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Again, that edge—and worse, a certainty. He was certain that my mother and he were a done deal. He was certain that they belonged together—the way my father was certain of the same thing.
It made me want to ask him a question. Not if he understood what my parents’ love was like—what it had been like to grow up in the glow of it—because how could he? And he didn’t care as much about that as he cared about being with my mother.
But that wasn’t my question. I was wet and freezing and exhausted. I wanted to ask him if he could lend me twenty dollars so I could get home.
Then the restaurant door opened. And he was standing there.
In his sweater vest glory.
Jacob. I started putting pieces together. Jacob grew up in New York. I only knew Jacob’s mother, not his father. Was Henry his father? I didn’t know Henry’s last name, but he had moved here from New York. I knew that. I knew Jacob was a winemaker. Maybe this was the story. These two men, father and son: Henry destroying my parents’ marriage, Jacob destroying their livelihood.
Jacob held out his hand, offering Henry his half-smile. If he had a piece of licorice he’d have offered that too.
“I’m Jacob McCarthy,” he said.
“Henry,” Henry said. “Henry Morgan.”
“Good to meet you, Henry,” Jacob said.
I breathed a sigh of relief as Henry walked inside and away.
Jacob did a double take, looking through the window, after him. “That wasn’t the Henry Morgan, was it?”
“You know about classical music now?”
“I know enough to know about Henry Morgan,” he said.
He gave me a smile, not commenting that I was dripping like a wet dog.
“What have I missed?” he said.
I pointed at the closed door. “Henry is my mother’s non-lover, and according to him, her soul mate,” I said. “And my brothers tried to kill each other over pot roast. And there was an incident with a fire hydrant.”
Jacob took a breath, as if overwhelmed himself. “That’s it?”
“There is a theory that I don’t love my fiancé. And I need money for a cab.”
Jacob reached into his coat pocket, held out his wallet. “I can help with that part,” he said.
He peeled off a fifty-dollar bill, handed it over.
“Thanks,” I said. “Are you meeting Lee here?”
He nodded as if remembering her. “Lee. Yes,” he said. “We keep meaning to go other places, but this is the only place open by the time we can eat. She’s at Foo Camp and running late.”
“Foo Camp?”
“Foo Camp.” He nodded. “That’s what they call this computer camp Lee is attending. This guy Tim O’Reilly runs it up here. He basically is at the forefront of everything technological. Lee idolizes him. It’s like hacker nerd dreamland.”
“Lee likes chia and computers and Vera Wang. She’s interesting.”
“To both of us.” He smiled, considering that. Then he pointed to the restaurant with his wallet. “You want to come in and have a drink?” he said.
I looked down at my outfit—wet jeans, a white T-shirt. “I shouldn’t,” I said.
Jacob reached out and held his hand over the back of my neck, like he was going to touch my skin, hold me there, warm me there. I felt a chill. I felt a chill where his hand almost was.
“Come in,” he said. “That way there can be two of us looking stupid when Lee explains the algorithm that is going to change the way we log in to secure websites.”
