Chapter 11 #3
“I’m not sure what to do about my family business,” I said. “My great-grandfather started a restaurant, Walter’s Café.”
For the rest of the ride to the lighthouse, which Shane had wanted to visit (again), I told them about my family’s problems. It had started with difficulties after the broken water pipes and subsequent flood a few years back, something that Johnny Bishop understood well since he was in the insurance game.
“That will set you back,” he mentioned and also had questions about our coverage. He winced slightly (and I happened to catch that in the mirror) when I disclosed how underinsured we’d been.
I told them about our struggles to recover from that, like my dad borrowing money from predatory lenders and then gambling, two terrible strategies.
I also got into my mom’s issues with bookkeeping (she’d used actual ledgers and not accounting programs, which had been one of her problems) and how much we owed on the family house.
“Now that my dad is gone and the restaurant needs repairs, I don’t think we’ll ever reopen,” I concluded.
“That’s a hard situation,” his mother sympathized.
“It’s embarrassing, too,” I said. “I can’t really believe that everyone behaved that way.
My sister and my brother didn’t want to help but I really did.
I really did,” I repeated. “Not that I’m some kind of hero, because I wasn’t always making things better.
I argued a lot with everyone and I had a bad attitude that dragged us all down.
If I had dropped out of school, I could have helped a lot more financially.
My dad was furious with me because I refused.
I had thought that with a degree, I’d be in a much better position to do something for our family. ”
“Like what?” Nedra asked. “What did you plan to do for a career?”
It was funny that she wanted to know, because I’d been thinking about that a lot. “I didn’t have much of a plan,” I admitted. “I still don’t.”
“Molly has submitted so many applications,” Shane said. “She’s just not getting any bites.”
“For what type of positions?” his mom persisted. “What is your experience? What’s your degree in? What do you want to do?”
“I don’t have any real experience except for working in restaurants,” I said.
“But you were doing a lot of different jobs at Walter’s,” Shane reminded me. “Customer service, bookkeeping, security, housekeeping, management.”
“I guess so. I got a finance degree because I thought it would help me with our business, but it was a lot of vagueness. I did like the actual number parts about it, but not the theory,” I said.
She thought that I might enjoy bookkeeping or even becoming an accountant, which would have involved more school and studying but could have been a long-term goal. I started to feel a little more hopeful, maybe even enthusiastic.
Then she looked in the back seat, at her son. “What about you, honey?”
“What about me?” he asked. “I’m good. I told you that I’m getting promoted.”
That didn’t seem to make her happy. “I’m glad about that, but in the future, how will your job work for you?”
“I’ll keep going until it doesn’t.”
“But—”
“Mom,” he stated, cutting her off. “Let’s not start that up again.”
We went the rest of the way to the lighthouse in silence.
His dad had a bad knee and didn’t want to do all the stair-climbing that it took to reach the lookout at the top, but Shane and I went up again.
We stared at the vast expanse of water that ended miles and miles away at the shoreline of the Upper Peninsula, which my eyes couldn’t begin to make out.
I looked over at his, wondering what he could see.
“I love this,” he said. “Whenever I go to a new town, I try to find the high point. Not the most exciting place but the literal highest, so I can look around. It’s amazing how small you can feel.” He pointed off into the distance. “What’s out there? We don’t really know.”
“Sea monsters?” I suggested.
“I didn’t notice those on any of the informational signs here.”
I had been trying to be funny to lighten the dark mood that had hovered over us since his mother had asked about his job, but I didn’t succeed. He was still frowning as he looked across the lake.
“Are you mad at your mom?” I asked. “I can tell you from experience with my family that it’s better to talk about things, not let everyone hate each other for years upon years.”
“I don’t hate my mom, of course not. I just don’t know what she expects me to say,” Shane told me. “I’m not going to quit my job just because it may not work for me sometime in the future. That’s crazy.”
“I don’t think she meant that. But it’s a bad idea to guess someone’s thoughts, since we don’t really know what’s happening in another person’s head.” For example, I never would have guessed that my father planned to run away and ditch us. “I think she’s worried about you becoming me.”
“Pardon?”
“Like, that you’ll wake up one day, such as the day of your graduation, and you’ll come to the realization that you should have done a hell of a lot more preparation because there’s your life, looming in front of you like a lake with sea monsters, and you’re not ready for that at all,” I explained.
He put his arm around my shoulders. “You’re doing ok.”
Maybe I could be, someday, but I should have braced for it. “I don’t want that for you. It’s very upsetting,” I stated. “What if you talked to the Woodsmen about accommodations?”
“I can’t imagine what those would be. A coach needs to see the game and I can.”
Right now, yes.
He pulled away his arm. “I’m not willing to give up on my life,” he told me. “Not even if you and my mom want me to.”
“I certainly don’t want that. I’m with you,” I told him. “I mean, I’m in your corner and if you plan to try for the head coach job, I’ll do my best to you get there.”
“Thank you, but that’s not what I’m after.”
“Then what? I do think that you should have a plan,” I said.
“I plan to have lunch soon. What do you think? Are you hungry?”
I nodded mutely. It seemed like his life was simultaneously heading down two separate tracks: one led him on a cautious, prudent route where he was concerned about his financial security, but the other followed the tenuous path of coaching football at the highest level.
Finding success on that track would have been difficult for anyone, and how would he do it when he was losing his eyesight?
I understood his mother’s fears but I also understood that if I pressed, I would lose a friend. And maybe it was selfish (I knew that it was), but I didn’t want to lose him.
“Good golly,” his mom panted as she joined us. “That was a climb!” She looked around. “Look at this view! It’s just like the ocean, isn’t it? I didn’t know a lake could be so fearsome.”
“I didn’t know you were coming up here. I would have helped you,” her son told her.
Everybody needed that at times, and he needed ours.
It wasn’t just giving him rides at night or pointing out that someone was waiting for his treadmill at the gym.
But how could you force someone to listen to you?
I had failed at that with Morgan, Max, and my parents.
Now we didn’t even speak, not really, and we certainly didn’t care about each other. Maybe I could work on that…
But I wouldn’t make the same mistakes again with Shane.