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“Everyone sit down at the table,” my mom commanded. “The lasagna is about done, and you’re all in my way.”
I rounded the island and placed a kiss on her cheek before reaching into the silverware drawer to get what I needed to set the table. We had family dinner nearly every Sunday, and I loved it—looked forward to it, actually. But I knew one day the frequency would dwindle, and things would change. My parents were getting older, and my sister and brother-in-law were about to have a baby. It was the way of the world, and I was okay with that. I just intended to soak up every moment I could now.
Laura saw me in the drawer and stepped up to the plate—somewhat literally. “I’ll get the napkins and plates.”
My mom didn’t say thank you, but she didn’t have to. We could see it shining in her eyes, and she didn’t owe us one anyway—it was the other way around.
Laura and I made quick work of the setup, working around my dad, who’d already taken his seat at the head of the table, while Cam hung out in the kitchen and waited to carry things in for my mother.
The garlic bread came out just as we were taking our seats, and I immediately reached into the basket to do what I always did. I pulled a piece out and tossed it to my dad, who caught it deftly before moving it to a secure location below the table. Laura clapped her hands like a quarterback, and I tossed a piece in her direction where she quickly executed a similar maneuver to my father.
It was then that my mother entered the room behind a lasagna-carrying Cam to find my hand once again in the basket.
“Reed Luca!”
I pretended to be surprised.
“Why am I always having to tell you to wait?”
I shrugged.
“For Pete’s sake!”
“Sorry, Mom. I guess I just never learn,” I apologized contritely. I wasn’t planning to learn in the future either, but that wasn’t the point.
The point was to get away with the con, and my mom soaked up butter like a roll.
Laura and my dad stared at their plates and chewed discreetly. This was how it always worked, and I’d never even considered ratting them out.
Though, I did find it funny how they never reprimanded me for lying for their sake, but all of my other lies were derived directly from the devil.
“I guess that’s just going to have to be the only piece you get,” my mom decreed. I shot eyes to Laura, and she promised telepathically she’d do me a solid and secure me another piece.
I looked back to my mom with my sweetest smile. “Okay, Mom.”
She huffed her satisfaction at my easy compliance.
Cam did his best to break the ice. “So, uh, Reed. Where are you working now?”
It was actually comical how much of a staple this very conversation had become of our family dinners. I changed jobs often, and at some point over the years, the discussion had finally morphed from When are you going to settle on something? to Tell us about what you’re doing now.
“Well, actually, I just got done with that three-week stint on the Golden Gate Bridge. It was absolutely incredible. The views from the top are unlike anything I have ever seen. The fog doesn’t even seem real.”
Their faces all said cool, but their silence said they couldn’t relate. And I truly got it. I’d imagined what it would be like so many times over the years, but even that hadn’t ever come close to what it was actually like.
“So what are you doing now?” my dad asked as he shoveled the first bite of steaming lasagna into his mouth. My mom still stood, scooping out pieces onto each of our plates individually. I was pretty sure it wasn’t as much about serving us as making sure I only took my share.
“I’m going to be writing a column for the San Fran Journal.”
“Seriously?” Cam asked at the same time Laura exclaimed, “How cool!”
Of course. The column in the paper got their attention, but working at the very top of one of the tallest bridges in the country was no big deal. I nearly shook my head.
“What’s the column about?” my mom asked, the patient one of the group.
“Dating, relationships, and sex.”
My dad choked, sputtering and coughing and banging on his own chest.
“Oh, my God! Jimmy!” my mom yelled, panicked.
Cam jumped to his feet, the first-responder instinct strong within him. He moved around the table swiftly and wrapped his arms around my dad, prepared to Heimlich, but my dad swatted him away.
“I’m fine, I’m fine! Jesus.”
“Well, don’t scare us like that!” my mom reprimanded, like he’d choked on purpose just to garner some attention.
My dad ignored her. “What in the Sam Hill do you know about dating and relationships?”
“Pretty sure he doesn’t know about sex either,” Cam muttered under his breath, obviously still distressed by my earlier betrayal.
“Honestly, I only know my own experience and my observation of the world around me,” I admitted, and feelings of being in over my head washed over me. I really didn’t know what I was doing. All I knew was that reading Lola’s column was easy, and refuting it was even easier. Something about the two of us together, even when we were on rival teams, seemed right.
“Then why the hell did they give you the job?” my dad asked.
“Actually, it’s an opposing column to one that already exists at the Times.”
“Sex Says,” Laura shouted. “Oh my God, I love that column.”
I rolled my eyes. Of course she did.
“I’d never heard of it until a few weeks ago,” I admitted. “Anyway, I made a video about it, and apparently, a lot of people caught wind.”
I shrugged. Done with my explanation, I went back to my lasagna, but I looked up again when I heard no sounds. No talking and not the reverberations of a family scarfing down their meal.
When my eyes finally met Laura’s, she glanced to my dad and my mom before stating, “We’re going to need to see that video.”
I rolled my eyes. “Laura—”
“We’re just gonna watch it when you leave if we don’t watch it now,” my dad said. “I don’t know much about finding videos on the internet—”
My mom scoffed, and a mental image of my dad surfing for porn jumped unwelcome into my mind.
“Fine,” I interjected, before my brain could fully develop the idea of my dad one-handing it at the dinner table.
“I have my laptop with me!” Laura shouted as she jumped up from the table and ran, well, wobbled at a quick pace, for the other room.
She came back with it nearly instantly and shoved my plate to the side before I could even lay my fork down. “Here.”
I reached around her to put my fork on the plate and pulled up the browser to head to YouTube. The rest of the family pushed back in their chairs and rounded the table to stand behind me.
“It’s going to be out of context if you don’t read her column first,” I warned.
“I read it,” Laura said. “I read all of them.”
Of course she did.
“And we can look it up after if we need to,” Cam added.
I found my page and clicked play on the video. Immediately, my mom’s eyes went to the laundry. “What’s all over your shirt?”
“I’d just gotten done working down at the wharf.”
“Gross,” Laura mumbled and I chuckled.
“Seventeen million views?” Cam exclaimed. “Holy fuck!”
Laura reached over and pinched his nipple, and Cam tried to squirm away.
My mom smacked my head as I picked up a cigarette and lit it in the video. “Still smoking and doing it in your apartment! What’s wrong with you?”
“I enjoy it, and I do what I like in my own apartment. I don’t do it in yours,” I explained patiently.
“I’m your mother!”
“Hush, Linda,” my dad ordered. “I can’t hear the goddamn video.”
As I spoke, I heard the words I was addressing like a song in my mind. Lola’s voice and fervor as I imagined her saying them—and the way she reacted to mine.
The rest of their commentary faded out as the woman who inspired the video took up every corner of space in my mind and chest. Her quick wit and quirky smile and the way she’d been wound up as I left her apartment to head here—but mostly, what I was going to do to make sure I saw her again.
And soon.
I tossed a few goldfish crackers into my mouth and stopped mid-chew when I felt like I was being watched. Out of my periphery, I discreetly glanced toward Louie’s aquarium, and I could tell he wasn’t happy. His little fish eyes were pointed right in my direction.
Shit. I probably needed to rethink my snack food selections.
Eating actual goldfish—even if they were of the cracker variety—probably came across as a bit morbid to my finned roommate.
I made a mental note never to buy these crackers again, and when I thought a little harder about it, marked Swedish fish off my snack list, too.
“Sorry, dude,” I offered an apology as my eyes met his.
He gave no response.
Yeah, definitely pissed off. But who could blame him? He might’ve been a smart aleck, but it didn’t give me the right to spur paranoia that I’d one day turn cannibalistic and eat him for lunch. Actions spoke louder than words, and I’d get into Louie’s good graces again by going cold turkey on all foods that resembled him.
