Burnt

What should she play? Agnes loved Beethoven’s sonatas but didn’t feel up to the efficient “Waldstein” or the untamed “Appassionata.” Not today, so she settled on the last sonata Mr. Larney taught her, “Les Adieux.” Its lilting tones began to echo off Mama’s dark, paneled walls. It felt so cozy in this living room with the fireplace going, the plush red furniture and blue orientals, chrysanthemums in front of the window, and Thanksgiving decorations scattered all over the room. Agnes could almost forget the Depression, and what a bad girl she'd been --

The sound of crashing crystal and her mother’s scream punctured their way through Beethoven’s lilting melody. The collapse of a Philadelphia greenhouse, the blood-curdling scream in a knife fight – those would've intruded on Agnes less. And then she heard curses from Mama and then from Granny.

“Mary, Mother of God!”

“Horse manure!”

Agnes darted into the kitchen. Once her eyes adjusted to the bright white of the room, she saw what’d happened. Mama stood at the sink, her right hand under the running faucet, a plump mass of distress surrounded by a jagged maze of broken crystal. Granny sat at the corner table, her face as flaming as her hair.

“Oh, poo,” Granny said. “Your mother put her hand on the stove and dropped Grandpa Limerick's Waterford. Go fetch the broom, princess.”