“Thirteen,” he mumbles.
“Your mom, is she…”
He shrugs. “She’s at home.”
“She know this happened?” I ask.
He stops sniffling long enough to let out a long, shuddery exhale and I know, without hearing the answer, what he’s going to say.
“I tried, you know? I tried. He’s always hitting her and I tried to make him stop, but I’m just too…fucking…weak.” Every word’s punctuated by a sob and that piece of me, deep inside, that’s been hiding for all these years wakes up andfeels.
It’s unbearable, I remember, to let yourself feel. To know that you aren’t loved the way you’re meant to be and you’re not good enough, not nearly strong enough to save the people who matter.
It takes a few seconds of silence for me to realize that Kit’s attention’s on me again, intense, despite her eyes’ focus on the road.
Fabric rustles and something touches me. Her hand. On mine.
I stare at it for a few seconds before returning her squeeze.
Then she holds me. Just like that. Not too tight or loose. I hold her back. The same way. No pressure. No expectations.
Just accepting comfort when I hardly remember what that feels like.
It’s the easiest thing I’ve ever done.
Kit
“My dad died when I was a little older than Travis,” Jake tells me like he’s reciting the day’s specials.
The too-bright fluorescents of the ER waiting room bathe us both in a sickly light that would be unflattering at the best of times. After an almost sleepless night, Jake’s face looks gaunt, his ink stark. I’m pretty sure I look like refried ghoul.
I watch him, still, silent.
“Couple years later, my mom got remarried to anupstanding citizen. Rich guy. Family money. Political connections.” He’s facing forward, staring straight ahead, at nothing but an empty row of molded plastic chairs. “Still lives around here. Last I heard he had a mansion in Remington with his…third wife? Fourth? Mom loved Dad. But, you know, the diner, always working…it was tough. Real tough. When he got sick and passed, she sold it. For a while, we were good. Mom had these friends and used to go out and do things she never got to do when the diner owned her life. But then she methim.” A slow, measuredinhalation lifts his chest. He doesn’t otherwise move from that straight-backed position. “Thomas A. Bentley. Tommy to his friends.” He smirks. “The third.”
I give him a low scoffing sound, just so he knows I’m listening. To our right, the ER doors swoosh open and a young couple comes in with a crying baby. My belly clenches.
When my attention returns to Jake, he continues. “I never liked Tommy. Didn’t trust him. He took us out to eat this one time, before they were married. Steak house up on the highway.”
I know the one he means. It’s still there. Still full of stodgy old, red-nosed white men leering at waitresses in short skirts. There’s a piano and a guy who sings jazz standards every weekend. Their steaks are huge and expensive and come alone on the plate. Sides of potatoes and mushrooms and green beans are extra. Clark’s parents took us there when he got his PhD. In a way, I guess I wanted Parlor to be a kind of antidote to restaurants like that. A place that feels rich and lush, but where the food’s simple, and full of flavor, the service friendly and above all, human. Everyone is welcome. Not just straight, rich white men.
“Mom went to the bathroom and I watched him watch the waitresses like they were as available for consumption as the steak on his plate. A woman walked by and he called her over and held out a folded bill. Maybe ten bucks. When she reached for it, he pulled it back, teased her a couple times like that. She was…not happy. After she took off, having well earned that cash, he turned to me with a wink and said ‘Tips for tits.’”
“Oh my God.”
“Yeah.” He looks at me and then faces forward again. Behind us, the baby’s still crying, the family talking in hushed tones while they wait for the check-in person to call them. “Dad always said you could see right into a person’s soul by the way they treat waitstaff, cashiers, cleaners, folks in the service industry.”
I nod. It’s true. It’s absolutely true. You know what kind of person you’re dealing with from that very first interaction.
He sighs. “They got married.” He pauses. “I…I think she needed or wanted the security. I think she felt like she…deserved the money, the privilege, after doing the diner thing for so long? Supporting my dad, not having something of her own? I don’t know. She was still young. Maybe she had stars in her eyes. I, on the other hand, did not. So…when he started…hitting her…” I hold in a gasp. “Can’t say I was all that surprised.”
“I’m so sorry, Jake.”
He shakes his head. Doesn’t want my apologies or commiseration. Doesn’t want a damn thing. This is why he’s like he is. Self-sufficient, contained, and alone. “After the fact, I figured out that he’d probably been doing it for a while. We were living in this fucked-up house, just huge, with a woman who came in to cook and a cleaner and these guys who mowedconstantly. I avoided that asshole, kind of did my own thing. Barely saw Mom at that point.”
The way he’s telling this story, in something close to a monotone, his back ramrod straight, his face utterly expressionless, tells me it’s coming. The thing, the big, big thing that made this man into who he is today. He was a kid, I keep thinking. He was just like Travis, who’s back there, getting checked out by doctors and interviewed by social workers.
He was a kid.
