Chapter 20 Land Sharks and the Wrong Bull #2
Only a few weeks into this budding romance, four days after the last of the grapes had been harvested, Mike climbed onto the stool at the island in the kitchen.
He wore what he always wore, a white T-shirt and black jeans.
Whereas Cam was fiendishly handsome and graceful, Michael was battling acne and moved his lanky frame awkwardly.
“Can I take Annette to Point Break tomorrow?”
“ Point Break ?” Rebecca said, wearing a Mama Hen apron and feeding her sourdough starter, a culture that Sparrow had shared with her years earlier. “No, sir. I’m sure it’s rated R.”
“Who cares?” Mike said, desperate lust for a girl in his eyes. Otis knew it oh so well.
Bec put another scoop of flour into the jar. “We care. Help me out here, husband.”
Thursdays, Otis always cooked, and he currently sipped on a glass of water while putting together a curry tofu dish that would be topped with fresh herbs.
No, that was not true. Halfway through a bottle of Franciacorta, with a cabernet franc from Bourgueil on deck, Otis topped off the oil in his deep fryer, preparing to make the best frites his family had ever tasted, which would accompany three wonderfully marbled rib eyes.
“I don’t know what Point Break is,” Otis said. “Seems fine to me.”
Rebecca gave him the stink eye.
Otis fell in line, put his “father” cap on, and inclined an eyebrow toward his son. “But you’re not going to see an R-rated movie. Nevertheless, all those tricks your old man taught you are paying off.”
“What about Hot Shots! ?”
“What’s Hot Shots! ?” Otis asked, wanting to say yes.
“It’s a comedy with Charlie Sheen.”
“What’s it rated?”
“PG-13.”
Otis pointed to Bec, who had her back turned, and silently whispered to his son, “She’s in charge. I’m okay with it.”
Mike mouthed back, “Help me.”
Bec had eyes in the back of her head and said without turning, “Otis, don’t make me the bad guy.”
“Mom, please.”
Rebecca turned, drying her hands on a towel. “Let me see if they talk about it in the paper.”
“I’m thirteen,” Mike pleaded. “I’m old enough to see PG-13 without even asking.”
Rebecca let out a long motherly sigh. “Fine, but I’m the one driving you.”
“What?” Otis said. “It will be I who chauffeur the young lovers.”
“Not a chance,” Bec said.
“Then we’ll both go.”
“No way,” Mike said.
Rebecca and Otis had drawn straws. Otis had won and was driving along Highway 12 in their new sedan while bestowing further nuggets of wisdom to his young whippersnapper.
Mike was already exhausted by Otis’s advice. He checked himself in the mirror and straightened his white T-shirt. “Dad, I know how to do it.”
“I did the same for Cam. Let me do my dadding.”
“Things have changed since the twenties.”
“The 1920s?” Otis said. “Is that how old you think I am? I’ll have you know I first pursued your mother in 1969, the Summer of Love. It wasn’t that long ago.”
“Trust me, things have changed. You probably didn’t even have movies back then. Or electricity.”
Otis slowed down and looked over. “Okay, a few things have changed, though we did have electricity; however, many things have been the same since Adam and Eve. You open the door for a girl. You give her a compliment. Tell her she’s pretty.
You pay for her ticket, buy her whatever she wants.
Skittles, popcorn. Twizzlers. Treat her with respect, you understand?
Don’t you dare kiss her, as much as you might want to.
Maybe hold her hand, but you have to read the situation first.”
Mike looked up to the roof of the car. “Why me?”
When they pulled up to her ranch-style house in Santa Rosa, Otis slid to a stop. There wasn’t a vine in sight, and he wondered whether he could trust these people. God, what if the parents weren’t wine drinkers? “Want me to walk up with you? I should probably meet the parents.”
“No, please, I’m begging you.” He spoke quietly, despite no one being around to hear. “Mom already knows them.”
“You think I’m going to embarrass you?”
“Yes.”
“Very well. Remember: eye contact; shake hands; be respectful.”
“I know.”
Otis set his hand on his son’s arm. “Never forget, she’s the lucky one.”
His second-born son climbed the steps and knocked on the door. Otis loved seeing the warrior in Mike, especially after struggling with bullies and depression and all the other shit that life throws at a kid.
Here he was, though, propped up by a girl. Like father, like son.
Mike looked uncertain as he escorted his girlfriend back to the car. They’d been together almost a month now, sealed by a box checked on a handwritten note, but they barely spoke and stayed a good distance from each other. Otis was beyond sure he didn’t have to worry about Mike kissing her.
Yet.
Mike opened the door like a gentleman, and Annette climbed in. She was adorable, brown hair topped with a beret. “Hi, Mr. Till. It’s nice to meet you.”
“And you, Annette. I’ve heard so much about you.”
The way things worked, though, when one member of the family reached the top, another fell. Bec would say it was a self-fulfilling prophecy and warn Otis not to say such things, as if he were the conductor of this dark, dysfunctional orchestra of mad violinists, cellists, and the like.
“So you think that if I say it’s going to go well,” he suggested en route to her parents’ house, “then it will go well?”
“Not in front of Mike.”
“He needs to hear, Bec.” He turned to the back seat and gestured for Mike to pull off his headphones. Once he had, Otis said, “Please be on your best behavior. It’ll be over in a blink of an eye.”
“Otis,” Bec said, “this is my family you’re talking about.”
“They are kind of difficult,” Mike confessed.
“I know,” Bec replied, finding her son’s eyes in the rearview mirror, “but they’re your grandparents. You’ll be sad one day when they’re gone. And your uncle loves you, despite his troubles.”
Otis cracked into a laugh that he tried to keep to himself.
Jed was the engineer of a slow train to hell.
Otis had tried—God knows, he’d tried—to help.
There had been moments, too, when the two had connected.
Otis had taught him to drive a tractor and paid him for months at a time to work the land.
He’d also encouraged him to stay clean, telling Jed what he hadn’t shared with Bec, that he’d made a promise to himself never to touch the hard stuff again.
Jed had made yet another false promise, telling Otis that he was done too. Otis had hoped it would stick.
It didn’t.
Bec tensed with each mile. This is the problem, Otis thought.
She’s being a martyr, forcing herself—and dragging her family along—to show a family love that barely deserves it.
They weren’t bad people, but they were damaged .
.. perhaps beyond repair. The gloom that hovered over their heads never dissipated, and their complaints and negativity dominated every get-together.
However, Otis reminded himself, they are family .
Armed with this acceptance, he took Bec’s hand, as he had the first time they’d pulled up to Marshall and Olivia’s humble house, and made it clear that he had her back, no matter what.
Apparently unfazed, Mike raced out of the car to get his hands on whatever sugary treat Grandma Olivia had rustled up for him.
“Hey,” Otis said to Bec, waiting till she turned to him. “You’re amazing. You know that, right?”
She gave him a close-lipped smile that was barely a smile at all.
“You’ve given them everything. Don’t let them take any more.”
They gathered outside around a picnic table dressed in a ratty plaid tablecloth.
The usual condiments and a tray of toppings covered in Saran Wrap rested in the center.
Marshall presided over the grill, beer in hand.
He was happy to not be working. Since Otis and Rebecca had found more success, her checks to her parents had grown in size.
Essentially, the Tills were paying for the lives of Rebecca’s family, and Otis had long ago stopped fighting Bec about it.
The smell of charring burgers wafted into the air. A few empty soldiers already gathered in the grass by the fence that barely offered any privacy from the neighbors, who had more than once called the cops on Jed.
Mike sat at one of the tables, playing his Game Boy. In normal circumstances, Otis would never allow it, but the conversation had already taken a negative turn, and he preferred that Mike hear as little of it as possible.
Jed, who was high on something far more powerful than the Jack Daniel’s that shot from his breath, had become the world’s greatest master of political thought, and he chose now to share his opinions.
His chair sat pressed up to the picnic table.
The red Solo cup holding his strong cocktail rested before him.
He wore his army jacket rolled up at the sleeves, revealing needle marks and razor scars from the hell he’d put himself through.
He raked his fingers through his long beard as he spoke.
“You know Cheney’s pulling the strings, right?
Bush doesn’t know his head from his ass.
The only reason we’re in the war is Cheney chose to put us there.
Is it any surprise? He’s getting kickbacks from every fucking sheik over there, and he’s got his hand up Bush’s ass like a puppeteer.
” He lifted a hand and opened and closed his thumb against his other fingers like a sock puppet.
“My name’s George Herbert Bush, and I will do anything Dick tells me.
Because Dick is the only one with balls around here. ”
Marshall smacked the spatula against the top of the grill, a smack heard round the world. All heads turned. “Jesus, Jed. Will you stop with it? Nobody wants to hear your conspiracy theories.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. Let’s continue being Dick’s sheep. Let’s keep fighting more wars. Did we not learn anything in Nam?”
“Please, Jed,” Bec said.
“I’m not doing anything wrong, sis.”