What Happens to Goodbye(56)

“But I liked them,” she said softly.
“I did, too.”
Opal looked up at him, surprised. “You did?”
“Yeah.”
“I thought you loved the pickles!”
My dad shook his head. I said, “He hates pickles. All kinds.”
“But especially fried,” he added. When Opal just stared at him, mouth open, he added, “It’s not about my personal feelings, though. It’s about what’s best for the restaurant. You’ve got to take emotion out of it.”
She considered this as I got up, putting my now-empty glass in the sink. Then she said, “Well, I’ll tell you one thing. I could never do what you do.”
“Meaning what?” my dad asked.
“This,” she said, pointing at the pad on the table between them. “Coming into a place and making tons of .s that piss everyone off, firing people. Not to mention putting in all this time and work into something, only to move right on to the next place when it’s done.”
“It’s a job,” he pointed out.

“I get that.” She picked up a napkin, shredding the edge. “But how do you not get invested? In the place, and everyone in it?”
I turned off the water. I wanted to hear the answer.
“Well,” he said after a moment, “it’s not always so easy. But I had a restaurant of my own for many years. I was beyond invested, and that was hard, too. Harder, actually.”
“Tell me about it,” Opal said. “I’ve loved Luna Blu since I was a teenager. It’s, like, where my heart is.”
“Which is why,” he told her, “you want it to be the best it can possibly be. Even if that means making some tough decisions.”
We were all quiet for a moment. Then Opal folded the napkin, placing it neatly in front of her. Then she looked up at my dad and said, “I really hate it when you’re right.”
“I know,” he told her. “I get that a lot.”
She sighed, pushing off her chair and getting to her feet. “So tomorrow, when we meet with corporate, we’ll give them these numbers . . .”
“. . . and go from there,” my dad said.
Opal gathered up her purse and keys. “I feel like I’m going to death row,” she said, wrapping a scarf around her neck. “How am I supposed to look these people in the face, knowing they will most likely be unemployed next week?”
“It’s not easy being the boss,” my dad said.
“No kidding,” she replied. “I wish I had some rolls to drown my sorrows in. Carbohydrates are great for guilt.”
“Really,” my dad said. “Are you ever going to let that go?”
She smiled, pulling her purse over one shoulder. “Nope,” she said. “Bye, Mclean. Feel better.”
“Thanks,” I replied. And then my dad and I both watched as she walked across the living room to the front door, pushing it open. Halfway down the walk, she stopped, adjusting her scarf. She looked up at the gray sky for a moment, then squared her shoulders and started walking again.
I looked at my dad. He said, “She’s really something.”
“Everybody is.” I wiped down the counter, then turned back, only to find him still sitting there, continuing to watch Opal as she crossed the street and started down the alley. “So what do you think? Is everyone really going to get fired?”
“No telling,” my dad replied, gathering up some of the papers on the table. “Depends on myriad factors, everything from Chuckles’s stock portfolio to how benevolent he’s feeling. What she doesn’t realize, though, is that people getting fired isn’t the worst-case scenario.”
“No? ”
He shook his head. “The building itself is worth a lot more than the restaurant right now. Chuckles could decide to just sell, wash his hand the whole thing, and move on.”
I looked back at Opal, barely visible now. “You think he’d do that?”
“He might. We’ll find out tomorrow, I guess.”
I turned back to the sink, pulling off a paper towel and drying my hands. My dad came over, kissing the top of my head as he picked up his phone, and started down the hallway.
Once the bedroom door was shut behind him, I went over to the table, glancing down at the pad with the names and numbers on it. Tracey was a four, Leo a three. Jason was a nine, whatever that meant. If only you could really use a failproof system to know who was worth keeping and who needed to be thrown away. It would make it so much easier to move through the world, picking and choosing what connections to make, or whether to make any at all.
Later that night, I was in my room, trying to do some Western Civ homework, when I heard a knock on our kitchen door. I walked down the dark hallway to see Dave standing under the porch light. He had on jeans and a long-sleeved plaid shirt and was carrying a steaming saucepan in his hands, a pot holder around the handle.
“Chicken soup,” he said when I opened the door. “Great for bar-fight injuries. Got a bowl?”
I stepped back and he came inside, walking straight to the stove and putting the pot down. “You cook?”
“I used to,” he replied. “It was either that or stick to my mom’s menu, and sometimes I wanted, you know, meat and dairy. But it’s been a while. Hopefully, this won’t kill us.”
I got out two bowls and two spoons. “That’s not exactly a ringing endorsement.”
“Maybe, but look at it this way,” he said. “You already got punched in the face today. What do you have to lose?”