was perfectly content living in my grandmother’s old house with squeaky floorboards, water-stained ceilings, and decades-old wallpaper on every square inch in sight.
My dad took his place at the head of the table. To be honest, the table was pretty much square, so there was no geometric head. But it seemed to make him happy to think there was one, so we all played along and made him feel important. He stacked four pancakes on his plate, and Mom poured so much chocolate syrup over them that I half expected them to float off the edge of the plate and onto the floor. Which might have caused the outburst we all feared. So I sat in front of my own melted-cream-saturated pancakes and willed his to stay in place. Please, God, let them not make like a barge and flow downstream.
“Thermos, Shelby,” he said. Which was my dad’s way of saying, “May I please have the thermos of coffee, my beautiful daughter?” I liked his voice better in my head. I watched him spoon enough sugar into his coffee that it should have permanently sweetened his countenance, but life wasn’t fair that way. After all, this man who was devouring four pancakes and already eyeing the ones coming off the griddle, this man who could order two McDonald’s meals without blinking, this man to whom oversweetening was a culinary habit, not a character trait, this very same man was so thin that seeing him without a shirt on made me want to feed him butter. I, on the other hand, seemed to be wearing my butter—mostly around my hips and chest. And at the ripe old age of thirteen, it felt not only ugly, but icky in a can’t-I-just-be-a-skinny-man kind of way.
“Got practice before the game?” he asked Trey. There was a game that afternoon, and Trey’s team was so riddled with incompetent newcomers to the sport that they often resorted to pregame scrimmages to try to get their act together.
Trey nodded yes. Then he went back to eating.
It had become something of a hobby trying to imagine the subtext of conversations that happened on my dad’s happy days. Under normal circumstances, there would have been no subtext needed. He would have hit us right between the eyes with his personal brand of overt insult and not-so-subtle disdain. But on his happy days?
“They’re lucky to have you,” he said. Translation: Anyone says anything bad about my son and I’ll have their head. Insulting you is my job.
“Thanks, Dad.” Translation: I hate it when you’re happy—makes me squeamish. Trey gulped some orange juice and caught my eye-rolling. His eyes crinkled. I liked making him smile.
“Cleats still feeling okay?” Translation: You should be kissing my feet for spending so much money on your cleats, young man. I’m a wonderful dad.
“Yup. Fine.” Translation: I’d rather kiss Sonya Roland than say thanks to you, and she’s got zits and braces.
“Well, try to score one for the old man.” Translation: I’ve got a belt and I’m not afraid to use it. You stink, you sting. That’s the rule.
“Sure, Dad.” Translation: Like I’m ever going to put any effort into making you happy, you pompous bag of bones.
I wanted to play too. “It’s too bad you hurt your ankle skateboarding,” I said. “Maybe you’ll be able to play anyway, though.” Translation: Let’s see if we can make Dad crazy by letting him think you might not get to play.
“What’s wrong with your ankle?” He put his fork down and narrowed his eyes. Translation: How stupid have you been, Son?
“It’s fine, Dad.” Translation: Please don’t get mad, please don’t get mad, please don’t get mad. Trey sent me an are-you-nuts? glare and swallowed a too-large bite of pancake.
“What’s with the ankle, Son?” The distant sound of thunder was in his voice.
“Nothing,” Trey answered, an almost imperceptible tremor weakening his words. I knew it meant fear, but to my dad, it sounded like guilt.
He leaned across the kitchen table, the napkin he’d stuck in his collar brushing the chocolate syrup on his plate. “What—did—you—do?” Strange that a minute before his face had looked clean-shaven. Now, with the blotchy red creeping up from his collar and the dirtiness of his scorn flaking out from his eyes, it looked like a kind of threatening stubble was growing out of his skin.
Trey saw it too. “I didn’t . . .”
My dad pushed away from the table with so much force that a couple of plates went flying and the milk container