When she'd hung up, her mother wore an astonished expression. "You'd record something again just because of a single word?"
"It's done all the time. Sometimes we record an entire harmony track and never use it at all. Last week Jack had a concert violinist in the studio at my insistence, 'cause a violin's got an entirely different sound from a fiddle and I thought that this one song should have a violin solo in one spot where-"
The phone rang, interrupting, and Mary began to push herself up. She winced and Tess said, "I'll get it. Momma. I'm right here." Tess reached for the wall phone and answered, "Hello?"
"Oh… you're there." It was her sister Judy, with little warmth in her voice. "I was just calling to make sure."
"I'm here. Got in about a half an hour ago."
"You drove, I hear."
"How'd you hear?"
"People around town saw your license plates."
Tess turned her back on Mary and said more quietly, "I thought I should have my own car while I'm here. Four weeks is-" She stopped herself short: her mother could hear quite plainly.
Judy said it for her. "A long time… I know. I'm the one who took care of her last time, remember?"
For several seconds silent animosity crackled along the phone line while the two sisters relived the conversation in which Judy had ordered her younger sister home.
Finally Judy asked, "How's she feeling today? She had to go over to the hospital to have a pre-op check and go through some kind of little explanation and tour thing. I suppose it tired her out."