I hear a new voice, one I didn’t think to expect. It says, “Jordy?” And then I see her face, peeking around a potted plant.
“Jordy, you’re here. I heard your voice.”
My mother says, “Go back to bed, pumpkin.”
I say, “What are you doing home from school, peanut?” My sister is only nine. She was an accident. As far as my parents are concerned. I think she was a good enough idea.
“Her asthma is acting up,” my mother says. As always, giving Pammy no room to speak. As always, discussing her like she at least isn’t around. Maybe like she never was.
“Pammy,” I say. “This is Chloe.”
“Chloe.” She makes it sound like a nice thing. She’s standing off from the situation; she catches its volatility. There’s still a potted palm between us, but I can see her thick bangs. She wears them long, almost over her eyes. When I was younger I wanted to say, Good luck, kiddo. Grow them as long as you want, but the world is still all right there to see. But I didn’t say that. I did my best to be kind.
Chloe responds to the introduction by waving the way a prom queen waves from a parade float. She must be having a prom queen day, which is a new one on me.
“Pamela, I said go!” my mother shouts. Chloe jumps, and then the potted palm is empty.
“Mom, I’m going to make this quick. I’m going to get right to it. We have a chance to get on our feet and live in a decent place, but some things have come up that we didn’t expect.”
“You need money.”
“I never hit you for college, I walked out of here with the clothes on my back.” Actually, I walked out of the hospital with the clothes on my back, but why split hairs? “I never asked you for money, and if you help us out today, I promise I won’t ask again.”
She rises dramatically from her chair. “Well, the money was never the problem, Jordan.”
She finds her purse on the wet bar and brings her checkbook back, opens it onto the coffee table. “I can give you a thousand.
Any more and I’d need your father to sign. He won’t, of course.”
I shake my head. “We don’t need that much. Another five hundred and we’d get the place.”
She stares at me like I’ve just said something in Swahili. “We can spare it.”
“I don’t want to take any more from you than I have to.”
She continues with the confused look for a beat or two.
Then she writes out the check. I wait for some kind of comment.
Like she might say, That shows a certain ethic on your part. Or, I’m glad you want to do as much on your own as possible. In other words, I never learn.
“You always were a stubborn boy.” She holds the check out to me and I take it. It’s for a thousand. “Now for God’s sake please go before your father—”
“He’s in the garage? I’m going in there.”
“Dear God, Jordan, no.”
But I’m already up off the sofa. “Wait right here, Chlo. It’s okay.” I refuse to walk out of this place like a whipped puppy, my tail between my legs. At least, I refuse to do it again.
My father has a workshop in the garage. He restores cars. He could afford to pay somebody to restore them for him, but I guess that wouldn’t be the same. Then he might have time to go in the house or something. I step into his shop, and he’s working on the Stutz. All this time later, he’s still working on the freaking Stutz.
I don’t know why I should be surprised. It just confirms my suspicion that he never wants to be done.
He’s standing looking into the engine. Just looking. He has a vinyl drop cloth over the fender, and on top of this a cigar burns in an ashtray. I notice an absence of tools. Maybe he’s too close to done, and he’s reduced to staring. I also notice that his bald spot is gone. Then a moment later I realize it’s just black. His hair is dyed jet black now, and he’s using some product to make the bald spot black, too. If you look right at it, it’s pretty obvious.
He could see me out of his peripheral vision,
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