Читать книгу Outnumbered - Mandi Eizenbaum - Страница 6

1

“Señor, señor, what’s the matter with you?” the pear-shaped waitress asked. Her whole face puckered like she was sucking on a sour lemon. The young woman dug her long, red fingernails into my shoulder and shook me hard. “It looks like you saw a ghost! Are you okay, señor?” she repeated.

It wasn’t the first time someone said that to me. The ghost of my late father truly did follow me everywhere. I never met the man, but his words were as aware and persistent as if he were right by my side, lurking in my head and casting a protective shadow over me. But all the secrets, the silences, the numbers, the haunting echoes—it was all too much now. The latest emptiness and grief were only making my anxiety worse. Much worse.

The panic-stricken screech from the waitress broke me out of my trance. Instinctively, my left hand fluttered to the gold chain around my neck, and my right hand fumbled with my pocket where I carried the faded, crinkled photograph of my father. Squirming out of the waitress’s clutch and shifting my weight in my seat, I shrugged my shoulders and leaned forward over the table.

“Yes, I’m fine. Can you just bring me a glass of water?” I stammered. A heavy tear escaped the corner of my eye as the jittery waitress hurried away.

“And where is Gabby?” I exhaled. I crossed my arms over my chest and scrutinized the wasted minutes ticking away on my watch.

My daughter, Gabby, was a spitting image of her mother in so many ways. They were both constantly running late. It’s a funny thing about time. When you’re young and live in the day, time seems to go on and on for eternity. But when you’re older and try to appreciate each precious moment of life, time seems to be fleeting and provisional.

I grabbed the crusty sugar bowl from the center of the table and fidgeted with the sugar packets that were randomly crammed in.

A familiar voice began humming in my ears, Claire’s tone-deaf melody chastising my incurable impatience. After forty-one years of marriage, her words still clung to me like the Caribbean sun hangs onto the horizon at dusk. “Don’t count the minutes, Max. Make the minutes count.” Her words of infinite wisdom swirled in my mind for what seemed like hours, until my attention finally drifted back to the sugar packets in my trembling hands.

“Oh, my sweet Claire! How I miss you!” My breath shuddered, and I choked as the words spilled from my lips. A sudden gust of wind blew the drizzling rain against the restaurant’s windows and sent a shiver of cold sweat down my spine. “I feel like shit!” I barked out loud. I didn’t recognize myself anymore. Claire would not have approved of my curmudgeonly manners.

I bowed my head and squeezed my eyes shut. There was no way for me to relax. I crossed my legs and uncrossed them four times in the next twenty-six seconds. My swollen fingers fiddled with the chain around my neck, my paling face reflected in the mirrored walls around the restaurant from a dozen different directions. My hair looked grayer than I remembered, there was a deflated sag in my shoulders, and bags of swollen dark skin protruded from under my eyes.

When did I get this old? I thought. Maybe I should just go home.

A warm hand brushed my upper back and sprung me out of my melancholy stupor. A soft whisper floated near my ear, and a wet kiss landed on my stubbly cheek.

“Finally made it through all the traffic,” chimed Gabby. She had all of her mother’s sweet innocence and charm, and now Gabby hastily threw her purse over the back of her chair and plopped down hard in her seat.

I glanced at my watch again, 11:11 a.m. What were the chances of these repeating numbers? Gabby threw her head back and clapped her hands together. She looked as restless and empty as I felt. She squinted her sad golden eyes and gaped at me. Our eyes locked.

Gabby sized me up quickly and sighed. “Are you eating enough, Dad? You don’t look so good!” Gabby faked a smile, a smirk that made her look like she was holding back a burp. Her voice was sensible and serious, yet I knew she was holding in the same pain and grief that I was feeling. No child should have to feel the loss of a parent. “You should have stayed over last night, Dad. Did you finally get some sleep at home?” Gabby scrunched the space between her plucked eyebrows.

She knew me too well, and just like Claire, she constantly worried about me. Neither one of us was getting much sleep these days.

“My chest is hurting more than usual, but it’s nothing I can’t handle. I’ll be fine,” I lied, not totally convinced myself if this time I would really be okay.

Stop with the whining, I berated myself inside my crowded head. Shouldn’t I be the one comforting my daughter?

I picked up the sugar packets strewn all over the table and carefully began arranging them back into their crusty bowl again. An old Celia Cruz song screeched out over the din in the room. “Azucaaaa!” shrieked from the overhead sound speakers.

I couldn’t control the burst of laughter that escaped my pouting lips. Oy vey, the irony!

“I hate to bring it up again, Dad, but I need to be sure. Are you totally sure you’re okay with Jason and me going on our trip? I mean, we could always go next year.”

“No, we should never put off a happy occasion,” I snapped. Then, softening my voice, I added, “I know the timing stinks, but this is your honeymoon we’re talking about.”

“It hasn’t even been a month, Dad, and I don’t want to leave you alone. Not now,” Gabby muttered. She pressed her lips together in a slight frown and dabbed at the corner of her eye. “God, I miss her so much!”

Gabby’s words stung my heart. “I miss her too, angel.” The words caught like a clump of sand in my throat, and my trembling hands went up to my heaving chest. I gasped for air, every breath rattling in my weak lungs. “Enough talk about postponing your honeymoon, Gabby. It’s all set and you two are going,” I croaked.

Try to pull it together, Max. My wet eyes darted around the noisy restaurant.

“Where’s that water I asked for?” I yelled out for our waitress and then glanced back at Gabby. “Today, let’s just try to enjoy our breakfast together.”

Havana, Cuba

1941-1958