by Sarah Dessen
“May,” the councilwoman told her.
“What?” Opal said. “May? I . . . I thought the centennial was in June.”
“It is. But the town celebration begins May sixth, and we’re going to put this in the mai post office to kick it all off,” the councilwoman replied. She looked at Opal. “Oh my God! I told you that, right? I was sure I did.”
We all watched Opal swallow. “Um,” she said. “Actually—”
“Where the hell is everybody? ” my dad’s voice boomed from the bottom of the stairs. Now it was my turn to flinch, just out of reflex. “Are we not opening for lunch on game day in less than an hour?”
“Gus!” Opal said, or rather kind of shrieked. Beside me, Tracey closed her eyes. “We’re all up here with the councilwoman, showing her the model.”
“The what?”
“The model,” she repeated. Then she cleared her throat, her face pink, and said to the councilwoman, “That’s Gus. He’s—”
These words, however, were drowned out by the sound of my dad stomping up the stairs. Fee-fi-fo-fum, I thought, and then he appeared on the landing, face red, expression annoyed. “Leo!” he said. “Didn’t I tell you fifteen minutes ago I needed all the vegetables prepped ASAP? We’re opening the doors and half the side work isn’t done. Who the hell is supposed to be setting up in the dining room?”
“That would be me,” Tracey said cheerfully. He glared at her, and she directed her attention back to the model, quick.
“I thought these were youth volunteers? ” the councilwoman said to Opal.
“Gus,” Opal said, her voice rushed, “this is Councilwoman Baker. Remember, I told you that she was helping us with the parking....”
My dad glanced at the councilwoman, then back at us. “Jason, get down there and finish the vegetable prep. Leo, I need the pots boiling and the carts stocked for service, now. And Tracey, if that dining room isn’t set up in fifteen and spotless, you’ll have more than enough time to volunteer for any project, I promise you.”
“Hey!” Tracey protested. “How come I’m the only one you’re threatening to fire?”
“Go!” my dad barked, and she did, tossing down the house she was holding and going to the stairs faster than I’d ever seen her move. Leo and Jason followed, in equally rapid time, leaving just me and Dave. I picked up the house, walking back over to the model, while he focused on assembling another building, his head ducked down.
Opal gave a helpless look to the councilwoman. “It’s game day,” she said, trying to explain. “Our cooler broke, and . . .”
The councilwoman ignored her, instead breaking out that big smile again as she walked over to my dad. “I’m Lindsay Baker,” she said, holding out her hand. “You’re Gus Sweet?”
My dad, distracted, shook her hand. “Yeah, that’s me.”
“I believe you left me a message yesterday,” she replied. “Something about having no room for this project?”
“Actually, I said it was a complete and total nuisance and I wanted it gone,” he replied. Then he looked at me and said, “What are you doing here?”
“Just needed to talk to you about something,” I said. “You were fixing the cooler, though, so I didn’t want to interrupt.”div> “Smart girl.” He sighed, then ran his hand through his hair. “I gotta get back down there. Come down in five or so?”
I nodded. As he turned for the stairs, the councilwoman said, “Mr. Sweet?”
My dad paused, looked back. “Yeah?”
She was still smiling at him, totally unfazed that he was barely giving her the time of day. It was obvious she was the kind of woman who was used to getting attention not just from men but from women, children, even animals. I knew the type. I’d been raised by one who came from a family of the same. “Concerning the model, I’d love to talk to you about it further. At a more convenient time, of course. Maybe we can set up a meeting at my office later this week?”
Opal looked at her, then at my dad. “That would be great,” she said quickly. “We would love that.”
My dad, however, just grunted, then went downstairs without comment. A few moments later, we heard him start yelling again. But Councilwoman Baker, hardly bothered, was looking at the space where he’d been standing with an intrigued expression, like someone had told her a good riddle and she was enjoying figuring out the answer. Uh-oh.
“Look, Lindsay, I really appreciate you coming by,” Opal said to her. “If you want to just tell me a good time to get together, I’ll make sure we can—”
“Oh, dear, I’ve really got to run,” the councilwoman said, glancing at her watch. “But I’ll come back in a week or so. By then you’ll have more volunteers and a bit of progress, don’t you think?”
Opal swallowed again. “Um . . . of course. Yes.”
“The truth is, for now, this project has to stay here,” she continued, heels clacking. She was coming right toward me, and I felt this urge to jump out of the way, which was crazy. This woman was nothing to me. “It’s a good space and you did offer it, if I remember correctly. Maybe you can communicate that to Gus? I don’t think he realized it when he called me.”
The reporter let loose with a nervous cough while her photographer, for some reason, chose this moment to snap a shot of Opal. I pictured it in my mind, with the caption below: SCREWED.
“Oh, it’s going to really look like something when I come back, I just know it,” the councilwoman continued. Then she stopped, right in front of me, and stuck out her hand. “We haven’t met, I don’t think. I’m Lindsay Baker.”
To say I was surprised to be addressed was an understatement. It wasn’t just me either: behind her, Dave looked up, raising his eyebrows. “Mclean Sweet,” I said.
“Do me a favor.” Her hand, closed around mine, her grip strong, once I extended it. “Tell your dad I said it was really nice to meet him. Okay?”
I nodded, and she smiled. God, her teeth were bright. It was like she traveled with her own black light or something.
“Maureen? ” she said over her shoulder. The reporter jumped. “Walk with me. I want to give you some of my thoughts on that article. Bye, Opal! See you at spin class!” And then she was moving as if she knew even without turning around that the reporter would fall in behind her. Which she did, scurrying past me, the photogrpher loping in her wake.
We all watched them go, none of us saying anything until we heard the door at the bottom of the stairs swing shut. Then Opal exhaled, collapsing against a nearby table. “Oh my God,” she said. “Is it just me, or does anyone else feel like they just had a stroke?”
“She is kind of intense,” I agreed, walking over to the directions Jason had left behind and picking them up.
“Kind of intense? Did you even see that?” she demanded. “The way she comes in and rolls over everyone and everything ? God. It’s exactly the way she was in high school. And she’s so nice, at least to your face. All the better to hide her dark, evil soul.”
Dave looked up at her, eyes wide. “Wow.”
“I know!” Opal buried her head in her hands. “She makes me nuts. Plus, she’s, like, incredibly good at spinning. I don’t even know how I got into this! All I wanted was parking.”
We both just looked at her. Downstairs, my dad was yelling again.
“Well,” I said, after she’d been in this position, like an ostrich, for a good fifteen seconds, “parking is important.”
“It’s like, I know what I want to say to her,” Opal said, dropping her hand. “I plan to be professional and prepared. But when the actual moment comes . . . it’s not so simple. You know what I mean?”
Just then, the door banged open again downstairs. “Mclean?” my dad called up. “You needed to talk to me?”
Hearing this, I felt my own heart jump, remembering the real reason I was there. I looked at Opal, then answered both her question and my dad’s with the same answer. “Yeah,” I said. “I do.”
Ever since the divorce, and my ensuing epiphany that I di
d in fact have a choice and an opinion concerning it, I’d justified every bit of my anger toward my mom simply because of how she’d wrecked my dad. Cheating on a man with someone he greatly admired, in the public forum, and then leaving him for said person while his own life crumbles into pieces? Even now, just thinking about it never failed to get me mad all over again.
I couldn’t keep people from talking about my mom and Peter Hamilton on the street or at Mariposa, couldn’t go back in time and change what she’d done. But I could run interference with the morning paper, carefully taking out the sports section and chucking it into the recycling before he woke up in the morning. I could refuse to talk to my mom on the phone in his presence, and never put up any of the framed pictures of her and Peter and the twins she kept giving me for my room at home and then rooms, plural, everywhere since. I could talk about the past, our past, as little as possible, avoiding the entire subject of my first fifteen years in conversation whenever I could. He wasn’t looking back, so I did my best not to either.
But occasionally, this was not an option. Like, say, today, when in two hours I’d be sitting right behind the coach of the number-three-ranked college basketball team, on national TV. After two years of keeping everything possibly hurtful away from him, I was about to hand him a grenade. It was no wonder that as I walked over to meet him at a table by the window ten minutes later, I literally felt sick.
“So,” he said, once I sat down. Across the restaurant, Opal was at the bar, washing glasses and talking to Tracey, who was dusting the plant I’d noticed was so dirty on our first visit here, what seemed like ages ago. “What’s the verdict on lunch? I can probably get away for a full hour. We can really go crazy.”
I smiled, feeling even worse. The truth was, the last place my dad needed to be on a busy game day was anywhere but the kitchen here, and we both knew it. But he felt bad about canceling on me, and was trying to compensate. That made two of us.
“Um,” I said, glancing over at Opal, who was wiping down the bar, the cloth in her hand making smooth, big circles across its surface. “Actually . . . I sort of have plans this afternoon.”
“Oh,” he said. “Well, maybe we’ll shoot for breakfast tomorrow or—”
“With Mom,” I blurted out. It wasn’t pretty, these two words just falling from my mouth and landing like dead weight between us. Then, since I was already in it, I added, “She’s coming down with Peter for the game and wants to see me.”
“Oh,” my dad said, and it was amazing to me how this, the same word he’d just spoken, one syllable, two letters, could sound so totally different. “Right. Of course.”
Over at the bar, Opal was restocking glasses, the sounds of happy clinking drifting over to us. Everyone was bustling around, the energy building. They were opening in ten minutes.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I don’t want to. But things have been pretty strained since the move, and Peter asked me to do this. I just didn’t think I could blow it off.”
“Mclean,” he said.
“I mean, I could blow it off,” I continued, “of course, but they’re probably already on the way here and will freak out, and I know you don’t need that. . . .”
“Mclean,” he repeated, stopping me from going further, although I had no idea what I was planning to say. Something equally lame, I was sure. “You’re supposed to want to see your mom.”
“I know. But—”
“So you don’t have to apologize to me for that,” he continued. “Ever. Right?”
“I feel so bad, though,” I told him.
“Why?”
He was watching me, really wanting to know. Oh, God, I thought, swallowing hard. This was exactly the conversation I did not want to have. “What she did,” I said, starting shakily. “To you. It was really, really awful. And it feels disloyal to act like it wasn’t.”
It was horrible, talking about this. Worse than horrible. I felt like I was chewing thumbtacks, with each word another spoonful forced in. No wonder I’d taken such pains to avoid it.
There was a clang from the kitchen, followed by someone letting loose with a string of curses. But my dad kept his eyes on me, for once not distracted. “What happened between me and your mother,” he said slowly, taking his time, “was just that: between us. Our relationships with you are separate things entirely. Being with your mom isn’t an insult to me, or vice wa. You know that, don’t you?”
I nodded, looking down at the table. Of course I knew this: it was, after all, my mother’s party line, as well. But in the real world, you couldn’t really just split a family down the middle, mom on one side, dad the other, with the child divided equally between. It was like when you ripped a piece of paper into two: no matter how you tried, the seams never fit exactly right again. It was what you couldn’t see, those tiniest of pieces, that were lost in the severing, and their absence kept everything from being complete.
“I just hate that it’s like this,” I said softly. I looked up at him. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“You’re not,” he said. “You couldn’t. Okay?”
I nodded, and he reached over, taking my hand and squeezing it. And this simple connection, reminding me of the one between us, made me feel better than any words he’d said so far.
“Gus?” I turned, seeing Jason standing in the kitchen doorway. “Fish guy’s on the phone about that rush order.”
“I’ll call him back,” my dad said.
“He says he’s about to leave for the day,” Jason told him. “Do you want me to—”
“Go,” I said, patting his hand. “Take the call, it’s fine. We’re fine.”
He cocked his head to the side, studying my face. “You sure?”
“Yeah,” I told him. “I have to get home anyway and get ready for . . . you know.”
“The game,” he said, speaking the word for me.
“Right.”
He pushed out his chair, getting up. “Well,” he said, “it should be a good one. I have a feeling you might have decent seats.”
“I’d better,” I replied. “If I’m not on the actual bench, I’m leaving.”
“Of course,” he said. “How are you supposed to talk smack to the refs from anywhere else?”
“Forget the refs,” I replied. “I’m planning on telling Peter what I think about his offense.”
He gave me a rueful smile. It was weird to be talking about basketball again after such a long time away from it. Like we were speaking a language we’d once been fluent in, but we now had to struggle with verbs and tenses.
“Have fun,” he said to me. “I mean it.”
“You, too,” I told him. He smiled again, then started back toward the kitchen. Jason, who was waiting, pushed the door open, and my dad walked through, taking the phone as he handed it off to him. I thought again of how I’d seen them at the cooler earlier, working in tandem, the ongoing intricate dance of making this place somehow come together and perform. Through the open door, I could see the kitchen staff loading carts and chopping and cleaning, a blur of movement around my dad as he stood in the center, the phone at his ear. Always the calmest one in the chaos, even when all hell was breaking loose.
I was halfway out the door, headed homehen I realized I’d left my jacket upstairs. I doubled back, up the alley and through the kitchen door. As I passed my dad’s office, I saw him sitting at his desk, still on the phone. Opal was standing behind him, using the copy machine that was crammed in the corner. It was whirring, lit up, spitting out pages she took as they emerged, one by one.
“Sure,” my dad was saying. “A staff review doesn’t have to be a bad thing. I’m just saying that the situation here doesn’t necessarily lend itself to HR formulas.”
The copy machine started making a clicking noise, which grew steadily louder. Opal pushed a couple of buttons. Nothing happened, other than the noise changing from clicking to grinding.
“Oh, I’m sure,” my dad continued, glancing back at her, “it will be enlighte
ning.”
Opal tried another button, sighed, then stepped back, surveying the machine as the grinding grew louder. Behind her, my dad was watching as she furrowed her brow, then balled up her fist, whacking the machine hard in its center. BANG! BANG! My dad raised his eyebrows. The machine sputtered, then began whirring again, and another copy slid out into Opal’s hands. She smiled, pleased with herself, and I was surprised to see my dad smile, too. Then he turned back around.
Upstairs, Opal’s volunteer force of one—Dave—remained, sitting cross-legged by the model, working with a piece in the vicinity of Tracey’s old apartment. I watched him from the landing for a moment as he bent over it, his face serious as he concentrated on getting it attached in the right spot. I’d thought I was being stealthy until he said, without looking up, “I know my artistry is fascinating, but really, feel free to jump in at any time.”
“I wish I could,” I said. “But I have to go to the game.”
“The Defriese game?” he asked, looking over at me. I nodded. “Seriously?”
“Yep.”
“Wait. Do you not want to go or something?”
“Not really.”
He stared at me openly as I walked over to get my jacket. “You know, there are people who would sell their souls for a ticket to that game.”
“Would you?”
“I’d consider it.” He sighed, shaking his head. “God, I just don’t get you non-basketball people. It’s like you’re from another planet.”
“I’m not non-basketball,” I said. “I just—”
“Would rather work on this model than get to be there in person for probably the best game of the freaking year.” He held up his hand. “Just don’t even try to explain yourself. You might as well be speaking Romulan right now.”
“Speaking what?”
He rolled his eyes. “Forget it.”
I picked up my jacket, digging out my phone from my pocket. I had one missed call, and a text from my mom on the screen. LOOKING FORWARD TO SEEING YOU, it said. Formal, polite. WILL BE WAITING AT WILL CALL.