I leave it exactly as it is.
Because some things don’t need fixing.
EIGHTEEN
PAUL
Dad is on the dock at seven-fifteen with a bag of tomatoes and a level of confidence that concerns me.
He’s wearing a clean shirt. A clean, ironed shirt. My father has not ironed a shirt since Mom’s funeral, and even then I’m pretty sure Justin did it for him. But here he is, standing at the end of the dock like a man with a mission, holding tomatoes from his garden in a brown paper bag and wearing a shirt that has actual creases in the sleeves.
“Morning,” he says.
“Whose funeral?”
“What?”
“The shirt. You ironed it.”
“A man can take pride in his appearance.”
“You haven’t taken pride in your appearance since 2014. What’s happening?”
He adjusts the bag of tomatoes the way someone adjusts a bouquet of roses. “Vivian mentioned she’s coming by to see the yacht this morning. I thought I’d bring her some things from the garden.”
“So the tomatoes are for Vivian.”
“They’re good tomatoes.”
“Dad. It’s seven-fifteen in the morning. You’re wearing a pressed shirt and carrying produce like a courting ritual.”
“I’m being neighborly.”
“You’re being something.”
He gives me the look—the one that saysI am your father and you will stop talking now.I stop talking. Not because of the look. Because I want to see how this plays out.
Grandma Hensley arrives at eight in a golf cart she definitely doesn’t have a license for. She’s wearing a floral blouse and her good sun hat—the one that costs sixty dollars and deserves the exposure, according to her—and she’s brought a Tupperware container of something that smells like cinnamon.
“Harold.” She says his name like she’s confirming an appointment.
“Vivian.” He holds out the bag. “Tomatoes. Cherokee Purples. Best ones of the season.”
She looks in the bag. Looks at him. Looks at the tomatoes again, like she’s evaluating both the produce and the man presenting it.
“These are acceptable,” she says.
Dad beams. Dad never beams. My father’s emotional range typically spans from content to mildly amused, with occasional detours into stubborn. But right now, standing on the dock with a bag of accepted tomatoes, the man is beaming.
“I brought you banana bread,” Grandma Hensley says, handing over the Tupperware with the same energy a diplomat uses to exchange treaty documents. “Don’t read into it. The recipe yields two loaves and I only need one.”
“You’ve been making that recipe for forty years and you’ve never once had a spare loaf.”
“Well, today I did.”
“Because I was coming?”
“Because flour was on sale. You are not the center of my baking decisions, Harold Spencer.”
