Half an hour, I thought. This dinner will be over in half an hour.
When Chuck walked past me, I looked over at the exact right time to see the bulge in his pocket. I waited for that sinking feeling. Chuck was putting fifths of vodka in his pockets again and he was so dumb to think I wouldn’t notice, just like he was so dumb to think I wouldn’t know the ball was a fake.
“You want more pasta, Dad?” Cam asked.
“Thanks, son,” Chuck said in his Ward Cleaver way.
“So Chucky. I mean Chuck, sorry,” Ana said. “How was your day today, Chuck?”
Obviously, she wanted him to tell the story of finding a snake in his car.
But Chuck was unwilling to go there. “Great pasta,” he said. I had to give him kudos for that, even if he did have vodka in his pocket.
“I’m glad you’re enjoying it,” Ana said. “We made it with a lot of love.” She picked a noodle from the heap with her fingers and slurped it up and smiled. “So you had a good day, Chuck?”
Twenty-five minutes. No, twenty. In twenty minutes, this dinner will be over.
Quickly—he was losing patience—Chuck said, “It was fine, thanks.”
“We were just talking about college,” Ana informed him. “I was telling all four of these boys they need to go to college.” She pounded the table once and laughed.
“Absolutely,” Chuck agreed.
Jed whispered something to Liko.
“No whispering at the dinner table,” I said.
Liko’s eyes got big. His mouth turned into an O. “Dude,” he said to Ana, “you were a stripper?”
Chuck furrowed his brow. He couldn’t tell if this was true or not.
“Does that intimidate you, Liko?” Ana asked him. Her eyes were dark and spinning, and she was sweeping her pointer finger through the candle flame now, back and forth and back and forth.
“Hell no, it doesn’t intimidate me,” Liko said, sitting up straighter.
“She made six grand in one night,” Jed blurted out.
“Daaaaayum,” Liko said.
Tom nodded like this information was very interesting. Cam shifted in his chair. Jed’s face flushed.
Chuck said, “I’m going to the bathroom,” not very cheerily, and left the table again.
When I realized I’d been twirling the same bite of pasta for way too long—I’d only taken one bite this whole time—I gave up and put the fork down.
Ana said, “I used to dance for guys like you, Liko. I know guys like you like I know the back of my hand.” She trailed the back of her hand through the flame.
“What do you mean, guys like me?” Liko’s joker smile. He was acting like he didn’t care what she thought of him but of course he did. He wanted to know what kind of guy she thought he was.
“Small guys,” Ana said, “with big trucks.”
“That’s right I got a big truck,” Liko said, and held his hand up for a high five from Jed, who slapped it. “Got the big-ass wheels.”
The toilet flushing, Chuck coming down the hall, and then there he was, looking like he’d been smacked. The bottle was gone from his pocket. He must have stowed it behind the toilet. Or drunk the whole thing.
“What kind of car do you drive?” Liko asked Ana, proud that he had finally come up with a retort.
“Jeep Wrangler,” she said. “Purple. It’s in the driveway.”
“Oh yeah, I saw that thaaaang,” Liko said.
“Nice car,” Tom said, maybe because he hadn’t spoken in a while and felt that when invited to dinner, you should say things every so often.
“Thank you, Tom,” Ana said effusively, and Tom smiled, which wiped the worry off Cam’s face.
“Hondas are the best car,” Chuck said to no one or everyone. “They last forever.”
Ana grabbed a candle and held it to her face. “The eternal Honda,” she said in a spooky voice.
Liko looked at her. “You’re kinda batshit, yeah?”
“Meeee?” Ana said, placing a hand on her heart.
“Yeah girl, you,” Liko said. That joker smile and the tomato fragment lodged between his two front teeth.
“Moi?” Ana dramatized a look of disbelief. “A girl?”
“Yeah, girl, you girl.” Liko pointed at her with both hands.
“Boys,” Chuck said, “should we talk about H-two-oh polo?”
Oh, Chuck. He was trying to do things right, and he was doing them so wrong.
“No, Dad, let’s not,” Jed said, rolling his eyes for Liko.
“No? Come on, boys!” Chuck put his hands on Liko and Tom’s shoulders and shook them a little. Tom took it because he was polite and Liko put his hand on Chuck’s shoulder and shook back hard enough for Chuck to say, “Whoa there, Nelly.”
The song ended, and in the silence, we all heard Cam whisper to Tom, “Are you okay?”
Fine, Tom mouthed, embarrassed because we were all looking at him.
“Are you okaaaaay, sweetie pooooo?” Liko said in a baby voice.
“Shut up, dude,” Cam said, and rubbed the sweat from his temples.
Liko’s head danced in a zigzag don’t-mess-with-me pattern. “Why should I shut up?” With every word, his body moved into a slightly different position.
Tom looked at his lap. Ana leaned forward and touched the tips of her fingers together and glared at Liko. My neck was prickling. I set my water glass down. No one spoke.
Until Liko said, “You guys are obviously boyfriend boyfriend. You should just tell everyone.” And then he was laughing hard and slapping his belly.
The kinder part of me could tell how uncomfortable he was, and the Mom part of me wanted to attack this horrible child, whose obvious destiny was to become a convicted felon.
Cam crossed his arms over his chest to make himself smaller. Tom was still looking at his lap.
“Okay,” I said sternly. But I didn’t know what else to say. Not my proudest moment.
Chuck was looking at Tom and at Cam and at Tom and at Cam, and when they didn’t defend themselves, he brought his hands to his cheeks slowly and then he was muttering something under his breath.
“Chuck,” I said, trying to snap him out of it.
“Oh shit, you didn’t know that?” Liko widened his eyes.
A bead of sweat rolled from Jed’s hairline down to his nose.
Ana pressed her palms together, staring straight at Liko.
My neck was on fire.
Gently, Tom put his hand on Cam’s shoulder.
“You,” Ana said to Liko, “are going to get what you deserve.”
“You’re batshit, lady,” Liko said and wagged his finger, but he was obviously a little scared.
“Cam, why don’t you and Tom go outside?” Ana said, which was exactly the right thing to say, and why hadn’t I said it first?
Cam nodded. He stood. Tom stood. They walked toward the door. It was silent except for Bob Marley. The happy beating drums of reggae music—it was just so absolutely wrong right now.
For a few beats, no one moved. And then Chuck squeaked his chair back and followed them out of the house. To tell Cam that he loved him, I hoped.
Liko relaxed into the chair and checked his phone. Ana was still boring a hole into his head with her eyes.
“Liko,” I said.
He didn’t answer. From his phone, an arcade noise. Like a pinball machine.
“Liko,” Ana said.
Liko didn’t look up. He flicked us off.
“Dude,” Jed said, “that’s my mom.”