AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I sighed and pushed my fork through the mounds of food on my plate. It wasn’t talked about much, but I had pieced together how my grandfather had been forced to resort to petty crime to resolve some of his gambling debt. Our house had only been saved from foreclosure when Bubbe collected his life insurance. No one ever said it directly, but it wasn’t one hundred percent clear that his death by drowning in the East River wasn’t an accident, although I wasn’t totally sure if that meant suicide or something more sinister.
As I grew older, it became evident that a weakness for gambling ran in the family. The last time my dad had gotten into trouble, it had cost Dad a few black eyes and me about fifty thousand dollars out of my trust fund to pay off Victor Messina and finance Dad’s three-month stint in a rehabilitation center. And now it appeared we were facing that road again. Damn.
“I’ll talk to him,” I said quietly.
Bubbe nodded as Dad strode back in. He sat down to his food and eyed us curiously.
“Everything all right in here?” he asked. “You’re too quiet.”
“I’m just trying to get your daughter to eat,” Bubbe said without looking up from her food.
“Bubbe, I’m not this hungry. Really.”
“You need to eat.” She pushed my plate toward me. “Especially if you’re going to impress that young man again.”
Dad simply drank coffee while avoiding my accusing gaze.
“He told me everything, Skylar.” Bubbe patted my hand. “What a doll, escorting you home like that. A real gentleman.”
“I can’t believe you told,” I grumbled at Dad, who shrugged and mouthed “Sorry” before taking a large bite of eggs.
A bike messenger had delivered a first-class ticket yesterday morning while I was out for a jog, providing the means to get back to Boston by train instead of bus. It was no mystery who had sent it, and Dad clearly spilled the beans.
“I even looked him up on the online,” she informed me proudly.
I pressed my mouth into a firm line at her misspeak; trying to correct Bubbe on technological jargon was like trying to teach a cat to ride a bike.
“Goyish, of course,” she continued, “with that blond hair and those blue eyes, but still, very handsome. He looksverynice.”
“Would nice mean rich?” I asked slyly, acting as though I was about to poke her with my fork.
She batted it away. “Eat,” she ordered again with an imperious point of her finger. “And, Skylar, it’s not a bad thing that a man has enough to take care of his family. You would have nothing to worry about; you wouldn’t even have to work.”
“Bubbe, I’m not going to law school to become a housewife.”
“And is that the worst thing in the world?” she asked. “To take care of your home and family?”
“Ma,” my dad said with the rare sharp tone that generally stopped Bubbe’s tirades. “Stop. We should be proud of Skylar that she’s doing so much with her life. She don’t need a man to take care of her; she can do it herself.” He squeezed my shoulder. “I’m proud of you, Pips.”
I quickly took a few bites to appease my demanding grandmother while the conversation turned to the latest gossip at temple. Thoughts of impending classes loomed in my mind, as did the conversation I’d have to have with my father before my train.
“I need to finish getting ready. I promise, Bubbe, I’m stuffed.” I gave her a peck on the cheek after I stood. “But I couldn’t eat as much of anyone else’s cooking, I swear. Pack me some more for the train, all right?”
* * *
My bedroom doorcreaked open just as I finished stripping the sheets off my bed. I threw the last pillowcase into the pile by my desk as Dad appeared in the doorway.
“Hey, Pop.”
I sat on the naked mattress. Dad took a seat next to me.
“You know,” he said as he looked around, “I never come up here anymore. I forget how it looks sometimes.”
It was an attic room that had never been finished, with one of the walls still gaping with exposed studs and a few electrical wires. The others had been drywalled but never sanded, and one of Bubbe’s old oriental rugs covered the thick subfloor that had never been carpeted. Over the years, I had hung faded tapestries over the insulation and Christmas lights from the rafters, along with a few concert posters and some street art on the other walls. I had moved up there when I was just a kid, preferring the space and quiet of the attic to the tiny room wedged between Dad’s and my grandmother’s. It wasn’t posh by any means, but it had always been mine.
“Does it look different?” I asked.
“No. It’s just strange to think I could forget what my kid’s room looks like.” Dad shrugged. “I guess I just miss you, kid.”
