Walking on Broken Glass (41 page)

“How about a celebratory snowball for your new sobriety?” Peter asked and headed in the direction of the best snowballs in the universe. Papa Sam's. Summer. Snowballs. Sam's.

When we were kids, we waited for the summer day when we could stand in the long, long line in the hot, hot sun for the first snowball of the season. Younger and shorter, stretched on tiptoes, my fingers would curl over the windowsill, my nose almost dented by the aluminum window ledge so I could watch the magic: the SnoBall Wizard ice machine blew shaved snow crystals of ice into cups. An ice-packed funnel, mashed on the top, formed a white mountain. The best tippytoed part was watching the glistening rivers of syrup as they drenched the ice and the mountain became yellow or red or green or, in my case, chocolate.

We ate our snowballs sitting under the striped-umbrella-shaded picnic tables—Peter with his usual traffic-signal green spearmint, and me with my thick, dark chocolate. I couldn’t remember how long it had been since Peter and I shared this ritual. Years, probably. Years I spent polishing off bottles of wine or fruit-flavored martinis, and didn’t make time for my brother. And if I did spend time with Peter, I would hardly remember the next day. This, I realized, would not be a memory drowned in alcohol.

I reached across the table and carved out a spoonful of Peter's snowball and mixed it with my chocolate. “I have an idea,” I said. “Did you know if you mix these two flavors it tastes like that chocolate candy with the green in the middle?”

“If that's your idea, I made a mistake asking you to come here to help.”

“You’re the one asking a pregnancy-surprised, marriage-impaired, newly recovering alcoholic for help. I called Dad before I left and told him we’d work something out for tomorrow. Why don’t I invite Dad and Dani to lunch? Since he knows I’m staying with you, he’ll definitely want me to meet her, so he can prove to me how wrong you were about her.”

Peter tossed his empty cup into the clown-mouth of the trash barrel. “And the fun begins …”

“You want me to swing by and get you? I’m not so sure you should be driving right now,” he said.

“Dad, if the doctor didn’t think it was safe, I wouldn’t be driving. I’ll be fine. I’m on my way out the door,” I said. The doctor defense usually quieted him. He’d argue with me, but not with the doctor. I only came to know that, unfortunately, because he never questioned Mom's doctors. “They know what's best for her, honey. Now don’t argue. We don’t want your mom upset,” was his standard answer. I’d asked if he’d discussed it with Mom. That's when he told me a doctor said it might be best if she didn’t know her cancer was stage 4, which meant the lung cancer, when they found it, had metastasized to her brain. That's when I booked a flight home.

And, once again, I’m home because, when it came to women, my father sometimes malfunctioned.

Dad and Dani didn’t see me walk into Moran's Deli. They were looking at the daily specials posted on the front chalkboard. Not much to tell from the back, except her red hair had to be salon-induced, and the vertical purple and gold striped knit pullover over black stretch pants was not her best wardrobe decision. She had her arm around Dad's waist, which, besides being overkill affection for deli lunches, tugged at my memories of Mom.

Wisdom to know the difference. Okay, God, we’re on.

I smoothed my sleeveless cowl-neck sweater over my baby bump, brushed off my linen skirt, and stepped over to the other side of Dad. Looking at the same board, I leaned his way and said, “Excuse me, do you know what's good here?”

His laughing surprise made the corny entrance worthwhile. I hugged him and felt more than saw Dani taking out her woman-to-woman ruler. He introduced her as his “good friend, Dani” and me as “my daughter, Leah, the one I told you about, remember?”

I smiled. She smiled. We all smiled.

Dani was either a deceptively young fifty-year-old or a prematurely aged thirty-year-old. She fit the definition of a handsome woman. Not beautiful, not delicate, not cute, but not unattractive. Milky blue eyes were outlined by a too-heavy hand with blue eyeliner. She definitely didn’t have my mother's graceful hands. Her long strawberry red acrylic fingernails looked misplaced on her chiseled and rough hands.

“You ready to order, honey?” Dad asked.

Dani and I both said, “Sure.”

We found a booth because “Dani has back problems.” She and Dad shared a side, but Dad scooted to the wall seat because “Dani has claustrophobia.”

Peter was right. Dani had a hold on Dad.

“Leah, can you believe Dani has two sons? She looks great, doesn’t she? How old are Cash and Sam? Oh, wait, seventeen and twenty. That's something, huh? She's been raising those boys by herself for years, and they’re terrific kids. She's done a fine job being a single mother.”

Her beatific smile after hearing his praise wasn’t lost on my Dad, who glowed. “I’m just blessed to have such fine young men who listen to their mother. You know, Leah, some boys make bad decisions when they don’t have a father figure around. Not Cash and Sam. Those boys knew we had to work as a family, even though their father didn’t want to be part of their lives. Like I said, the Lord just blessed me.” She said this against the backdrop of my father's woebegone expression punctuated by a “tsk, tsk” at the abandonment part of the plot.

“Can you believe a father would leave like that?” Dad asked. “What’d he do, honey, oh, just not come home one night? It's a shame, that's what it is. A shame.”

She nodded, then patted his hand. “Have you told Leah about your fishing trips with the boys and the deck they’re planning for your backyard?”

A smart woman, indeed. She knew that to brag on her own sons would’ve been cloying. Dad bragging on them let me know how much time they’ve all spent together and how proud he was to have done so.

He smiled. She smiled. They both smiled.

Right again, Peter.

Dad and Dani split a large fried oyster po-boy and a basket of sweet potato fries because “Dani's system can’t tolerate too much fried food.” Dad insisted we try the bread pudding, and Dani graciously allowed him to scoot out of the booth to order it. She did, though, smile sweetly and tell him she wouldn’t mind at all “taking care of dessert,” which gave him an opportunity to, once again, crow about her generosity and kindness.

She eyed Dad as he excused himself through a mixed bag of construction workers, suits, and soccer dads, then she turned and made dead-on eye contact. “Your father is won-der-ful. One of the nicest men in the world (which sounded like “whirled”). Of course, you know that already.”

Her cell phone jingled, and I was treated to a mother-son bonding moment. “Hi, sweetie. No, I’m not at work. Remember I asked for the day off so I could meet Mr. Bob's daughter? (smile) No, no, I’ve been working so many hours, they were happy to let me go for a day. (eye roll) Um. No. I don’t think we’re going to be long. (eyebrows raise questioningly) Well, okay, but you know you don’t have to do that. (unabashed pride) Sure, sweetie, I’ll tell Mr. Bob you said you can’t wait to go fishing. Bye, Sam-Sam. Talk to you later.”

Dani snapped her phone closed. “Sam called to ask if he could go to Home Depot and buy a book of deck plans. Those boys just adore your father. They’ve been such company for him. You know how lonely he must be, poor man. I’m so glad he's had some time to enjoy himself. He certainly deserves it.” She must have spotted Dad headed back to the table because she leaned my way, and said, “Sometimes it's just hard for men to do what they need for themselves. Your dad deserves to be happy, and he seems to be really happy since we met.”

I sat back and waited for the credits to roll.

“Dani made Gloria Thornton's performances look like Scout Finch's ham acting in the county play.”

Peter and I shared his backyard swing. Since my feet couldn’t reach the ground, Peter pushed us back and forth.

“Can you stop with the literary references already?” He looked up, then back at me, “Wait. I’ve got this one.
To Kill a Mockingbird.
Atticus Finch. He was a lawyer I remember.”

“You
did
read in school,” I teased.

The sultry quiet erupted. A trio of white-faced squirrels on a feeding frenzy, pecans clutched between their tiny paws, chased one another up, down, and around the trees. The neighbor's orange cat watched in bemusement from its perch on top of the fence post. It had jumped down once already, sending the squirrels into a manic run to the tree's top branches. I watched their crazed but amusing behavior, and knew I’d felt that same frenetic lunacy. I knew, too, that wasn’t the life I wanted.

“I forgot to mention Dani figured out Dad's hot spot—”

“Yuck, Leah, what—”

“I meant she's all over the ‘I love to garden and plant flowers and play in the dirt thing.’”

“Didn’t I tell you?”

“Stop. You’re almost sounding like him. Do you want to be the cat or the squirrel?” I pointed to the nature drama in front of us. “I’ve been watching them, thinking how I’ve been like those squirrels, running all over the place trying to get what I need. Sometimes I do. But I’m always at the mercy of that thing hanging over my head or scaring me away from what I need to do. You can’t let his problem become your problem.”

“Might be too late for that.”

“I hope not,” I said, and hopped off the swing to call our father.