresses and Kath&amp;#039;s three boys making fun of their matching royal blue polo shirts. Dressy-casual was what Kath decreed, so the picture wouldn&amp;#039;t look too formal or wedding-ish. Maura sits down on a bench next to Ryan, Kath&amp;#039;s oldest boy. He&amp;#039;s in college, six-foot-four and a former hockey player. He&amp;#039;s a good kid. &amp;quot;Pretty back here, isn&amp;#039;t it?&amp;quot; she says. &amp;quot;Beautiful,&amp;quot; he says, surprising her \u2014 he sounds appreciative, mature. She&amp;#039;ll have to remember and tell Kath about it later. Kath, she sees, is fussing with Mark&amp;#039;s shirt and leaning in to whisper something that makes them both laugh. Carter whistles to gather everyone, but then he frowns, shaking his head. He jogs back toward the house, calling over his shoulder that he needs a different lens. &amp;quot;Where&amp;#039;s Grammy?&amp;quot; Ellie says. There&amp;#039;s a sudden pocket of quiet as they all gaze around, then at one another. &amp;quot;She was standing next to the fountain,&amp;quot; Ryan says, pointing. &amp;quot;She was right there.&amp;quot; A chickadee chirps and buzzes high in a tree. &amp;quot;I&amp;#039;m sure she&amp;#039;s fine, she&amp;#039;s just\u2014&amp;quot; Maura says. &amp;quot;No, she&amp;#039;s not,&amp;quot; Kath says, pulling away from Mark and springing into action. &amp;quot;Ryan, Sam, go see if she went out the back gate there. Paulie, can you check the street? Mark?&amp;quot; &amp;quot;We&amp;#039;ll both go check the street,&amp;quot; Mark tells her. &amp;quot;Your mom&amp;#039;s around here somewhere, Kath. Getting all crazed and panicky isn&amp;#039;t going to help.&amp;quot; Kath nods but taps her toe, frowning. &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s a busy street,&amp;quot; she says. &amp;quot;Oh come on, she&amp;#039;s not going to dash into the street like a toddler,&amp;quot; Maura says, but she sees Kath giving her a look that&amp;#039;s both dagger-eyed and pleading. &amp;quot;OK, OK,&amp;quot; she says. &amp;quot;I&amp;#039;ll go check the front door.&amp;quot; She doesn&amp;#039;t tell Kath what she&amp;#039;s thinking: that Mom did seem kind of distracted today, and also oddly irritated about the photo shoot. Mom&amp;#039;s not a 4-year-old, Maura reminds herself on her way into the house, though that&amp;#039;s exactly what it feels like: as if Maura&amp;#039;s and Kath&amp;#039;s kids are tiny again, and someone&amp;#039;s wandered off from the playground at White&amp;#039;s Park, Maura and Kath imagining drowning, broken bones, kidnapping. Maura&amp;#039;s worries these days are continual but diffuse \u2014 Is Ellie&amp;#039;s vegetarianism a cover-up for anorexia? Should Janie be posting that many photos of herself on Facebook? \u2014 unlike the concrete terrors of early parenthood. Maura steps into the cool darkness of Carter&amp;#039;s house. Half-furnished with the owner&amp;#039;s heavy Victorian furniture, the place is a funny mix, with Carter&amp;#039;s airy modern chairs and photos added in. She passes the blown-up photo of his Esso station model; only when you get up close can you tell that it&amp;#039;s a miniature. She opens the front door, peering down the walk: No one out there. As she shuts the door, she hears something, a murmuring from somewhere in the house, and she moves toward it. Now she hears sounds coming from Carter&amp;#039;s basement workshop. She hurtles down the stairs like a teenager, stopping short when she sees Mom, hunched in her silk tunic and snuffling into a tissue, and Carter next to her, talking quietly. The workshop is cool and dry \u2014 he runs a dehumidifier all summer \u2014 and well lit, with two worktables and shelving along the walls. Propped on one shelf are more blown-up photos of the models he&amp;#039;s sold. He&amp;#039;s begun a new series of models from the Concord rail yards, not the glorious, vanished train station but random old buildings that remain: the falling-down brick tannery and the Feed and Seed&amp;#039;s tilting silo. As she gets closer, she sees Carter and Mom leaning over another model. She recognizes the familiar gray paint and white trim on the tiny building, and there&amp;#039;s the one-car garage where on rainy days she and Kath acted out plays, Kath up in the loft pretending to be a kidnapped princess, Maura below in Dad&amp;#039;s car, pretending to drive to Kath&amp;#039;s rescue. Carter&amp;#039;s built a model of Mom&amp;#039;s house, she sees, the house where they grew up. Carter&amp;#039;s models usually draw her in with their sadness and decrepitude, their ugliness compelling her to keep looking. By contrast, this one is almost dull in its tidiness. Still, it&amp;#039;s Mom&amp;#039;s house. Carter smiles over at her. &amp;quot;A birthday surprise,&amp;quot; he says. &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s not finished yet, but your mom\u2014&amp;quot; &amp;quot;Bridget,&amp;quot; Mom interrupts. Carter nods. &amp;quot;But Bridget seemed a little sad, and I figured I could show her ahead of time.&amp;quot; &amp;quot;Yes,&amp;quot; Mom says. &amp;quot;But it only made her sadder,&amp;quot; Carter says. &amp;quot;I remember so much,&amp;quot; Mom says, looking out the tiny basement window. &amp;quot;Like it was yesterday.&amp;quot; &amp;quot;Mom?&amp;quot; Maura says. Mom turns her way. She blinks, as if she&amp;#039;s just woken up from a long nap. &amp;quot;I know something&amp;#039;s not right, but I don&amp;#039;t know what it is.&amp;quot; Maura can only nod. &amp;quot;Let&amp;#039;s go take the picture.&amp;quot; She follows her mother and Carter back up the narrow stairs and through the house, toward the bright backyard. In the kitchen she slips around them, racing out the back door. She sees Kath, alone in the backyard, still waiting for everyone, and calls to her. Meet the Winner Sarah McCraw Crow lives with her husband and three kids on a farm in central New Hampshire, where she writes and gardens. She&amp;#039;s at work on a novel about the family of the artist John Singer Sargent. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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