Deliberately keeping my tone light, I said, “You have no idea how much I appreciate Taryn’s friendship and your mom’s cooking.”
Fortunately for me, I’d managed to stick my feet under Mrs.Hamilton’s table once or twice a week starting October of my senior year of high school. Making sure I partnered up with Taryn for science projects had ensured those invitations. After I graduated, whenever I was home on leave even when Taryn was away at college—I had a standing invite to dinner. Hanging out at the Hamiltons’ only emphasized what I’d missed growing up in a military family without a home base. Growing up without a mom to make a home wherever we landed.
Because of how I zeroed in on her whenever we were together, I caught the way Taryn stiffened at my words. Before I could fully process that stiffening, she stood and reached a hand across the table for Tina’s plate, stacking it on top of hers.
“Are you finished, Dad?”
With a nod, he passed her his plate.
“Danny?”
I sopped up the last bite of saucy enchilada then handed her my plate as I enjoyed that last taste.
“Mom?”
“Thanks, sweetie.” Though Mrs.Hamilton passed Taryn her plate, she, too, stood from the table. “Excuse me while I warm up the hot fudge sauce... and one or two other things I found to complement sopapillas.” Her sly smile put all of us on the edge of our seats in anticipation of dessert.
Though I wanted to catch the low conversation coming from the kitchen, Mr.Hamilton had other ideas.
“Besides football, what do you plan to study at MSC?” he asked with a grin.
“Girls.” Tina stretched the word out in a silly singsong voice.
Baring my teeth at her, I said, “Engineering.” With a shrug, I added, “I’ve always liked taking things apart to see how they work, so I thought it might be fun to be on the creating end of that.”
Resting his forearms on the table, Taryn’s dad asked, “Any particular discipline catching your eye?”
“Civil or mechanical—something that involves problem-solving for construction.”
He sat back in his chair with a grin. “Good man. The civil engineers we’ve been working with to build the new city loop are top-notch. Whenever one of us on the road team points out a potential problem with their design, they listen. I appreciate working with them.”
The expression accompanying his words implied he expected I’d be like those “top-notch” guys working with him and the rest of his crew in the city road department. I had to admit having the professional respect of someone like Mr.Hamilton would mean the world. Especially since the captain’s deliberate absence on my return home from the service had blared the message that I’d lost his.
Right as thoughts of my dad and his piss-poor acceptance ofmyplans formylife threatened to sour my mood, Mrs.Hamilton walked back into the dining room carrying a platter mounded with powdered-sugar-covered confections I knew from experience would melt in my mouth. Behind her Taryn carried another platter with a series of small bowls on it. The aroma of deep-fried sugary dough wafted through the dining room to make my mouth water.
Rubbing his hands together, Mr.Hamilton said with undisguised delight, “What have we here?”
“Hot fudge, hot caramel, hot butterscotch, and raspberry,” Mrs.Hamilton said as she set four small bowls of dipping sauces on the table before heading back into the kitchen. A second later, she returned with a stack of dessert plates.
A memory of Taryn gently educating me about dessert plates during one of my first dinners at the Hamiltons’ unexpectedly floated up. In the captain’s house we had four plates: two for each of us, and all of them the same size. The distinction was dirty or clean. Dessert was for softies—or people who couldn’t see how a shot of whiskey, neat, took care of any cravings for sweets at the end of a meal.
As usual, Tina pounced on the sauces, spooning about half the hot fudge onto her plate before sliding the dipping sauces down the table toward her dad.
Mrs.H. shot her a glare. “Tina—”
“What?” Tina feigned innocence with her big-eyed expression as she snagged the tongs and loaded three hot sopapillas onto her plate. “You brought out four dipping sauces, practically giving each of us our own sauce.”
A long, exasperated sigh and a shake of her head met Mrs.H.’s youngest daughter’s comment. “That is not what I did, as you very well know.” With another long stare at the opposite end of the table, she said, “I thought the people in this house were raised with manners.”
Mr.H. glanced up mid-reach for the tray of sauces and blinked hard at his wife. Then he let go a chuckle. “Ginny, Danny isn’t a guest.” He grinned. “He’s practically family.”
When she didn’t relent, he shook his head at her and slid the tray of sauces in my direction.
Beside me Taryn remained unnaturally quiet. Did she not want her family to think of me as part of them? Fisting my hand beneath the table, I answered my own question.Of course you’re not part of her family. You saw to that, dumbass.
Nodding to the dessert, I said, “Please. Help yourself.” Smirking across the table at Tina, I added, “If there’s not enough hot fudge left, I know distraction techniques.”
“As if.” She wrinkled her nose at me and swirled sopapilla through a lake of hot fudge on her plate. When a drop of sauce escaped on the way to her mouth and landed in her lap, she made a ceremony of lifting her napkin to her lips to lick off what she could.
