Chapter 2 #3
We stop at the cart on the corner—the same guy who’s been there for years, selling pretzels and hot dogs that taste questionable but somehow never make anyone sick. I hand over a dollar and he gives Emma a pretzel in wax paper, still warm.
She takes a bite and grins at me, mustard on her cheek. “Thanks, Daddy.”
“You’re welcome.”
We keep walking, and Emma’s talking about something else now—a story about a girl in her preschool class who brought in a hamster for show and tell—and I’m only half listening because I’m watching the time and thinking about the lecture, running through my notes in my head.
Prefrontal cortex development. Executive function.
Impulse control in children and adolescents.
I’ll explain to my students that the prefrontal cortex isn’t fully developed until the mid-twenties. I’ll show them fMRI scans demonstrating differences in activation patterns between children and adults during decision-making tasks. I’ll cite longitudinal studies on neural development.
What I won’t tell them is that knowing all of this doesn’t help when your four-year-old is having a meltdown in the cereal aisle. That understanding the neuroscience of attachment doesn’t make you better at comforting a child who’s grieving someone who’s still alive.
That sometimes knowledge is completely and utterly useless.
We reach the subway station and head down the stairs.
The platform is crowded—people huddled under umbrellas, shaking off rain, looking generally miserable about being awake and commuting.
Emma finishes her pretzel and wipes her hands on her jacket, which I’ll have to wash later, adding it to the ever-growing list of things I need to do.
The train pulls in and we squeeze into the car. I keep Emma close, one hand on her shoulder, and we grab a pole near the door. She looks up at me, mustard still on her cheek.
“Daddy?”
“Yeah?”
“You’re a good dad.”
The words hit me harder than they should. “Thanks, Em. I try.”
“Even when you say no to pretzels.”
I bark out a laugh. “I said yes to the pretzel!”
“I know! That’s why you’re a good dad.”
The train lurches forward and Emma grabs onto my leg to steady herself. Through the window I can see the tunnel walls flying past, dark and endless, and I think about how this is what every day feels like now. Moving forward but not sure where I’m going.
The ride takes seventeen minutes, which is actually faster than usual. We get off at First Avenue and climb the stairs back up to street level. The rain has let up to a drizzle, but the air still feels heavy and damp. I check my watch. 10:38. We’re actually making decent time.
“What do you think Yiayia’s going to say when she sees you?” I ask as we start walking.
Emma scrunches up her face, thinking hard. Then she throws her arms wide and says in the most exaggerated Greek accent I’ve ever heard, “Emma! My precious koukla mou!” She even waves her hands around for emphasis.
I burst out laughing. “That’s scarily accurate, kid.”
“I know, right?” She grins up at me, pleased with herself.
I pick up the pace, practically dragging Emma along beside me as we head toward the restaurant.
The East Village on a weekday morning is alive in a way that’s both chaotic and oddly comforting.
We pass Veselka, the Ukrainian diner that’s been here since my parents moved to New York in the sixties.
The flower shop on the corner has buckets of roses and lilies out front, the petals dark with rain.
A guy on a skateboard weaves around us, nearly clipping Emma, and I pull her closer.
The bagel place two doors down has a line out the door despite the weather.
A woman with purple hair is walking three dogs that are all different sizes, and Emma squeals at them, delighted.
Then I see the sign for Roussos, green and white, hanging above the door.
My parents opened this place in 1976 with money they’d saved for years.
It’s tucked between a record store and a dry cleaner, but you’d never miss it.
It’s always full of people eating, talking, laughing.
There’s a small patio out front with four tables under an awning, and even in the drizzle, two of them are occupied.
We push through the door and I’m hit immediately with the smell of garlic and lemon and lamb.
Olive oil and fresh bread. The dining room is packed—the lunch rush is in full swing.
Most of the tables are taken, and I can see Peter, one of the servers who’s been working here since I was in high school, weaving between tables with plates balanced on his arm.
The walls are cream-colored, hung with framed photos of Greece—the Parthenon, Santorini, the beaches in Crete.
There are blue and white checked tablecloths on every table, and the ceiling has exposed wooden beams that my father installed himself.
In the corner is a small shelf with candles and a small statute of the Virgin Mary that my grandmother gave my mother when they opened.
I recognize half the people in here. Mrs. Papadopoulos at the table by the window, who’s been coming here for lunch every Tuesday and Thursday since 1978.
The two guys at the bar who work at the bookstore down the street.
A couple in the back corner who I remember from when I was in middle school—they used to come in every Friday night and always ordered the same thing.
“Emma! My sweet, precious koukla mou!”
I look up and there’s my mother, arms already spread wide, barreling toward us from behind the counter. Emma shoots me a smug look that clearly says I told you that’s what she’d say. I stifle a laugh.
My mother reaches us and scoops Emma up in one fluid motion, kissing both her cheeks, her forehead, her nose.
My mother is sixty-three, small and sturdy, with dark curly hair that’s starting to gray at the temples.
She’s full of an energy that makes you tired just watching her.
She’s wearing her usual uniform—black pants, a white button-up, and an apron tied around her waist that has “Roussos” in embroidered green letters across the center.
“Look at you! So beautiful! So big!” She’s speaking half in English, half in Greek, the way she always does when she’s excited. “Did you eat breakfast? You look hungry. Are you hungry? I make you something.”
“Yiayia, I had a pretzel,” Emma says.
“A pretzel!” My mother looks horrified. “A pretzel is not breakfast! This is why you need your Yiayia, agapi mou. Come, come. I have Candy Land in the back office. We play, yes?”
Emma’s eyes go wide. “No way!”
“Yes way!” My mother sets her down and Emma immediately takes off running toward the back.
“Emma!” I call after her. “No kisses for your favorite dad?”
She skids to a stop, turns around, and gives me the most exasperated look a four-year-old can muster. “But it’s Candy Land!”
“Get over here!”
She huffs dramatically, runs back over, plants a wet kiss on my cheek, and then bolts toward the back office.
“Love you too!” I call after her, but she’s already gone.
My mother shakes her head, smiling. “So much energy, that girl. Like a little tornado.”
“Tell me about it.”
She looks up at me then, and her expression shifts. Suddenly she’s not Yiayia playing Candy Land. She’s my mother, and she’s worried. “You look tired, agori mou.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine. You’re working too hard. Look at you—so skinny! You eat?”
“I eat, Ma.”
“You don’t eat. I can tell. Your face is—” She gestures vaguely at my face. “Thin. You need to eat more. You come here for dinner tonight, yes? I make pastitsio.”
“I can’t tonight. I have a lecture and then I need to prep for tomorrow’s class.”
“Always working. Always, always working.” She reaches up and cups my face in her hands. “You can’t keep doing this, Leonidas. You need help.”
“I know. I’m working on it.”
“The nanny quit?”
“The nanny quit.”
She sighs, long and heavy, in that way Greek mothers have perfected over centuries. “This is the third one?”
“Sixth, actually.”
“Christos kai Panagia!” She makes the sign of the cross. “That poor baby! She misses her mother.”
I don’t want to talk about Rebecca. I don’t want to think about Rebecca. But my mother has a way of cutting straight to the things you’re trying to avoid.
“I know,” I say.
“She needs some stability. She needs—”
“Ma.”
“I’m just saying—”
“I know what you’re saying.”
Maria appears then, emerging from the kitchen with a tray of spanakopita. She sees us and immediately changes course, setting the tray down on the counter and coming over to stand next to our mother.
Seeing them side by side is always a trip.
It’s like looking at the same person separated by thirty years.
They have the same thick, dark brown hair that waves when it’s humid.
The same fair skin with an olive undertone that tans easily.
The same high cheekbones and full lips. The same dark brown eyes that can convey affection or judgment with equal efficiency.
Maria’s wearing black jeans and a white T-shirt with the Roussos logo on it, her hair pulled back in a high ponytail. She has a smudge of flour on her cheek.
“Emma found the secret stash,” Maria says, grinning.
I look between them. “Secret stash of what?”
Maria points at our mother. “Ma’s chocolate.”
I rub my hands down my face. “Great.”
My mother laughs, completely unbothered. “Is a crime for a girl to enjoy her chocolate? She’s four! Let her live!”
“She’s going to be bouncing off the walls.”
“Then she bounce! She’s happy!”
“Irene!” A man at one of the tables near the window waves. “The baklava today—orea! Beautiful!”
My mother beams. “Thank you, Dimitri! I make it fresh this morning! You come back soon, yes?”
“Always!” He waves again and heads toward the door.
My mother turns back to me, and before she can launch into whatever she was about to say, Maria cuts in. “I’m taking Emma for the weekend.”
“What? No. You don’t have to do that. I already feel terrible for dumping her on you for the afternoon—”
“Leo,” Maria holds up a hand. “You’re going to go home after your lecture. You’re going to take a bath. And then, you’re going to actually sleep, because the bags you’re getting under your eyes are atrocious.”
I reach up self-consciously. “I don’t have bags!”
She points at my chest. “Your sweater’s also on backwards.”
I look down, and shit. It is. The tag is sticking out near my collarbone.
“See?” Maria says, raising a brow. “You need a break. I’ll take Emma. She’ll be fine.”
My mother nods enthusiastically. “Yes, yes. Is good. You rest. And you put ad in paper for new nanny. You find someone good this time.”
“I’ve been trying to find someone good!”
“You find someone better. Someone who understand children. Someone with patience.” She pauses, and I can see the gears turning. “Or you move home! We have space. Emma could have her own room. I cook for you every night. You don’t have to worry—”
“Ma, I’m not moving home.”
“Why not? Is good solution. You’re so tired. You’re—”
“I’m not moving home. I’ll figure it out.”
She looks at me for a long moment, and I can see she wants to argue, but Maria puts a hand on her arm. “He’ll figure it out, Ma.”
My mother sighs again, heavier this time. “Fine. But you put the ad in paper today. Today, Leonidas. Not tomorrow. Today.”
“I will.”
“And you eat something before you go. You’re too skinny.”
“I ate.”
“A pretzel is not eating!”
“I’ll grab something on campus, Ma! Don’t worry.”
She mutters something in Greek that I don’t quite catch but is probably about how I’m going to waste away to nothing.
Then she reaches up and pats my cheek, hard enough that it stings a little.
“You’re a handsome boy. A good boy. A good father.
But you need help. Everyone needs help sometimes. Is not weakness.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
I don’t answer that.
Maria checks her watch. “You should go if you want to make your lecture on time.”
She’s right. I check my watch. 10:51. I need to leave now if I’m going to make it.
“Okay,” I look toward the back office. “Tell Dad I said hi since I didn’t catch him. And tell Emma I’ll see her tomorrow?”
“We’ll tell them,” Maria says.
“And don’t let her eat too much chocolate. And no more Basic Instinct, Maria.”
My mother waves me off. “Go, go. We take care of her. She’s fine. You go teach your students about the brains.”
“Brain, Ma. Just the brain.”
“That’s what I said.”
I head for the door, and just as I’m about to leave, my mother calls after me, using the nickname only her and my father use. “Leoni!”
I turn.
“You’re doing good. I know it doesn’t feel like it, but you are.”
A lump swells in my throat. I nod, and push my way out into the rain.