Love, Like Father Like Son novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: The Head of the Table

June moves her father's chair back in front of guests and Chet's hand finds her waist.

Chet took me to a diner by the ferry dock, and he ordered for both of us without asking.

"Pie first," he said. "Whatever they have."

"That's not dinner."

"It is if you're me."

It was a cherry pie, and he ate half of it before he spoke again.

"Does it bother you?" he said. "Your name on all those shares."

"Why would it?"

"A company that size. A lot of people would think you were rich."

"I'm a pharmacist," I said. "I'm rich in expired coupons."

He almost smiled.

"My father says money like that makes people stupid," he said. "I'd like to see you stay smart."

"Is that an order?"

"It's a request."

I put my fork down.

I had planned to ask him twenty questions and had, until then, asked four.

"Why are you being nice to me, Chet?"

"Because you got in my car," he said, "and you asked about the parked car and not the weather."

That was all he said, and it was not an answer, and I let it stand.

At seven we drove home, because my mother's dinner was at eight.

It was a board dinner, which meant her six oldest directors, their wives and a long table with the good china.

My father had set the silver himself, as he did every year, because he liked how the forks lined up.

I came down in a dark green dress and found my mother in the dining room with a seating chart.

Russell was at the head of the table.

My father was down at the foot, beside the kitchen door.

"Mom."

"What?" she said, not looking up.

"Dad sits at the head. He's sat there for thirty years."

"Russell is our guest of honor. Davis won't mind."

I looked down the long table and my father was there already, straightening a fork.

He didn't mind.

That was the whole problem.

The guests came, and they all kissed my mother, and they all shook Russell's hand and said they'd heard so much.

My mother introduced my father last.

"And this is Davis," she said. "He's at the institute. Mixing his little solutions."

One of the directors laughed politely.

"Still pays the bills, Davis?" he said. "Government salary and all?"

"Most of them," my father said.

"Davis has never in his life made more than I spent on shoes," my mother said, and the whole table laughed.

My father laughed too.

I stood up.

"Excuse me. I'm going to fix something."

I walked down the table with everyone watching me, and I took my father's chair by the back and picked it up.

It was heavy, and it was heavier than I expected, and I had to drag it the last few feet.

Chet was already there.

He took the other side of the chair without a word and lifted it with me, and we carried it past all of them to the head of the table.

Russell stood and stepped back, and I saw the exact moment his smile checked itself.

Chet set the chair down at the head of the table and put his hand on the small of my back, and I felt it through the dress.

"Dad," I said. "Come sit down."

The room had gone quiet.

My father came slowly up the length of the table.

"June, it's all right."

"It's your chair," I said. "I'd like you in it."

He sat.

My mother's mouth had gone thin.

"June, this is a scene."

"It's a chair, Mom," I said. "Dad told me that last night."

She didn't know what I meant, and my father looked at his plate.

Chet's hand was still on my back.

He hadn't moved it, and I hadn't asked him to.

It was warm, and it stayed there a moment too long, and I was angry that I noticed.

"Well," Russell said to the table, and picked up his glass. He wasn't angry at all, which scared me more than if he had been. "Helen has raised a daughter with a spine. And my son seems to have found a use for his."

People laughed.

My mother laughed last.

"To the next generation," Russell said, and looked straight at me and then at Chet.

I raised my glass to him and drank.

Under the tablecloth, my father's hand found mine and held on.

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