up a pepper and expertly deseed it as I tell him, “Jed taught me.”
He smiles. “That explains it.”
“He needed to if I wanted to pick up shifts at Hook & Ladder during the summer.”
“Hold on,” Jennings interrupts me. “You said you teach high school, right?”
“Yes,” I reaffirm. I pull another pepper toward me, but Jennings’s hand lands on mine just as I start to chop. “That was stupid! I could have chopped your finger off!”
“Screw that, Kara,” he says, making me want to show him the damage a chef’s knife can really do. “Why were you working shifts at Jed’s bar?” he asks low, menacingly.
I answer unthinkingly. “Why, to make more money to put towards Kevin’s college…Jennings!” Without warning, the knife is yanked from my hand and is skating across the cutting board. I’m being pulled into Jennings’s arms, pressed tightly into his chest where I don’t just smell his cologne, I’m devouring it. My “What is your problem?” is muffled against his sweatshirt.
He doesn’t answer me anyway. Instead, he rocks me back and forth for long minutes before letting me go.
I feel the loss of his warm body against mine, but it’s the look of painful agony on his face that has me whispering, “What’s wrong?”
Trailing a finger down my face, his voice is so low, I can barely hear it when he says, “Everything,” before he turns and calls out to Kevin, “So, what are we watching?”
Frozen, I stand there until the timer startles me. What was that all about? Having two hungry guys to feed, I shake myself out of my head and lift the nachos out of the oven.
Moving the large pan to the counter, I smile to myself as I hear Kevin and Jennings debating back and forth about which is better, Jimmy Fallon and the Roots singing along with classroom instruments or James Corden’s carpool karaoke.
I add my own two cents when I call over, “Jimmy Fallon singing ‘I Want It That Way’ is embedded in my heart.”
Father and son exchange a long look before bursting out into laughter at my expense. I just shrug before sprinkling on the final peppers onto the mounding tower. Grabbing a stack of plates, I make my way over to the television. But I freeze when my son haughtily informs his father, “Unless you like classic rock, we can’t be friends.”
Because it’s not the teasing I care about at all. That’s something Dean used to say to Kevin when he was little over and over as he schooled him on the Stones, CCR, and Lynyrd Skynyrd. “Can’t live in Jacksonville and not know our native sons by heart,” he’d tease my son with as he would cut his generic chicken patty with a dollar-store cookie cutter to make it look fancy.
I hold my breath, waiting to see what happens next.
“Who taught you that?” Jennings laughs. “Your mother and Maris used to listen to garbage. In fact, she kinda just confirmed she still did.”
I stick my tongue out at Jennings as a reply but angle my head toward Kevin.
His face twists for a moment before he blurts out, “Uncle Dean. I remember he used to play all this great music when he’d pick me up from daycare.”
“He sounds like someone I would have enjoyed getting to know,” Jennings replies evenly, his tone not betraying anything beyond interest. I want to sag in relief, but that would be too obvious to our son. With a quick glance in my direction, he murmurs, “I wish I had the chance.”
My son nods. “I’m certain you would have. He was great.” Then his voice takes on a hesitancy. I wouldn’t be the mother I am if I didn’t pray with every fiber of my being my son would open up to someone, anyone. Even if that’s his father he’s known about a month. So, I hold my breath as Kevin asks, “Maybe I could tell you about him sometime?”
Jennings leans over to snatch the remote up from the coffee table. Flicking the television to Off, he casually says, “What’s wrong with now? The movie can wait.”
And Kevin starts to open up. I don’t know if it’s because Jennings has no preconceived notions about Dean or because he wants his father to understand him better, but my son finally releases some of the pressure that’s been built up inside of him since Dean and Jed died.
Shifting so I’m out of Kevin’s line of sight, I catch Jennings’s eye and mouth, “Thank you.”