My mother passed Claire the mashed potatoes without looking at her.

?Thank you, Valerie,? Claire said in her sing-song voice, and asked my sister, Bay, to please pass the gravy boat. Bay did, but the handle was small, like on a tea cup, and the heavy boat tipped over. Brown drips dotted the tablecloth and my mother looked uneasy but told Bay not to worry.

It was our second Thanksgiving in Alabama. We?d moved here from Idaho two summers before because my father said he couldn?t take the cold winters anymore, but the temperature outside was a freak: thirty-one degrees and the weatherman calling for snow flurries.

My father had gone to the health spa to swim laps before lunch, so he could have two pieces of pumpkin pie, he?d said, but he was an hour and a half late.

Claire made an excuse for him. ?He?s probably sitting at the shallow end, talking to some faculty member.?

?Smart guess,? my mother said.

Claire was studying to be an opera singer at the university and my father taught theory and composition in the music department. He used to complain about her: ?An airhead,? he?d say, ?with a decent middle register,? but over the last few months she?d become his favorite student and our family friend.

Claire had been teaching Bay how to drive. On the weekends she?d come by the house early so they could practice in the empty parking lot at Winn Dixie. And twice a week she walked with my mother around the neighborhood. I didn?t do anything special with her; she was five years older and I didn?t like how she?d cozied into our family with her good manners, so curious about us. Hadn't she seen musicians before? My mother called her the third daughter, although Claire called my dad and her by their first names.

The brown dots of gravy weren?t being absorbed. I slid my knife under them and lifted them off, which left brown stains on the linen. ?Let it be,? my mother said.

Snow flitted outside the window.

"Look how pretty," Claire said. "I've only seen snow once."

?Looks like it's followed us down here," my mother said, taking a sip of wine.

?Should I go by the spa and see if his car?s still there?? Claire said.

?I don?t think he needs another wife, dear,? my mother said.

I?d heard my parents arguing that morning. My father was writing an art song for Claire to sing at her senior recital.

?I don?t even own a winter coat,? Claire said.

?That?s nothing to be proud of,? I said. She wore a fluffy black turtleneck and her hair was in a French braid.

Bay picked at wax drips on the candles. She?d taken diet pills so she would look good for the winter formal and her appetite was zip. Her hair was French-braided, too.

?Everything smells so good," Claire said. "I?m hungry."

?Maybe you should say grace,? my mother said, putting her fork and knife down, hanging a spotlight over Claire, who closed her eyes and asked that we bow our heads.

We didn?t pray in our family. The food would be placed around the table so we could serve ourselves and pass the dish, water glasses would be filled, wine for my parents, warm bread in tin foil, soft butter, my father would do a little conducting motion, count two bars with his fork, and the quartet that was our family would dig in.

I went outside without a jacket to wait for my dad. The snow didn?t stick, but it looked like Idaho until it hit the driveway.