“No Nathan tonight?” I can’t help myself from asking.
She frowns and slides in next to Meredith, who’s already got cheesy-toast butter on her face. We’re so busy, that’s all I can really talk to them right then. I bring cheeseburgers for Henna and Meredith and a chicken salad for Mel, who digs in like she’s famished. I notice slightly too long. She makes a face.
They’re still there half an hour later when something completely unexpected happens for the second time this week. It’s not a bomb this time, even if it might as well be.
My dad shows up.
“Dad?” I say, so surprised I stop right there, at the entrance where Tina is wrangling with menus and trying to seat people. There’s a line of customers waiting to get in, which usually only happens on Sunday mornings after all the churches let out. My dad’s at the front of the line, looking around, slightly stunned, but not smelling of booze that I can tell.
“Busy tonight, huh?” he says.
“What are you doing here?”
He fingers his collar, only catching my eye in brief little glances. “Meeting your mother. Is she here?”
“You’re meeting her here? At the restaurant?”
My surprise must finally sink in because he stops, seeming confused. “I think so,” he says, and it’s almost a question.
“Uh,” I say, because I really don’t know what else to say.
Tina finally can’t take it any more. “Are you busy?” she says to me, eyes wide, voice high.
“Because I am!”
I snap out of it. “Dad, Mel and Meredith are sitting over there with Henna.” I point. Three astonished, frozen faces stare back at us from their booth. “Why don’t you … you know … sit with them?”
My dad nods, but doesn’t head over to the booth. “Can I talk to you for a sec?” he asks me.
Without even looking at her, I hand the coffee pots I’m holding to a really-very-angry-now Tina and follow my dad out into the parking lot. It’s only just getting dark. The rain let off the week before the Bolts of Fire concert and you can tell that summer might actually be on the way. If we live to see it.
My dad scrunches up his face like his mind’s elsewhere and pulls again at his collar. “Why don’t you take your tie off?” I ask.
“Hmm?” he says. He doesn’t touch the tie. He looks at the moon, up already, only about half-full.
“When I was your age, we really did think we’d be living up there by now.”
I wait. He doesn’t continue. “I’m kinda busy, Dad. What’s up?”
He scratches his ear. I think for a second that he’s not steady on his feet, but then I realize he’s just shuffling around, not staying still. I lean in and smell him again. He gives me a small grin. “Nope,” he says. “Sober.”
“Well,” I say. “That’s good.”
“Listen,” he starts, but again doesn’t finish.
“Dad, seriously, I–”
“I’m going to go into rehab.”
He stops because a family has come out of the restaurant. Tina leans out the door behind them, looking at me with furious eyes. I flash a “one minute” index finger at her and she goes back inside.
“That’s, um,” I say, “that’s great, Dad. I–”
“Not until after the election. But I’m going to go.”
I frown. “I think you’re a bit more important than–”
“Not her idea. Though she’s been asking for years, hasn’t she?”
“I wouldn’t know, Dad, but even so, I think she’d probably–”