Twelve
“Okay,” Opal said.
“Be totally honest. Angel Baby or Calm
Waters? ”
“What happened to
just blue?” Jason asked.
She looked down at
the two color swatches she was holding. “I don’t know. It’s too
boring, I guess. And they’re both blue.”
“I like this one,”
Tracey said, flicking her finger at the lighter color on the right.
“It looks like the ocean.”
“So does the other
one,” Jason pointed out. “I honestly can’t tell the
difference.”
“The other one has
higher hues, more white in it. This one”—Tracey picked up the
swatch on the left, flipping it over—“Angel Baby, has darker notes
going to lighter, but it’s more of a mix.”
Opal and Jason just
looked at her as she turned the swatch back over, sliding it back
in place. “What?” she said. “I’m into art, okay?”
“Clearly,” Jason
said. “That was impressive.”
“So we’ve got one
vote for Angel Baby, and one no opinion. Maybe I should go back to
the yellows.” Opal sighed, picking up a stack of swatches and
flipping through them, then looked up and saw me. “Hey! Mclean!
Come tell me what you think.”
I walked over to the
bar, dropping my backpack onto a chair. “About what?”
“Colors for the
new-and-improved upstairs alfresco dining area,” she
said.
“You’re going to
reopen the second floor?” I asked.
“Well, not right now.
I mean, there’s the model, and we still have to get the restaurant
on a better footing.” She laid out the two swatches. “But now that
Chuckles has spared us, he might be open to some ideas for
expanding and improvement. He’s supposed to come in tonight,
passing through town, so I’d thought I’d just plant the idea in his
head.”
“I do not like the
idea of having to go up and down stairs to my tables,” Tracey
said.
“And there’s the
question of keeping food warm during the trip,” Jason
added.
“Where is your sense
of adventure? Of change? This could be really, really good for the
restaurant. A return to its past glory days!” Opal said. They just
looked at her, and She laghed, flipping her hand, then turned her
attention to me. “Okay. Mclean. Pick one.”
I looked down at the
colors. Two blues, different and yet so similar. I couldn’t see
notes of white, or various shading, and didn’t know the language
Tracey used to describe the most subtle of nuances. These days,
though, I was sure of one thing: I knew what I liked.
“This one,” I said,
putting my finger on the one on the right. “It’s
perfect.”
It was now March, and
my dad and I had been in Lakeview for almost two months. Anywhere
else, those eight weeks would have followed a routine pattern. Get
moved in, get settled, pick a name and a girl. Unpack our few,
necessary things, arranging them in the same way as the last place,
and the next place. Start school while my dad got a line on whether
his restaurant had slimy lettuce or great guacamole, and plan my
own moves in terms of joining clubs and making friends accordingly.
Then, all that was left was following the signs so I’d know when to
pull back, cut for good, and get ready to run.
Here, though, it was
different. We’d come in the same way, but since then everything had
changed, from me using my real name to my dad starting to date even
with no next move in sight. Add in the fact that I was actually on
decent terms with my mom, and this was officially an entirely new
ball game.
Since I’d agreed to
go to Colby for spring break, as well as committed to four other
weekends between April and June, my mom and I had reached tentative
peace. She’d called her lawyer and withdrawn her custody-review
request, and I’d explained the plan to my dad, who was relieved, to
say the least. Now, I had the third week in March circled on my
calendar in Angel Baby or Calm Waters or just blue, and we had
something to talk about that was not a loaded subject. Which was
kind of nice, actually.
“Now, the ocean’s
going to be freezing, obviously,” she’d said to me the night
before, when she called after dinner. “But I’m hopeful that the hot
tub will be working and the pool heat up and running, although it
might not happen. I’ll keep you posted.”
“Your house has a hot
tub and pool?” I’d asked her.
“Well, yes,” she
said, sounding kind of embarrassed. “You know Peter. He doesn’t do
anything halfway. But his place was a great deal, apparently, a
foreclosure or something. Anyway, I can’t wait for you to see it. I
spent hours agonizing over the redecorating. Picking colors was a
nightmare.”
“Yeah, I bet,” I
said. “I have a friend who’s doing that right now. She wanted me to
help her, but all the blues looked the same.”
“They do!” she said.
“But at the same time, they don’t. You have to look at them in the
daylight, and afternoon light, and bright light. . . . Oh, it’s
nuts. But I’m really happy with how it turned out. I
think.”
It had been weird, I
had to admit, to be having such a, well, pleasant conversation with
my mom. Like once again, the beach had somehow become a safe place
for us to be together, separate from the conflict of her house or
this one. So we continued to talk and e-mail about plans for what
to do on rainy days, what I wanted to have for breakfast, if I
wanted an ocean or sound view. It was easier, so much easier, than
what I was used to. Maybe even okay.
Meanwhile, as I was
making up with my mom, my dad was busy doing something with Lindsay
Baker. As far as I could tell, they’d been on several late
lunches—with her giving him the tour of other local eateries—and a
couple of dinners when he could get away from Luna Blu, which was
rare. Normally, I could tell when my dad was laying groundwork for
another escape by how committed he let himself get, as backward as
that sounds. Phone calls and lunch dates meant I should proceed as
I had been, that nothing was happening. But once I started finding
hair elastics that weren’t mine in the bathroom, or someone else’s
yogurt or Diet Coke in the fridge, it was time to stop buying
staples like sugar and butter and use up what we had instead. So
far, none of these things had materialized, at least that I knew
of. I was kind of distracted myself, though, to be
honest.
It had happened on
the night we’d gone to Riley’s, after the game, when Ellis was
driving us all back home. Deb had hopped into the front seat, armed
with a plate of leftovers packed up by Mrs. Benson for her mom, who
Deb had said was working through dinner for overtime, which left me
and Dave alone in the back. As Ellis pulled out onto the dirt road,
we were all quiet, worn out by all the food and talking, not to
mention a great game the U had won with a jump shot in the final
seconds. When he put on his blinker at the main road, the ticktock
was all you could hear.
There’s something
nice about the silence of a car ride in the dark, going home. It
reminded me, actually, of those trips back from North Reddemane
with my mom, sunburned, with sand in my shoes, my clothes damp from
pulling them on over my suit, as I wanted to swim until the very
last moment. When we were tired of the radio and conversation, it
was okay to just be alone with our thoughts and the road ahead. If
you’re that comfortable with someone, you don’t have to
talk.
As we headed toward
town, I leaned back, pulling one leg up underneath me. Beside me,
Dave was looking out the window, and for a moment I studied his
face, brightened now and then by the lights of oncoming cars. I
thought of all the times we’d been together, how I kept coming
closer, then retreating, while he stayed right where he was. A
constant in a world where few, if any, really existed. And so as he
sat there beside me, I moved a little closer, resting my head on
his shoulder. He didn’t turn away from the window. He just lifted
his hand, smoothing it over my hair, and held it
there.
It was just a tiny
moment. Not a kiss, not even real contact. But for all the things
it wasn’t, it meant so much. I’d been running for years: there was
nothing scarier, to me, than to just be still with someone. And
yet, there on that dark road, going home, I was.
Eventually, after
dropping Deb at her car, Ellis pulled up in front of my mailbox.
“Last stop,” he said as I yawned and Dave rubbed his eyes. “Sorry
to break up the moment.”
I flushed, pushing
myself out onto the curb, and Dave followed. “Thanks for driving,”
he said. “Next time, it’s all me.”
“That car is a safety
hazard,” Ellis told him. “We’re better off in the Love
Van.”
“Yeah, but it needs
to hold up for the road trip,” Dave replied. “Gotta take care of
her, right?”
Ellis looked at me,
then nodded and hit a button. The back door slid closed, like the
curtain at the end of a show. “That’s right. Later!”
Dave and I waved, and
then Ellis was driving away, bumping over the speed humps. As we
started walking, he reached down, sliding fingers around mine. As
he did, I had a flash of that night he’d pulled me into the storm
cellar, when he’d taken my hand to lead me up to the world again.
It felt like second nature then, too.
We weren’t talking,
the neighborhood making all its regular noises—bass thumping, car
horns, someone’s TV—around us. The party house had clearly watched
the game as well. I could see people milling around inside, and the
recycling bin on the porch was overflowing with crumpled beer cans.
Then there was my dark house, and finally Dave’s, which was lit up
bright, his mom visible at the kitchen table, reading something, a
pen in one hand.
“See you tomorrow? ”
Dave asked when we reached our two back doors, facing each
other.
“See you tomorrow,” I
repeated. Then I squeezed his hand.
The first thing I did
when I got inside was turn on the kitchen light. Then I moved to
the table, putting my dad’s iPod on the speaker dock, and a Bob
Dylan song came on, the notes familiar. I went into the living
room, hitting the switch there, then down the hallway to my room,
where I did the same. It was amazing what a little noise and
brightness could do to a house and a life, how much the smallest
bit of each could change everything. After all these years of just
passing through, I was beginning to finally feel at
home.
I left Opal
reconsidering her yellows, then headed upstairs to the attic room,
where I found Deb and Dave already hard at work. This time, though,
they weren’t alone. On the other side of the room, sitting in a row
of chairs by the boxes of model parts, were Ellis, Riley, and
Heather, each of them engrossed in reading a stapled packet of
papers.
“What’s going on over
there? ” I asked Dave, as Deb bustled by, a clipboard in her
hands.
“Deb has shocked them
into silence,” he told me. “Which is really hard to do. Believe
me.”
“How’d she do
it?”
“Her POW
packet.”
I waited. By this
point, it was understood that if you said one of Deb’s acronyms,
you usually had to then explain it.
“Project Overview and
Welcome,” Dave said, popping a roof onto a house. “Required reading
before you can even think about attempting a sector.”
“It’s not that
strict!” Deb protested. I raised an eyebrow at her, doubting this.
“It isn’t. It’s just . . . you can’t come into an existing, working
system and not educate yourself on its processes. That would be
stupid.”
“Of course it would,”
Dave said. “God, Mclean.”
I poked him again,
and this time, he grabbed my finger, wrapping his own around it and
holding it for a second. I smiled, then said, “So, Deb. How’d you
manage to double our workforce since yesterday? I didn’t hear you
doing the hard sell last night.”
“I didn’t have to
sell anything,” she replied, checking something off the top sheet
on her clipboard. “The model spoke for itself. As soon as they saw
it, they wanted in.”
“Wow,” I
said.
She puttered off,
clicking her pen top. Beside me, very quietly, Dave said, “Also I
might have told them that the sooner
this thing is done, the sooner I can up my hours at FrayBake for
the road-trip fund. This way they can pitch in during spring break
next week, and we can really knock some stuff out.”
“You guys aren’t
doing anything for spring break?”
He shook his head.
“Nah. We thought about it, but figured we’d just save the money for
the real trip later. What, are you taking off or
something?”
“With my mom,” I
said. “The beach.”
“Lucky
you.”
“Not really,” I said
as I walked over to my current sector, reacquainting myself with
it. “I’d rather be here.”
“You know,” Heather
called out to him from across the room, “when you talked me into
this, you didn’t say anything about it being like school.”
“It’s not like
school!” Deb replied from the other end of the model, where she was
checking off things on another one of her lists. “Why would you say
that?”
“Because you’re
making us study?” Ellis asked.
“If you guys just
plunged in, it would totally throw off the SORTA,” Deb told him.
“I’m having to completely rejigger the STOW as it is!”
“What?” Heather
asked. “Are you even speaking English?”
“She’s speaking Deb,”
I said. “You’ll be fluent in no time.”
“I’m done,” Riley
said, getting to her feet, her packet in hand. “All fourteen bullet
points and the acronym overview.”
“Good,” Heather said,
getting up as well. “Then you can explain them to me.”
“This is just like school!” Ellis said. Heather elbowed
him, hard. “Hey, don’t get mad at me. You’re the one who can’t even
make it through the POW packet.”
“You can take it home
tonight, and really go over it then,” Deb assured
Heather.
“Oh, okay,” Heather
replied. “Because that’s not like school at all.”
“Great!” Deb clapped
her hands, picking up her clipboard. “If you’ll all just follow me
over to our top sector here, I’ll start your guided
tour.”
Ellis got up, then
followed Riley and Heather, who was dragging her feet, as they fell
in behind Deb. “Are there going to be snacks?” he asked. “I do my
best work with snacks.”
Dave snorted. Deb,
though, either ignored this or didn’t hear it. “Now, once you’re
confident you understand the system, you’ll be assigned a sector.
Until then, though, you’ll share one. This one is relatively
simple, perfect for beginners. . . .”
As she kept talking,
I looked up at Dave, working away across from me, his hair falling
into his eyes as he attached a roof to the building in his hands.
“Hey,” I said, and he glanced up. “You know that building, behind
our houses? The abandoned one?”
“Yeah. What
about?”
“It’s on here, but
not identified. I realized the other day.” I pulled the building
out of the pile I’d assembled beside me, showing it to him. “So I
went to the library, to see if I could figure out what it
was.”
“Did
you?”
I nodded, realizing,
as I did so, how much I wanted to tell him. I wasn’t sure why this
had been so important to me, only that it seemed fated somehow,
that just as things began to feel real and settled, I’d moved onto
the part of the map that represented my own neighborhood. There was
my house, and Dave’s. The party house, Luna Blu, the street where I
caught the bus. And in the middle, this blank building, its
anonymity made even more noticeable as it was surrounded by things
that were clear and recognizable. I wanted to give it a face, a
name. Something more than two faded letters on a rooftop, and a
million guesses about what it used to be.
I put the building
down in its spot, the tape catching and sticking. Then there was a
click, the sure sign it was there to stay. “Yeah,” I told him. “It
was—”
“Oh my goodness!
Would you look at this.” I turned my
head, just in time to see Lindsay Baker, dressed in black pants and
a tight red sweater and smiling wide, appear on the landing. My
dad, looking markedly less effervescent, was right behind her. “I
assumed you all would have made a lot of progress. But this is
really impressive!”
Deb, across the
model, beamed. I said, “We appointed a good leader. Makes all the
difference.”
“Clearly,” she said
as she started around the model, making approving noises. After a
few steps, she reached back for my dad’s hand, taking hold of it.
“Gus, had you seen this? I had no idea the detail was so
specific!”
“It’s taken from the
most recent satellite-scanning information,” Deb called out. “Model
Community Ventures really prides itself on accuracy. And, of
course, we’ve tried to follow their lead.”
The councilwoman
nodded. “It shows.”
Deb flushed, beyond
pleased, and I knew this was her moment, and I should be happy for
her. But I was too distracted watching my father as he was led
around the far corner of the model, avoiding making eye contact
with anyone. Lunch dates and phone calls were one thing. But
hand-holding, or any kind of PDA for that matter, was a big red
flag.
“Whoa,” Dave said,
his voice low. “Your dad and Lindsay Baker, huh? She is a serious
Friend of Frazier. Pounds lattes like they’re juice.”
I shook my head,
although I was in no position to confirm or deny anything. “I don’t
think it’s serious.”
“Gus?” Opal yelled up
the stairs. “Are you up there?”
“Yeah,” he replied.
“I’ll be right—”
But he didn’t move
fast enough. Before he could even begin to extract his hand—and
something told me once Lindsay took hold, she had a good grip to
her—Opal was already on the landing.
“The meat supplier’s
on the phone,” she said, slightly breathless from running up the
stairs. “He says you put a change in on our standing order, so it’s
week to week now instead of set by the month? I told him that
couldn’t be right, but he’s phon”
She stopped suddenly,
and I followed her gaze to my father’s hand, still wrapped in the
councilwoman’s. “I’ll talk to him,” my dad said, letting go and
starting for the stairs. Opal just stood there staring straight
ahead as he walked by her.
“Opal, I’m so
impressed with what I see here!” Lindsay said to her. “You should
be very proud of the progress these kids have made.”
Opal blinked, then
looked at the model, and us. “Oh, I am,” she said. “It’s
great.”
“I have to admit, I
was a little nervous after my last visit !” The councilwoman
scanned the model again. “Not that I didn’t have total faith in
you, but at the time you seemed a bit disorganized. But Mclean says
they’ve got a new team leader—”
“Deb,” I said. I
nodded at her, and she beamed again. “It’s all Deb.”
I could feel Opal
watching me, her gaze like heat, and I realized too late it was
exactly the wrong time to draw attention to myself. “Well, Deb,”
Lindsay said, turning her bright smile in that direction, “if
that’s true, we’ll look forward to commending you properly at the
unveiling ceremony.”
“Oh, that sounds
wonderful!” Deb said. She thought for a second, then said,
“Actually, I have some ideas about the best way to display it. You
know, to really get that optimum wow factor. If you’d like to hear
them.”
“Of course.” Lindsay
glanced at her watch. “Shoot, I’ve got to get back to my office.
Why don’t you walk down with me while I go look for
Gus?”
Deb’s face lit up,
and she grabbed her clipboard, rushing over to join the
councilwoman as she started down the stairs. We all watched them
go, none of us talking. When the door at the bottom shut behind
them, Opal turned to me.
“Mclean?” she said.
“What’s . . . What’s going on here?”
I shook my head. “I
don’t know.”
Opal swallowed, then
looked around the room, as if only then realizing we had an
audience. She shifted her attention to the model, scanning it from
one side to the other, then back again. “I had no idea you guys had
done this much,” she said. “Guess I need to pay more attention all
around.”
“Opal,” I said.
“Don’t—”
“I’ve got to go
open,” she said. “You guys, um, keep up the good work. It all looks
great.”
She turned,
disappearing down the stairs. We were only down by about half, but
suddenly the room felt downright empty.
“Is it just me,”
Heather said in the quiet, “or was that weird?”
“Not just you,” Dave
told her.
Riley, from across
the room, said, “Is everything okay, Mclean?”
I didn’t know. All
that was clear was that everything, including me, suddenly felt
wholly temporary. I looked down at the model again. There, the
entire world was simple in miniature, clean and orderly, if only
because there were none of us, no people, there to complicate
things.
That night, like most
nights, we only worked on the model until 6:00 p.m. This was Opal’s
rule, although I sensed my dad had a part in it. It made sense,
though: it was one thing to have people moving around upstairs and
coming and going for the first hour of service, but another to have
to deal with it during the dinner rush.
Dave and I walked
back to our houses together. His was lit up, as usual, and I could
see his mom and dad in the kitchen, moving around. Mine was dark,
except for the side porch light that we always forgot to turn off.
I knew this was far from ecofriendly, and I needed to stick a
Post-it or something on the door to remind me. Times like now,
though, I was glad for the oversight.
“So. You got big
dinner plans?” Dave asked me as we started up my
driveway.
“Not really.
You?”
“Tofu loaf.” He made
a face before I could react. “It’s better than it sounds. But still
. . . not so good. What’s on your menu? ”
I thought of our
fridge, how I’d not had time to get to the store for a few days.
Eggs, some bread, maybe some deli meat. “Breakfast for dinner,
probably.”
“Aw, really?” He
sighed. “That sounds awesome.”
“You should suggest
it to your mom.”
He shook his head.
“She’s got egg issues.”
“Excuse
me?”
“The short version is
she doesn’t eat them,” he explained. “The longer one involves
certain dietary intolerances combined with ethical
misgivings.”
“Oh.”
“Exactly.”
We were at the
basketball goal now. I looked over his shoulder into the kitchen,
where Mrs. Dobson-Wade was stirring something in a wok while Dave’s
dad poured a glass of wine. “It’s nice that you guys eat as a
family, though. Even if eggs aren’t allowed.”
“I guess,” he said.
“Although more often than not, we’re all reading.”
“What?”
“Reading,” he
repeated. “It’s something you do with books?”
“You all sit together
at the table and don’t talk to one another?”
“Yeah. I mean, we
talk some. But if we all have things we’re engrossed in . . .” He
trailed off, looking embarrassed. “I told you that I’m weird.
Hence, my family is weird. Although honestly, you should have
figured that out already.”
“Weird,” I said, “but
together. That counts for something.”
Now he looked at my
house, that single outside light, the kitchen dark behind it. “I
guess.”
I was ready to go
inside. “Enjoy your tofu loaf,” I told him, turning toward my
stairs.
“Eat an egg for
me.”
I unlocked the door,
then immediately turned on the kitchen light, followed by the one
in the living room. Then I put on my dad’s iPod on the speaker
dock—he’d been in a Zeppelin mood that morning, apparently—broke a
couple of eggs into a bowl, and mixed in some milk. The bread in
the fridge was a bit old, but not moldy, perfect for toasting. Five
minutes later, dinner was done.
Normally, I ate on
the couch, in front of the TV or my laptop. This night, however, I
decided to get formal, folding a paper towel under my fork and
sitting at the kitchen table. I’d just taken a bite of toast when I
heard a knock at the door. When I turned around, there was Dave.
And his dad.
“We need your TV,”
Dave explained when I opened the door. They were both standing
there, plates in hand. Behind them, I could see into their dining
room, where Mrs. Dobson-Wade was alone at the table.
Reading.
“My TV?”
“The Defriese-U game
is just starting,” Mr. Wade said. “And our TV is suddenly refusing
to change channels.”
“Probably because
it’s about twenty years old,” Dave added.
“It is a perfectly
fine television,” his dad said, adjusting his glasses with his free
hand. “We hardly watch it anyway.”
“Except tonight.”
Dave looked at me. “I know it’s asking a lot. But can
we—”
I stepped back,
waving my hand. “Sure.”
They came in, their
silverware rattling on their plates, and bustled into the living
room, sitting down on the couch. I turned on the TV, then flipped
channels until I spotted my stepfather’s face. The game was about
ten minutes in, and Defriese was up by nine.
“How did that happen?” Mr. Wade said, shaking his head as I
went and got my plate, sliding into the leather chair beside
them.
“Our defense sucks,”
Dave replied. Then he sniffed and looked at me. “Oh my God. Those
smell amazing.”
“They’re just
scrambled. Nothing fancy.” Now, Mr. Wade was eyeing my plate as
well. “I . . . I can make you guys some. If you want.”
“Oh, no, no,” Dave’s
dad said. He gestured to his plate, where a beige square was
bordered by some broccoli and what looked like brown rice. “We’ve
got perfectly fine dinners. Your generosity with the TV is quite
enough.”
“Right,” Dave said as
on the screen, a whistle blew. Mr. Wade grimaced, reacting to the
call. “We’re good.”
I turned my attention
back to the screen. After a few minutes of fast back-and-forth, one
of the U players got fouled and the clock stopped. We watched a
couple of beer commercials and a news update, and then the game
returned, showing Peter saying something to one of his starters. He
clapped him on the back, and the guy started back out onto the
court. As Peter sat down, I saw my mom behind him. No twins this
time: she was alone, watching the game with a serious
expression.
“Making eggs is
really no trouble,” I said, jumping up. “I’m done eating, and it
will only take a second.”
“Hey, Mclean, you
really don’t—” Dave began. I looked at him, then at the screen,
where my mother was still in view. “Oh. Well. That would be great.
Thanks.”
It was easier to
listen to the game than to watch, so I moved slowly as I scrambled
the eggs, added milk, and preheated pan. I wasn’t sure what their
position was on toast. Gluten issues? Was wheat bad ethically? I
stuck some bread in the toaster oven anyway. While I cooked, the U
came back, tying up the score, although they racked up some fouls
in the process. Between listening to Dave and his dad reacting to
the action—groans, claps, the occasional cheer—and the smell of
eggs cooking, I could have been back in Tyler, in our old house,
living my old life. I took my time.
There were about five
minutes left in the half when I came back in, balancing two plates
and the roll of paper towels, and deposited them both on the table
in front of Dave and his dad. It was just eggs and toast. But by
their reaction, you would have thought I’d prepared the most
extravagant of feasts.
“Oh my goodness,” Mr.
Wade whispered, slowly pushing his half-eaten tofu loaf aside. “Is
that . . . Is that butter?”
“I think it is,” Dave
said. “Wow. Look at how fluffy and yellow these are!”
“Not like Neggs,” his
dad agreed.
“Neggs?” I
said.
“Not-eggs,” Dave
explained. “Egg substitute. It’s what we use.”
“What’s in them? ” I
asked as Mr. Wade took a bite. He closed his eyes, chewing slowly,
his reaction so full of pleasure I had to look away.
“Not eggs,” Dave
replied. He exhaled. “These are amazing, Mclean. Thank you so
much.”
“Thank you,” his dad
repeated, scooping up another heaping forkful.
I smiled, just at the
game came back on the screen. Immediately, the players were in
motion, moving down the court, the U out in front with the ball. As
they passed the bench, the action slowed, and I saw Peter again, my
mom behind him. As the team set up their offense, I watched as she
pulled out her phone, opening it up, and pushed a few buttons, then
put it to her ear.
I turned around,
looking at my purse, which was on the floor by the couch. Sure
enough, I could see a light flashing inside. I pulled out my phone.
“Hello?”
“Hey, honey,” she
said over the din behind her. “I just had a quick thought about our
trip tomorrow. Have you got a second? ”
Dave and his dad
erupted in cheers, plates clanging in their laps as the U stole the
ball and moved down the court. Where my mom was, there was
noticeably less of a reaction.
“Actually,” I said,
“I, um, have some people over for dinner.”
“You do?” She sounded
so surprised. “Oh. Well, I’ll just call back later,
okay?”
“Great,” I said,
watching Dave as he took another bite of toast, then smiled at me.
Real bread, real butter. All real. “Talk to you then.”