Part Twenty Eight

It is the summer of 1990.

Kevin stares at the ceiling while she gets ready for bed. And he says to Susan: I miss my restaurant.

Susan says to him, I knew you would.

Kevin handles the kitchen, including all the food, all the wine, and Jimmy. Sarah handles the front – waiters, tables, busboys, personnel. Susan handles finances (an artifact of the days when her parents fronted the money) and “atmosphere,” which includes everything from the lighting to the design of the menus. Either Kevin or Sarah or both are in the restaurant virtually every hour it is open, greeting guests, glaring at runners, keeping the waiters sharp. Sarah has proven that she is perfectly capable of handling things. Kevin doesn’t know what to do with his newfound time. Doesn’t know how to react to a waiter he hasn’t hired.

Kevin says to Susan: I can’t believe Preacher has been here less than a year. He’s good.

Susan agrees that he is good, and wonders what her husband is plotting.

Do you think he’s going to marry our daughter?

Would you have married me if my parents hadn’t made you?

Eventually. He laughs

Liar, she laughs back. Do you think it’s that serious?

He shrugs. You’re her mother. What does she say?

Nothing, she says. Why would she tell her mother? She got into bed next to him.

Think there’s a subtle way I can ask him what his… intentions are?

Don’t you dare, she says, turning to him and frowning.

Nothing obvious, Kevin protests, just, maybe, I could ask him…

Kevin, I swear to God, if you even HINT at anything like that I will kill you. The last thing your daughter needs is to have her father leaning on one of his employees to marry her.

He is silent to a moment. I guess you’re right.

Don’t even THINK about it, she says, arching one eyebrow. What’s got into you?

I’m thinking about… remember Gus’s?

That horrible little diner next to the campus?

Yeah.

Didn’t we used to call that place Chez Ptomaine?

Yeah, that’s the place.

What about it?

Gus died.

Recently? Jesus, he was a hundred when WE were in college.

If there was a way to make Pepsi fried and greasy, Gus would have done it. He wore the same stained white tee-shirt beneath his apron every day. When he cooked he slammed the food on the plate angrily. His daughter Myrna, an enormous woman who shared Gus’s disposition, would slam the plate on the counter in front of the customer just as angrily.

When we were in college, he was the same age we are now, Kevin says. Remember Myrna? Myrna’s daughter inherited the property.

Susan closes her eye in a half-wince. Thanks. I didn’t feel old enough.

Anyhow, what would you think about opening a second restaurant?

There? At Gus’s?

Something fun and hip. Someplace where the kids can get affordable real food. Someplace with a juke box.

Someplace where you can send Sarah and Preacher so you can have the Wine Dark Sea back.

I hadn’t really thought of it like that.

Liar.

No, really.

Big fat liar, she says, kissing him.

That would be perfect for them, though, he says thoughtfully.

Like this just occurred to you now. She slips her hand under the covers.

He laughs and reaches for the light.

No, she said, leave it on. Otherwise I’ll keep imagining getting humped by old Gus.

He chuckled at the memory of the sour-faced man standing at his grill, flipping cheeseburgers, with his crew-cut and ubiquitous Lucky Strikes.

And left the light on. And afterwards she curls up against his chest and coos:

Oh, Gus.