To the Last Drop

by Sandra Balzo

  ‘You’re so transparent,’ my son said, giving me a kiss on the cheek. ‘I’ll stop by and see you and Frank tomorrow, OK?’

  ‘Sounds good,’ I said. ‘I’m working nine to noon and then I’m off the rest of the weekend.’

  Which I thought I’d be spending with my son. Wah, wah, wah.

  Get over it, Maggy. ‘Are you and Ginny heading out now?’ I asked. ‘I can make you something for the road. Pumpkin lattes? Or we have chai and matcha, if you prefer tea.’

  I knew I was trying too hard but Eric just smiled and pulled out his phone. ‘Nah, we’re good. I just want to text Dad first and make sure he’s home.’

  ‘Your father was still at the office when I left about half an hour ago,’ William volunteered, getting up to go to the condiment cart.

  ‘Do you have a key for your dad’s house?’ I asked Eric.

  ‘No, but I can stop by the—’

  I assumed he was going to say the office but it wasn’t necessary as the door opened yet again and his father walked in. ‘You son of a bitch!’

  We all froze.

  My ex-husband had never been abusive, verbally or physically. But there was something dangerous in Ted’s tone now.

  The words, though, weren’t directed at Eric or me. They were meant for the man by the condiment cart. One William Swope.

  FOUR

  The sugar packet dangling between William Swope’s thumb and index finger slipped out and landed on top of the condiment cart.

  ‘Maybe we should go,’ I heard Eric whisper to Ginny.

  I caught my son’s eye and head-gestured toward the side door. Eric nodded and whisked Ginny down the hallway as her mother, seemingly frozen, watched Ted and William from the table.

  ‘Is there a problem?’ William asked lightly.

  Ted didn’t answer but I could see a vein pulsing in his temple.

  Recognizing that particular vessel, I tried to defuse the situation with the mundane. ‘Oh, a patient stopped by here earlier, mistaking it for your office, Ted. Did she find you?’

  ‘Rita Pahlke, you mean? She stopped me on my way out of the building. Though it wasn’t me she wanted to talk about any more than it was me Clay Tartare wanted to talk to when he called.’

  William Swope cocked his head, puzzled. ‘My ex-partner telephoned? Am I supposed to call him back?’

  ‘From the sound of it he’s wanted you to do that for over a week now.’

  But William had pulled his cell out of the pocket of his khakis and was punching buttons. ‘I don’t see any missed calls.’

  My ex didn’t take his green eyes off his new partner. ‘You don’t have to call him now. But we need to talk, Swope. Outside.’

  For his part, William didn’t seem at all troubled by either Ted’s tone or his suggestion they step out into the cold. ‘Sure.’

  He scooped up a fresh sugar packet and slipped it and his phone into his back pocket before crossing to the table to claim his mug. ‘Lynne, honey – why don’t you get Ted a cup and bring it outside. We’ll be on the porch.’

  I thought Ted was going to slug him. Whatever this Rita Pahlke or Clay Tartare had said, it had certainly pissed off my ex. And what kind of name was Tartare for a dentist, anyway?

  But to his credit, Ted just responded with a tight, ‘No, thanks,’ before swinging open the door and allowing his new partner to precede him.

  The door slammed shut behind Ted whether by his hand or a sudden burst of wind, sending the bells crashing against the plate glass.

  Lynne Swope cleared her throat. ‘My, it’s nearly seven. Where can everybody be?’

  I was straining to hear the men on the porch when the side door opened and a burst of voices dashed my hopes of eavesdropping on the conversation.

  ‘Hey, Maggy,’ Laurel Birmingham, a statuesque redhead called. ‘We just ran into Eric in the parking lot.’

  ‘With zee very tall, very pretty girl,’ the dapper man behind her added, unwinding a burgundy scarf from around his neck.

  ‘Jacque!’ Amy leaned back across the counter to replace the carafe on the warmer and turned to him. ‘Thank you for coming.’

  ‘A pleasure,’ Jacque said, kissing her.

  Jacque Oui wasn’t my cup of tea – or even French press coffee – but he seemed to adore Amy.

  ‘Jacque,’ the barista said, ‘I don’t think you’ve met Lynne Swope. She and her husband moved here this spring and the girl you saw with Eric is their daughter.’

  Lynne stuck out her hand.

  Jacque kissed it. ‘Enchante.’

  I wanted to gag but Lynne seemed to favor smooth, as evidenced by her choice of William as her mate. ‘How charming.’

  ‘Zee mother is as lovely as zee daughter.’

  ‘The mother,’ I wanted to scream. But there was nothing to be gained. Jacque’s accent had thickened to almost comical over his two decades in the US. He sure wasn’t about to drop the shtick now. After all, it had helped make him fishmonger to the rich – if not famous – of Brookhills.

  All that charm stopped short of me, for some reason, my last shopping expedition having ended with Jacque refusing to sell me a piece of halibut because, ‘You vill ruin eet, do you hear me? One second too long, eet will be zee cat food!’

  ‘I’m going home,’ I said, even now my face warming at the memory. ‘Enjoy your meeting.’

  Ducking back into the office, I snatched up my purse and coat. Though my Ford Escape was parked in the lot behind the depot, making the side door the more direct route, I had no intention of missing whatever was transpiring between Ted and William on the front porch.

  But, alas, the fireworks seemed over. As I pushed open the door, my ex-husband was pounding down the steps. ‘… Told Diane to cancel your appointments. Pack up your crap tonight and get out. You can leave your keys on her desk.’

  By the light coming through the shop window, I could see William’s shadowy figure. He was sitting on a chair slid away from the huddle of furniture by the building, coffee mug on the floor beside him.

  ‘God damn!’

  I swiveled to see Ted pointing keys at his midnight-blue Miata parked on the street.

  ‘He’s trying to open the car with the office keys.’ Swope seemed curiously detached.

  ‘Should we tell him?’

  A ‘bleep-bleep’ signaled that Ted had figured it out, so I turned back to the man sitting on my porch.

  ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘Oh, yes, certainly.’ A car door slammed and the Miata’s engine fired up. ‘I’m sorry … it’s Maggy, correct?’

  I nodded.

  ‘A simple misunderstanding that I’m sure we’ll work out.’ The dentist got to his feet a little unsteadily, rubbing at his lower back. ‘College lacrosse injury,’ he said with a wry smile. ‘I think I’ll take a cue from you and skip the meeting.’

  A burst of laughter from inside made us both look through the window to the brightly lit tableau inside Uncommon Grounds. Jacque was seated in William’s vacated chair, apparently being très amusing.

  ‘Don’t mind Jacque,’ I said as Ted’s Miata accelerated away from the curb. ‘He’s dating our barista but seems to think flirting is required of any Frenchman. It’s harmless.’

  ‘Is it?’ William Swope started down the porch steps. ‘I wonder.’

  FIVE

  I was feeling as blue as the stucco walls of my living room as I parked the Escape in front of the garage and mounted my porch steps. The forecast for the night was miserable – a cold rain that could freeze on the streets and sidewalks if the temperature dropped any further – but my mood had nothing to do with that or even Ted and William’s quarrel. In fact, the fight had actually cheered me a bit, given I was petty and required payback for Ted hosting our son instead of me.

  Which brings us, of course, to why I was moping. No Eric, and I purposely hadn’t made plans with Pavlik, who’d been nonstop busy anyway, since we’d gotten back from Fort Lauderdale.

  As for me, I was
alone and contemplating having a bowl of cereal for supper. Maybe watching an old movie before I turned in. Early, naturally.

  Spinsterhood, here I come. Hell, I’d get a cat if I didn’t think Frank would eat it.

  Which reminded me. ‘Frank?’ I called as I stepped into the house.

  Normally the sheepdog would be snuffling at the door as I unlocked it, whining plaintively and barely allowing me to get out of the way before exploding out onto the porch and down the steps into the yard.

  Now I felt a stir of anxiety as I looked around the front room. ‘Frank? Are you all ri—’

  That’s when I registered the scent of roasting pepperoni in the air. That, along with Frank’s absence at the door, could mean only one thing. ‘Eric?’

  ‘In the kitchen.’

  I found my son with his head ducked into the oven, Frank nearly cemented to his right leg so as not to miss anything that fell.

  ‘I see you discovered the pizzas.’

  ‘Yup,’ Eric said, closing the oven door. ‘How many of these things do you go through? I don’t think I’ve come home from school when there weren’t at least three in the freezer.’

  Because I bought them for him, of course. Dad might have the fancy house but Mom kept a freezer full of pizza and ice cream, a fridge full of soda and a house full of sheepdog.

  I mean, which would you rather come home to?

  ‘I thought Ginny was dropping you at your dad’s.’ I dumped my purse and coat on a chair and, yielding to the seductive aroma of browning cheese, took two plates out of the cupboard. Nudging Eric’s cell phone to one side, I set them on the counter.

  My son tilted his head, as if considering, and then opened the freezer door to pull out a second pizza. Wise boy. ‘I don’t have a key, remember? I just had Ginny drop me off here. I figure Dad’ll call or text when he’s through with Doctor Swope.’

  I had an inkling Ted was through with Dr Swope in more ways than one. ‘Ginny didn’t want to stay for dinner?’ I asked, taking our second course from him to strip the cellophane and cardboard off it.

  ‘I didn’t think to offer.’ Eric looked surprised. ‘Should I have?’

  Further proof my son was gay, God bless him. Let the gorgeous co-ed eat by herself.

  ‘Anyway,’ Eric continued, ‘Ginny said she was going to her cousin’s house for dinner, didn’t she?’

  Of course. In all the excitement, I’d forgotten Ginny planned to visit Mary’s daughter Caitlin, who had been two years behind Eric in school. ‘After the long drive, I’m sure she’s happy to just kick back with family.’

  ‘Long is right. Cool car, but I could have shaved thirty minutes off the trip if I’d been behind the wheel.’

  ‘But overall, Ginny’s a good driver?’ I was thinking this ride-sharing agreement might be a good idea, given my son’s lead foot.

  Eric shrugged. ‘I guess. Talks a lot, though.’

  Opening the oven door, I slid the new pizza in, pulling the one on the shelf above it out and onto the cutting board. ‘This done enough for you?’

  ‘It’s going to have to be – I’m starving.’ He took a cleaver to the pizza, pressing down. Given the satisfying ‘crack’ the crust gave between each of the six slices I was thinking it was done. Or overdone, by most people’s standards.

  But we Thorsens weren’t most people. In my family, we preferred our bacon extra crispy, our ribs falling off the bones and our Thanksgiving turkey roasted to an inch of its edible life, thank you very much.

  Eric put two slices of pizza on each of our plates as I considered whether I should tell him that his father was likely home by now. Given Ted’s mood, though, maybe Eric was better off here while his dad cooled down.

  Oh, hell, who was I kidding? My reluctance had nothing to do with Ted’s temper tantrum. I just wanted Eric home. In fact …

  I eyed my son’s phone on the kitchen counter. Would it be childish to turn off the ringer while we ate dinner?

  Of course it would.

  ‘Could you grab a bottle of wine out of the pantry?’ I asked, pointing to the cabinet behind him.

  Eric rolled his eyes but turned to obey. ‘You’re getting to be a wino, you know.’

  ‘I have one glass a night.’ Feeling defensive – and therefore justified – I flicked the switch on his phone to the silent position with my fingernail while his back was turned to the counter.

  A growl of far-away thunder sounded outside the window.

  ‘Sorry,’ I whispered.

  ‘You don’t have to apologize to me, it’s your liver.’ Eric held a bottle of wine in each hand. He lifted the one in his right. ‘Red or,’ he looked at the bottle in his left, ‘red?’

  The liver comment hurt. And was probably justified a year or so ago. Blame me, blame Ted, blame the divorce. But now that I’d cut back to a single glass a night, I made sure it was a wine I loved. Which meant red, though even the best-structured was barely drinkable by day four. Not that I didn’t persevere anyway. ‘One is a blend, the other a cabernet. I’ll take the blend. Right hand.’

  Putting the cab away, he brought the other bottle to the counter. ‘You want me to open this?’

  ‘You know how?’ I asked, sliding the junk drawer out to retrieve the corkscrew.

  He took it. ‘Of course. I’m in college, you know.’

  I should probably have been relieved he hadn’t gained the skill from watching me. ‘You’re also underage. You won’t be twenty-one until your senior year.’

  He removed the foil from the bottle. ‘Lucky for you and your Zin/Petite Sirah blend, I have older friends who enjoy wine.’

  I was a little unnerved by the expertise with which my nineteen-year-old was setting about opening the bottle.

  Plunk. Cork out, Eric took a glass from the rack over the sink. ‘Want me to pour shallow so it can breathe?’

  ‘Umm, sure,’ I said as he tipped an inch of deep red liquid into the stemmed glass and slid it to me. The kid had learned something about wine. From somebody. ‘So these older friends. Are they … nice?’

  Eric told me he was gay during his freshman year of college. I knew he’d been stressed about something, so it was a relief to know exactly what. Now out to everybody, the subject of Eric’s sexuality didn’t come up much anymore.

  Don’t get me wrong, I was as curious as any mother about my offspring’s life but I did draw the line at asking Eric whether he was seeing somebody. It had been an annoying question when I was in college and probably was no less so now. Gay or straight.

  ‘Nice? Sure.’ He opened the refrigerator. ‘No beer?’

  I’d taken a sip of the wine and choked on it.

  Eric was laughing at me. ‘Just kidding. And while I might have had a drink once or twice, my friends are nice and I’m being careful. You don’t have to worry about me. OK?’

  ‘OK.’ Like I’d ever stop.

  We downloaded the first Jurassic Park movie and ate pizza on tables in front of the TV. The meteorologist on the Ten O’Clock News was predicting that the storm, when it finally broke, would be in the form of rain rather than sleet when a phone rang.

  Eric grabbed his empty plate and made for the kitchen. I followed with mine and arrived to see him retrieve his cell from the counter. All credit to the quality of the movie and quantity of the pizza that Eric had forgotten to take the phone into the living room with him. ‘Not me,’ he said, holding it up.

  Which I could have told him, even if the ringing hadn’t been coming from under my coat on the kitchen chair. Setting down the plate, I dug my bag out from under my coat and the phone from my purse. By the time I finally had it in my hand, the thing had stopped ringing.

  ‘Damn,’ I said, pulling up the missed call: 10:09 p.m., but … ‘I don’t recognize the number.’

  Eric was frowning at his own phone. ‘Why’d I turn the ringer off?’

  Outside the window there was a white flash of lightning – this time with a simultaneous crack of thunder overhead. The heavens finally
opened, pelting rain against the glass.

  Ignoring the escalating celestial reprimand, I tried to look innocent. ‘Did Dad call?’

  ‘Nope, nothing yet.’

  See? I mouthed skyward as my son set the cell face down on the counter. As if in answer, my own phone dinged that a voicemail had been left.

  I punched in to listen and the voice was not God’s but Lynne Swope’s. ‘Hi, Maggy? Sorry to bother you but I’m looking for William and he’s not answering his phone. If you have Ted’s cell, could you call me with it? I think they might be together.’

  ‘Not much chance of that,’ I said after replaying the message for Eric.

  ‘Yeah, Dad seemed really ticked. Did he say why?’

  ‘Not really. It sounded to me like it had something to do with Louisville, where the Swopes came from. Dad told Doctor Swope to clear out his office.’ Though not quite in those words.

  Eric stood his plate in the dishwasher rack and straightened up to get mine. ‘That’s kind of brutal.’

  I agreed, but tried not to criticize Ted to Eric. Ever. So I just said, ‘I wonder if Mrs Swope tried the office.’

  ‘You need Dad’s cell number to give her?’

  ‘No, I have it, unless it’s changed.’ I’d been about to call Lynne back but looked up and smiled at our son. ‘Your dad and I do talk, you know.’

  ‘Cool.’ He slid the rack into the dishwasher, closed and latched it.

  I mentally shrugged as I waited for Lynne to answer. Eric had taken the divorce in his stride – siding with neither Ted nor me but supporting us both. He was so even-keeled that sometimes I worried it was a front. ‘Lynne?’

  ‘Oh, Maggy – thanks for calling me back. Hang on a second.’ To someone in the background, presumably Ginny, I heard her say, ‘Did you get something to eat?’ The girl’s voice answered and then Lynne was back on the line. ‘Anyway, could I get Ted’s number from you? I’m sure they’ve mended their fences and are just off having a drink. Don’t you think?’