Page 25 of Second Alarm
"Yeah." Cal nods, thinking. "Yeah, that's right. That's actually — yeah."
"There you go," Hanna says.
"You know what, you've described, like, a solid seventy percent of the guys on my crew."
"Have I."
"Derek. Derek fits that."
"Derek doesn't fit that," Hanna says.
"Rivera. Rivera fits it. Aiden fits it but he's engaged."
"Aiden is engaged," Hanna says.
"Ty fits it," Cal says.
"Calvin," Mom Larsen says, "pass the rolls."
"No, I'm saying — "
"The rolls, Calvin."
"Mom. I'm — I'm just noting the shape of the — "
"The rolls," she says.
Cal passes the rolls.
Across the table, Hanna has finally looked up. She's looking at her mother. Her mother is looking at the rolls.
I eat another piece of pot roast. It's, as pot roast goes, excellent. I chew it with the methodical thoroughness of a man who's trying to make a piece of pot roast last several minutes.
Mom Larsen clears her throat. "How's the chemo, you asked. It's fine. The doctors say the scans are clean. They'll keep scanning. That's what they do. You don't need to worry."
"I'll worry."
"You aren't allowed," Hanna says.
"I'll worry anyway."
"Tyler." Mom Larsen puts her hand over mine, on the table, and squeezes. "You're a good boy. Calvin, stop matchmaking my daughter at my table. Hanna, eat your rolls, you got thin. Everyone will mind their business, or I'll take back the pot roast."
"Yes, ma'am," the three of us answer, in unison.
Cal looks pleased. Cal is always pleased when his mother pretends to threaten us.
Under the table, my foot is a quarter inch from Hanna's. Neither of us moves. Both of us know. Mom Larsen, next to me, takes her hand off mine, picks up the salt, and passes it to her daughter without asking, because Hanna takes too little salt, and Mom Larsen has been salting Hanna's food from across tables for years.
I finish my pot roast.
I help clean up. I dry the dishes Hanna washes. We don't speak. We've never washed dishes in this kitchen before. I don't know how I know where the dishtowels are, but I do.
When I leave, Mom Larsen walks me to the porch. She hugs me the small hug. She pats me the fourth pat of the evening, which is a rule break, and she looks up at me in the porch light.
"Tyler."
"Yes, ma'am."
