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Even after quitting years ago, Howard Sinclair’s apartment smelled like pipe tobacco with a hint of mint. It was familiar and almost soothing to Jonah’s tattered heart.
“What are you doing here?” His dad poked his head out of the living room and looked Jonah up and down.
“I was in L.A. for an interview and thought I’d stop in to see you.” Jonah took a step in and said, “That all right with you?”
Howard grunted and disappeared into the living room. Jonah followed. He’d planned this week off just in case things didn’t work out at Taylor and King. He wanted to keep his options open. The intention was always to come out here and check in on his father.
The chairs were all the same, except the dent in his father’s recliner was deeper as he sank into it. Jonah sat on the couch. The television was on golf but muted.
“Got an interview?” Howard questioned as he reclined his recliner and picked up a glass of iced tea.
“Boyer Grant is hiring. Pay is high. Loads of travel though.” Jonah leaned his elbows on his knees as he stared at the moving pictures, not really focusing on the actual golf game happening.
“More travel. Thought you were trying to get away from that.” It wasn’t a question.
Jonah nodded. “Just considering. The pay is worth the look.”
“What do you need money for?” His dad scoffed and picked up his bowl of shelled walnuts. “Without a house or a family, you should have tons of money by now.”
Jonah grunted in response. Money wasn’t the issue. His bank account was why he could afford to work at a startup. All those years not buying anything or even paying rent had lined his bank accounts nicely. He could even take a few years off and not have to worry. But he needed work. Work would keep him sane.
“You’ve been at this new job, what, three weeks?”
“Two,” Jonah replied. Images of Lacy filled his mind. She’d become an integral part of his life. Always there whether at work or at home.
“Always figured your sister would be the one with the wanderlust,” his father said.
“What do you mean?”
“You hated leaving places growing up.” Howard tossed a few walnuts in his mouth and chewed for a moment. “If it weren’t for my job, your mom would have had us settle down somewhere, but she always tried to make wherever we landed home.”
Jonah looked at his hands. His mom had been a great mother. Even though a few years had passed since she died, it still hit his heart funny when they talked about her. “You still have the bowl?”
Howard chuckled. “On the table. Couldn’t part with it if I wanted to. Before Roxie died, she swore to me to keep that bowl until the day I died and make sure one of you kids got it.”
The bowl. It had a prominent place on the dining room table in every house or apartment they had lived in. Once when he and his sister Allison had been teenagers, they had moved to a new place. They had been bickering the whole way. Angering their father and annoying their mother. Neither of them wanted to leave their school behind.
For once, Jonah had a girlfriend and Allison had gotten involved in several clubs and had finally made a few friends. They had settled in a place long enough they had become part of the community. Then dad’s job had moved them again.
Unpacking was a ritual for Roxie and she made both of them help. He and Allison had argued over a box and who should carry it when it fell. The box held one item: the bowl.
When they opened the box, the bowl had broken in half. Mom had cried because her mother had given her that bowl for her wedding. With their nomadic lifestyle, Roxie had to give up on keeping everything. Things broke or got lost all the time, but she never wanted to part with that bowl.
Allison and Jonah had spent the next hours running to get superglue and restoring the bowl. It still had a crack down the center you could see but it was together at least. Their mother had hugged them both and placed the bowl in the center of the table. Jonah smiled at the memory.
“Did it bother you that we didn’t have a home?” Jonah couldn’t help asking. Lacy’s words bubbled up within him.
His father laughed. “What are you talking about? We always had a home.”
“Not a place to live but home.”
Howard leaned toward Jonah. “Where we landed or lived never mattered. As long as your mother was with me, I was home. Roxie was home for me. She was home for all of us.”
Maybe that was why Jonah had been feeling so lost lately. His mother’s death had weighed on his mind for the past year. She’d wanted to see them all settled, but Jonah’s job had kept him moving.
He took a deep breath in and even now, looking around his father’s living room, he could see every little touch his mother had left behind. Her grandmother’s quilt draped over a rocking chair in the corner. An old picture Roxie had found at a thrift store for ten dollars hung behind the couch. The few bits and pieces of her life were scattered everywhere.
This morning he’d packed up his suitcase and walked out his door, ready to leave everything behind. He hadn’t taken everything, but knew it wouldn’t take much to get what little he had. But he’d stopped in front of Lacy’s door.
