*
After we sat down at a slightly wobbly table in the far corner, and after I got up and took Ethan to the bathroom, then sat back down, then got back up to take him to the bathroom again; and after Mindy realized she left her phone in her room and she stood up, and after Mary said, “Sit down, you don’t need your phone, can’t you live without your phone for an hour”; and after Mindy sat down, picked up her menu, and issued a massively aggrieved sigh; and after Mary, trying to ignore sighing Mindy, said there was a draft coming from somewhere; and after Mindy said, “What’s with you and drafts; I don’t even know what a draft is,” using quote marks with her fingers when she said the word draft; and after Karen left to go to the bathroom for a ridiculously long time, then came back and said she was going up to her room and wasn’t coming back; and after Mary said, “Sit down, we have to talk,” and Karen asked about what and Mindy said, “What do you think, climate change?”; and after Karen sat down, picked up her menu, and issued a massively, aggrieved sigh; and after the waitress told me they didn’t carry Jim Beam; and after Mindy said, “Oh boy, Dad, are you going to get the shakes now or what”; and after I smirked and said, “Yeah, right, the shakes,” then secretly began to worry about getting the shakes, I picked up my glass of ice water and made a kind of toast.
“I want to thank everyone for coming along on this vaca—trip,” I said.
“We’re not doing this for you,” Karen said.
“Thank you anyway.”
Karen leaned across the table and spoke hotly. “We don’t agree with what you’re doing. We think it’s wrong.”
I took a deep swallow of my water. I can handle this, I told myself. “I’m sorry you feel that way…,” I began. “I know it’s going to be hard, but it’s the right thing to do.”
“The right thing for you, maybe,” Karen said.
“No. It’s the right thing for Ethan. He’s going to be very happy there. They have a—”
Karen cut me off. “Tell him what you think, Mindy.”
Mindy finished draining her glass of water. “I don’t know, Dad. I mean, you could have waited a few more years. He’s only nineteen.”
I switched on my teacher’s voice, a combination of patience and condescension. “Unfortunately, Mindy, there’s never a perfect time to do this.”
“I can’t imagine a worse time though.”
This came from Mary, and it surprised me. Based on our talk at the bar, and the fact she was even in Myrtle Beach with me, I assumed she had moved over to my side.
“Where. Pickle. Be?”
“Pickles are coming,” I said. “Do you have to go to the bathroom?”
“You already took him twice,” Karen said.“Don’t run off.”
I smiled. “Who’s running off?”
“Let me save everyone a shitload of time,” Mindy said. “We don’t want you do take him there. That’s it in a nutshell, Dad.”
“Okay, now I’m confused. I thought you said you were willing to come up and look at the place.”
“We never said that,” Karen said.
This was a bit of head-scratching, so I actually scratched my head. “Well,” I said, “I think the fact that you’re here, on the road with me, sitting here at this restaurant, at this hotel, implies that. You’ve also been driving all day in case you’ve forgotten that. I thought we agreed we would all go up there together and then make the final decision.”
“We changed our minds,” Karen said. “There’s no point in driving all the way up there. It’s going to take forever. So let’s just save the time and head home. If anything, he should be at a place in Chicago.”
I issued what would be my last smile of the evening. “First of all, in case you’ve forgotten, neither of you lives in Chicago anymore, so I don’t know why that matters.” I turned to Mary. “Isn’t that right?”
“She has a valid point, John. Chicago is our home. I don’t think we’ve exhausted all the possibilities.”
I could feel my smile retracting. “There’s nothing available in Chicago, you know that. We’ve been through this. And I thought you agreed to come up there with me and take another look. I don’t understand. A minute ago you were asking what the place cost. I’m sorry, but this is all very confusing.”
“Mom,” Karen said.
Mary straightened her silverware, briefly touched her throat. “You just sprang this on me, us. And I think the girls have good points. Maine is too far. We don’t need to drag him up there if we’re just going to say no.”
“Wow, the girls really got to you, didn’t they?”
“No one got to me,” Mary said.
“It’s pretty obvious what you’re doing.” This from Karen.