See You at Harry's(6)

“That I’m too sensitive? No.”

I nudge him. “Come on, you know what I’m talking about.”

“Yeah, I know.”

I wait for him to really answer, but he doesn’t. He just sits there with his arms crossed over his knees. If it’s true, I wonder what that must be like. To know you’re different. To know some people are going to hate you because of it.

We’re quiet under the pine, smelling Christmas in summer and listening to the traffic on our street pick up as people start getting home from work. It’s my favorite thing about Holden, being able to sit quietly together and not talk. Just think together and not have to say a single word. But today, for the first time, I feel something floating between us, a question I’m sure I know the answer to. I feel the weight of the answer separating us for some reason I don’t understand. If it doesn’t matter to me, why should it matter to him?

“I don’t care if what Sara said is true,” I tell him quietly, hoping my words will make the floating thing go away.

He takes a deep breath that sounds like it hurts. I wait for him to say something, but he just sits there, staring at the pine needles. And it almost feels like the floating thing has swallowed him up, leaving me all alone.





ABOUT A WEEK LATER, my dad waves a puffy manila envelope at us and calls a mandatory family and staff meeting at the restaurant. He rounds us all up in his office. It’s the hottest day of the summer, I think. August. And the office is packed with our family, the wait staff, the cook, and the line crew. We’re all crammed into the tiny room in the attic among cardboard boxes, paper products, and my mom’s meditation stuff. A dusty old fan buzzes hot air at us from the one window in the room. Instead of cooling anyone off, it just blows the stinky mixture of body odor, kitchen grease, and my dad’s coffee breath. I think I’m going to throw up.

My dad opens his laptop and holds up a disc that he handles as if it could crack at any moment. “Just arrived today!” he says, smiling like a maniac. “I haven’t even viewed it myself!”

My mom makes a tiny noise. I think it’s actually a whimper. One of the new cooks is standing on her meditation cushion. She closes her eyes, and I can tell she’s taking a deep breath. I am pretty sure she’s going to have a hard time finding her inner peace any time soon.

Charlie claps his hands.

I breathe through my mouth to keep from gagging on the growing smell.

“Here we go, here we go,” my dad says quietly as he slips the disc into the computer.

“Go, go, go!” Charlie yells. He hugs my dad’s knee.

An image of the Harry’s sign on top of the restaurant comes into view, then the camera pans lower to show us all standing there.

“Woo-hoo!” someone in the back of the room yells.

Holden moans.

“Shhh,” my dad says, and the room gets quiet.

On the screen, my dad is listing all the ice-cream flavors we sell at Harry’s. The camera zooms in on our faces. Charlie is inspecting my dad’s ear as he talks. I see myself cringe in the corner of the screen and feel myself do it again. There are a few shots of inside the restaurant while my dad’s voice-over talks about how great it is to be running a second-generation business and how he’s made every attempt to preserve the authentic feel of the place. I glance over at my mom, who shows no expression at all. Sara told me that when my dad inherited the restaurant, my mom wanted to renovate the place and sell organic vegetarian dishes, but my dad said the business would never survive and that he couldn’t bring himself to destroy his own dad’s dreams of making Harry’s truly famous one day. I guess my mom must have thought that was a noble-enough reason because whenever my dad comes up with these business schemes, my mom is always at his side.

“There’s Mona! There’s Patrick!” the staff shout as the camera pans to various staff members.

“Shhh,” Charlie says with his wet finger to his lips.

I see Ran with Charlie behind the counter, holding up the sundae they made. My stomach flutters when Ran smiles at the camera, and I feel myself blush. I look around, as if anyone could actually tell what just happened. But Holden nudges me and winks, and I realize maybe someone can.

The scene flicks back to our family standing in front of the sign and my dad mentioning heaven. Then it zooms right into Charlie’s dirty angel face when he says, “See you at Hawee’s!” at the top of his lungs.

The screen goes black, and then the store hours appear in neon-green text.

There are cheers, but I barely hear them. I am already imagining how this will play out at school. It is not a good scenario.

“Well?” my father asks, turning in his swivel chair to face us.

“Again!” Charlie cheers, pointing to the screen.

My dad tousles his hair.

“Born actor!” someone says.

Holden snorts.

“Fern, honey, remind me that we have to contact Ran’s parents and get them to sign a release form so he can be in the ad. I’d hate to cut that scene. It’s nice to have some diversity.”

“Di-what?” Charlie asks.

I roll my eyes. “It means Dad wants to use Ran because he has darker skin than the rest of us.”

“Oh, Ferny,” my dad says, tucking in his enormous T-shirt where it keeps coming untucked because it’s too small and only emphasizes how huge his belly has gotten. “I’m not using him. It’s just a nice coincidence. Just like Mona.”