Paullina Simons - Lone Star

“Jimmy, don’t be bad.”

More rustling. Even some grunting.

“Jimmy, come on …”

Sweet God. Chloe couldn’t even eavesdrop on her parents’ conversation about her without it becoming a study in her own mortification.

“But seriously,” her father said. The cooing had stopped, thank God. “We can’t let her go.”

“I agree. How do we stop her?”

“We’ll just tell her she can’t go.”

“I look forward to our spicy pork chops tonight over which you tell her.”

“I’ve never liked that Hannah. Why couldn’t that no-good father of hers have gotten custody instead?”

“I think the answer is built into your very question.”

“That Terri is a piece of work. Doesn’t she know what’s going on with her own kids? I hear Jason is always in trouble up in Portland. By the way, the raccoons got to her garbage again.”

“I saw. I smelled.”

“Did you talk to her about cleaning it up? Or am I going to have to?”

“She told me this morning the animals have to eat, too.”

“I’m going to shoot them next time I hear them near her cans. They’re a rabid nuisance.”

“Jimmy, carry the potatoes. She better come home soon. Dinner is ready.”

“Should I go get her? Did you drive her?”

“No, I didn’t drive her to Hannah’s house. It’s forty yards away.”

There was silence. “I didn’t drive her, Jimmy. She’s fine. She’s next door.” Chloe heard the pot being placed on the table.

“So what are we going to do?”

“Talk some sense into her. She listens to you . You’re her father.”

“If she listened to me, she’d never ask for something so stupid.”

“It’s not stupid, Jimmy, it’s just kids being kids.”

“I never did nothing like that.”

“Okay. We did some stuff too.”

“Not like that.”

“Worse. We were young, too.”

“Hmm.”

“You remember Pembina? The paleo flood in the Red River in ’77? All right, Mr. Comedian. I know you remember. We were so bad. We didn’t need to go to Barcelona.”

“We never needed to go anywhere, sweet potato.”

“Get the drinks. I’ll go get her.”

Pembina was where Lang was from. Pembina, North Dakota, less than two miles south of the Canadian border. The Red River is slow and small. It doesn’t have the energy to cut a gorge. It meanders through the silty bottomlands. Yet every few years it floods catastrophically through the marsh at its delta. It causes immense destruction. In 1977, the river flooded, and the National Guard was called in to help the locals cope. Jimmy Devine, National Guard, met Lang Thia, whose father was a prominent local businessman who made hearing aids.

Her mother didn’t need a hearing aid. She came to the window near which Chloe was hiding and said into the screen, “Chloe, come to the table. Dinner is served.”

With a great sigh, Chloe peeled away from the wood shingles and walked, head hung, to the door.

LANG TURNED ON THE LIGHT ABOVE THE SMALL RECTANGULAR table. They sat silently, their hands folded. They blessed their food. Jimmy said amen. Chloe asked him to pass the potatoes. Jimmy poured Lang a jasmine ice tea. Lang poured Jimmy a beer. They cut into their pork chops. The silence lasted two or three minutes. Jimmy had to get some strength before he began, though he looked pretty strong already. He was a big Irish guy, blond-haired once, now gray, blue-eyed, direct, no nonsense. He was funny, he was easy, but he also had a temper, and he never forgot anything, neither a favor nor a slight. It was almost his undoing, the merciless blade of his memory. Sometimes he had to dull it with whiskey. Sometimes he had to dull many things with whiskey. Tonight Lang eased him into Chloe’s summer plans by letting him eat for a few minutes in peace while she grilled Chloe on irrelevant matters.

“Did you do your homework?”

“I didn’t have any. It’s senior year, Mom. No one gives homework anymore.”

“Then what do they give you a fourth quarter grade for?”

“Showing up mostly.”

“So no tests, no quizzes, no overdue projects, no missing labs, no oral presentations, no incomplete class assignments?”

“Not to my knowledge, no.”

“Enough nonsense,” said Jimmy, having fortified himself on meat. “What’s this your mother tells me about Barcelona?”

Her father looked straight at her, and Chloe had no choice but to stare back. “Did my mother tell you that she wants me to enter into a story contest? Ten thousand dollar prize.”

“She mentioned something about that, yes. I don’t see how the two are related.”

“I have nothing to write about.”

“Come to work with me for a day or two. You’ll get three books out of it.” Jimmy Devine was the Fryeburg chief of police, like his father and grandfather before him. Fryeburg, Maine. Pop. 3500. Settled in 1763 by General Joseph Frye and incorporated in 1777, exactly two hundred years before the bad luck of the paleo floods two thousand miles away, and now Chloe sat impaled on the stake of parental disapproval.

“Really,” she said, irritated. “Books on what, breaking up domestic arguments and littering?”

“Nice. So now even my work, not just your mother’s, is denigrated?”

Chloe regrouped. “I’m not denigrating, Dad. But our hearts are set on Spain. Hannah and I have been talking about it for years.”

“You told your mother you thought of going just today. So which is it? An impulse or a lifelong dream?”

Chloe didn’t reply. They were denigrating her !

“How in the world can Hannah afford Barcelona?” Jimmy asked. “Her mother is at the bank every other day asking for an overdraft increase. And your friend, who abandoned you to do Meals on Wheels by yourself on Saturdays because she claims she has a job, often skips out on the one lousy four-hour shift she has at China Chef. So where’s her half of the money going to come from?”

Chloe hated that her dad knew everything about everybody’s business. It was terrifying. She stopped eating and stared at her father, the last bite of pork chop lodged in her dry throat. Did he know why Hannah was skipping out on China Chef? Oh God, please, no. A demoralized Chloe couldn’t withstand even two minutes of modest interrogation.

“Why do you want to go so much? Tell your mother and me.”

Chloe said nothing. Her entrails in knots, she felt like a scoundrel.

“Is it because we went without you that time to Kilkenny?” Jimmy said. “You’re lucky you didn’t go. Funerals are not for kids.”

And just like that the three of them were swallowed up by silent oceans. Jimmy awkwardly picked up his fork only to drop it. Lang nursed her jasmine tea. Sickened by the ghastly turn of the already difficult conversation, Chloe tried to right the course.

“It’s not about that. It’s not about funerals,” Chloe said. “It’s not about anything. It’s just awesome Spain. Why do you think I’ve been taking Spanish these last six years? I’m the only senior still taking a language. That’s why. Dad, I’m not a child anymore.”

“If you’re such an adult,” said Jimmy, “then what are you talking to us for?”

“I need your help with the passport.”

“Oh, now she needs us,” Jimmy said. “Just a signature. No help, no advice. No money. You have everything now, big girl. You’ve got it all figured out.”

“I don’t, but … it’s just a few weeks in Europe, Dad. Lots of kids do it.”

“Who?”

“I don’t know.” Chloe stumbled. “Lots of kids.” No one from her school.

“It’s the worst place, by the way, to have a vacation,” Lang cut in.