With the Father (2 page)

The shadow moved closer and morphed into a man. He
looked vaguely familiar though I couldn’t immediately place him. I shifted
uneasily on my feet and clutched my purse to my chest as he moved closer. One
arm extended toward me while the other remained hidden behind his back, and I
shrank backwards until my backside bumped into the car.

“Can I help you?” I asked, my voice shaky and
unrecognizable.

Cold lifeless eyes glared down at me, and the
realization of what was happening smacked me hard in the face.

I’d seen him before. In fact, I’d served the man
dinner tonight. It had been the first time I’d noticed him come through the
line, but he’d stood out. Something had seemed off about him. I’d dismissed it,
not wanting to judge a man who was probably just hungry. Like my mom, I tried
to give everyone the benefit of the doubt. ‘People are inherently good. Even
those that seem otherwise, are never too lost to be saved,’ she would say.

However, I was questioning the soundness of my mom’s
advice as the man advanced silently upon me. My kids, my husband, my life … all
passed before my eyes. I shoved my purse at him. It was replaceable. Everything
was replaceable. “Take it. Take whatever you want.”

He reached for it with his left hand, but the sneer on
his face made me question whether it would be enough. As I feared, he looked
down at it as if it were nothing.

“The keys to my car are down there,” I said, glancing
toward my feet. I was begging now, pleading with him to take it all and just
leave.

He looked at my car and whistled under his breath.
“It’s nice, lady. I bet a kept woman like you gets a new one every year. That
rich husband of yours takes real good care of you, doesn’t he?” The sneer on
his face grew more sinister, and his right hand emerged from behind his back.
In the dim light, I could see the glint of a knife.

My heart thumped erratically in my chest, threatening
to explode as he swung the knife back and forth, teasing me with it. The faint
street light
gleamed off the metal as he brought it close
enough to catch against my shirt. Another swipe and the cool metal against my
torso was fleeting but threatening.

I wondered if this was going to be how I would die.
I’d left my kids three nights a week to sling hash in an effort to do some good
in our community, only so I could die in the parking lot. Even my mother would
have agreed that it wasn’t worth it.

“Get away from her,” a thick voice bellowed, causing
me to jump again. The voice and accent were familiar, though the timbre was
unrecognizable.

My attacker reacted immediately. His eyes narrowed on
me, as if to make one final threat, but he retreated into the shadows. His
heavy body and lumbering gait would have been too cumbersome for an effective
getaway under any other circumstances, but neither Father Paul nor I made any
move to follow him. Instead, we stood staring at each other, the fear in the
air still smothering us.
  

He looked at me with wide eyes. “Are you okay?” His
hands gripped my upper arms as his eyes raked over me from head to foot to
assess the damage.

My heart sputtered in my chest.

“Grace, are you hurt?” he asked, his voice more
panicked.

I looked down at my stomach, half expecting to see
blood seeping through my clothes. I exhaled in relief when there wasn’t any. I
counted myself lucky. “I’m okay. Just scared.” A shudder ran through my body as
I considered
the what
could have been.
 

What had I been thinking, coming out here alone at
this time of night? It had been stupid. Reckless. My kids needed their mother.
My husband needed his wife. Nothing I was doing was more important than them.

Observing the quaking of my body, Father Paul wrapped
his arms around me. The warmth of his body enveloped me, and I stayed there
until the shivering stopped. “I’m so glad you were here,” I said, when I
finally felt a little calmer.

I expected him to let me go, but his arms tightened
instead. “I’ll always be here for you, Grace.” His voice was so quiet that I
wasn’t sure that he’d spoken at all. It was possible I’d imagined it.

_________________________

I
finally pulled into my driveway two hours later. I lowered the garage door and
sat in the car, listening to the ticking of the engine as it wound down and
replaying in my head the police officer’s assurances that they would do
everything they could to find the man. I took a deep breath and prepared myself
for the fight ahead of me.

Jonathan was standing, head bowed, with his hands splayed
on the kitchen counter top. My brows
raised
at the
glass of scotch in front of him. I wasn’t afraid of having a glass of wine or
two and even an entire bottle on occasion, but Jonathan rarely drank. He didn’t
like feeling out of control. When he did drink, it was only because something
was wrong, and he was looking for an escape. Alcohol and his family had a long
history.

The door clicked shut behind me, and his head
raised
in response. “You’re home,” he said. The words were
laced with a slight slur, and he stared at me with a perplexed look on his face
that matched my own confusion.

“I’m sorry that I’m so late. Are the kids already in
bed?” I asked, hoping that he was just irritated at me because it was so late
and that it wasn’t something more serious. I moved around the bar so that I was
standing beside him.

His eyes narrowed on me. “For several hours, Grace.”
His sharp tone didn’t surprise me, though the heavy exhale and drop of his head
that followed it did.
 
Shoulders
sagging, he leaned forward as if he needed the counter to support himself
before looking at me again. “I’m sorry. It’s just been one of those days,” he
said. “Dinner ran long.” The fact that work had kept him out late wasn’t
unusual and wouldn’t cause this kind of distress in Jonathan; late nights were
expected when you owned your own business.

Unlike most of the wives in my circle of friends, I
didn’t begrudge the time that Jonathan spent at work. We’d started the company
in our college apartment and built it into what it was today. Though I’d helped
him with bookkeeping and other behind the scenes tasks in the beginning,
Jonathan was the reason for its nearly immediate success. There was no question
that he was the brains and backbone of the operation.

Five years into our adventure, we’d decided it was
time to start a family. Unfortunately, we hadn’t had the instant success with
baby-making
that we’d had with money-making. After more than
a year of trying but failing to knock me up, Jonathan had all but demanded that
I ‘retire’ so that I could focus all of my efforts on getting pregnant. As
usual, he’d been right, and I’d gotten pregnant with Isabelle almost
immediately after I’d quit.
   

 
From day
one, she’d been one of those babies that
was
just
easy. At the age of six, she was still easy. She was the kid that ate
everything on her plate. She was the kid that you never heard a peep out of
after the sun went down. She’d suckered us into thinking that having another
would be no big deal, and her little brother arrived just seventeen months
later.

However, no two children are the same even with shared
DNA, and Trey was every bit as hard as his sister was easy. He refused to eat
almost anything you put in front of him, and I couldn’t remember a single night
when he’d slept through it. Even at four years old, our midnight traveler was
rarely in his own bed when he woke up in the morning. He was our little artist.
Our free thinker.
Like his father, he would take the
world by storm and had already made a good start by charming his way through
the Mother’s Day Out program at St. Mark’s Catholic Church. There wasn’t a
teacher in the program who wouldn’t give him anything he wanted.

My babies made trading work clothes and expensed
lunches for yoga pants and Happy Meals an easy choice. Even so, I hadn’t
forgotten about all of the goals Jonathan and I made together. Working
side-by-side with him during those early years gave me a unique perspective. I
understood the time and effort it took to build a business and keep it
thriving.

When he looked up again, he rolled his shoulders as if
to rid
himself
of tension. “You’re later than usual.”

The drama of events of the night hit me again. He was
going to be upset. He would list all the reasons I should give up Karen’s
Kitchen and shut it down. Some days I wondered if it was worth all of the time
it took away from the kids, but I didn’t think I could ever give it up. It was
all I had left of my mother.

“I was mugged in the parking lot as I was leaving.
Dealing with the police took a while.” I said it with a wave of my hand as if
it was no big deal. I used the same tone of voice that I would use if I were
telling him that we’d run out of laundry detergent that day.

He closed his eyes for a moment while he absorbed what
I was telling him. When they opened again, his gaze remained on his glass as he
downed the last of its contents. He picked up the bottle of scotch and poured
himself another drink before he finally spoke. “I’m sorry, Grace, but what did
you expect? You know how I feel about that place.” His words and tone were
harsh, letting me know that he blamed me for what had happened.

“I know,” I said, trying to stave off the coming
lecture though it was a hopeless endeavor.

“You don’t know anything about those people. They’re
hungry and poor,” he continued, bringing his drink to his lips again.
“Desperate people are the most unpredictable. You have no idea the lengths
they’ll go.”

“I’d never seen this guy before. He wasn’t a regular,
Jonathan. Besides, I’m fine.” I tried to address each of his points though I
knew he wasn’t wrong. Tonight had proven that. “Plus, Father Paul came out just
in time. He scared him off.”

“Did you get a good look at him? It’s important,
Grace, that you gave the police a good description. How confident are you in
your description?”

“Pretty confident. It was dark, but I got a good look
at him. He ate dinner with us tonight so we’re going to ask around to see if
anyone knows who he is.”

He turned to me but said nothing. He seemed deep in
thought.

“I can’t shut the kitchen down. It’s important to me,
Jonathan.”

His expression remained hard, but he pulled me into
his arms. “I know. I’m sorry. I just worry about you. I’m sure they will get
the guy, especially if you gave the police an accurate description.” he said.

“Let’s hope so.”

“Even if they don’t … all that matters is that you’re
okay,” he said, rubbing my back.

“The police said that it was just one of those random
things. I was in the wrong place at the wrong time.” I shuddered thinking about
it. “Let’s talk about something else. How was your dinner?”
 

“Uneventful,” he said before grabbing my hand leading
me to the living room. He walked to the fireplace and stuck a blazing log with
the poker.
 

That had to be why he was drinking. Tonight’s dinner
had been important. If he was calling it ‘uneventful,’ it hadn’t gone like he
had hoped. “Wow. That’s some fire,” I said, changing the subject. “It’s going
to be going for hours.”

“I didn’t know how late you’d be so I made a big
one.”
 

I sank into the chair closest to the fireplace. On a
night like tonight, I was happy to have the comfort of it. The lights in the
room were dim, but
a row of candles across the top of the
mantle were
lit, creating a shimmering glow on the wall above it. A
glass of white wine sat unclaimed on the coffee table. He picked it up and
brought it to me before sitting down across from me on the couch.
 

“For me?” I asked, referring to the wine, the candles,
and the romantic fire.

“All for you,” he said, settling into the couch.

After tonight’s events, I’d earned a glass of
wine.
 
Wishing it were red instead
of white, I brought it toward my mouth, but stopped to rub a smudge off the
glass with my thumb. “I’m not sure about that dishwasher. There’s lipstick on
this glass.”

He nodded in agreement and sat across from me on the
couch. “Maybe we need to call a repairman.”

I looked contentedly around the room, appraising what
I could see of the house from my chair. Though it had been tiny when we’d bought
it just after getting married, it wasn’t tiny any more.
 
We’d ripped it down to the studs and
completely rebuilt it just two years ago.
 
In its previous state, it was the place where dreams had been built.
Now, it was my dream home.
With the exception of the
dishwasher.

“So tell me about the rest of your day. Any other
excitement I should know about?”

Jonathan listened attentively while I recounted my
day. Aside from the mugging, it was mundane stuff. I’d taken the kids to
school. This was the last year that Isabelle would be at the church preschool.
When she moved on to first grade next year, she’d be going to a much larger
school. Trey, who was in pre-
K
would have one more
year there. I recounted dropping them off and working my shift in the soup kitchen
as Jonathan loosened the collar of his shirt and removed his tie.