Chapter 3: The Name That Should Have Been Forgotten
I stood in that diner and stared at my son's handwriting until the letters blurred.
The name at the top of the list was Walter Greer.
My husband's father.
A man I had not spoken to since the day of my husband's funeral, when he stood at the graveside and said, loud enough for me to hear, that his son had wasted his life marrying me.
I hadn't told Evan any of that.
He was ten when his father died.
He barely remembered the funeral.
"Evan." My voice came out flat.
"How do you know that name?"
He was still on the floor.
He pulled his knees up and looked at his hands.
"He found me," Evan said.
"About eight months ago.
He was waiting outside school."
"He was waiting outside your school."
"Mom—"
"He approached you.
Without telling me."
"He said he didn't think you'd let him see me if he asked."
The boss quietly stepped back toward the kitchen.
The older man against the wall hadn't moved.
I looked at him properly for the first time.
He was in his sixties, maybe older.
Thin.
A jacket that had seen better years.
Shoes with a crack along the left sole.
"Are you Walter?" I asked.
He nodded once.
"You went to my son's school."
"I know how that sounds."
"Do you?"
He flinched.
"I just wanted to see him.
I wasn't going to— I didn't plan any of this."
"Then what exactly did you plan?"
He didn't answer.
Evan did.
"He's sick, Mom."
The word landed quietly.
I turned back to my son.
"What?"
"His heart.
He told me at the beginning.
He said he didn't have anyone and he didn't know how long he had and he just wanted to know if I was okay." Evan's jaw tightened.
"He cried.
Right there on the sidewalk.
I didn't know what to do."
I looked at Walter.
He was staring at the floor.
"So you started giving him money," I said to Evan.
"Not at first.
We just talked.
Every couple of weeks.
He'd wait near the bus stop after school and we'd walk to the park." Evan finally stood up.
"Then I found out he was living in a room above a laundromat and eating once a day because his medication cost too much."
"Evan—"
"He's Dad's dad, Mom."
The room went quiet.
I sat down in the nearest chair because I didn't trust my legs anymore.
Walter spoke without looking up.
"I don't want anything from you.
I never did.
I told Evan the same thing.
I told him to stop."
"He wouldn't listen," the boss said from the kitchen doorway.
He had a dish towel over his shoulder and his arms crossed.
"That's what the fight was about tonight.
The man came in to give the money back.
Evan wouldn't take it."
I looked at my son.
"You fought him over it."
"He was trying to give back four months of savings." Evan's voice cracked for the first time.
"He said it wasn't right.
That I needed it for myself.
I told him I didn't need a bike.
I never needed a bike."
Something moved in my chest that I didn't have a name for.
"How much?" I asked.
The boss picked up the notebook and turned it toward me.
The total at the bottom was written in red and underlined twice.
Six hundred and forty dollars.
My thirteen-year-old son had given his grandfather six hundred and forty dollars, one paycheck at a time, and told me he was saving for a bike.
Walter finally looked up.
His eyes were wet.
"I tried to stop him," he said.
"Every time.
He wouldn't hear it."
I looked at my son standing there with scraped knuckles and a torn collar, and I didn't know whether to hold him or fall apart entirely.
Then Walter said the thing that broke me open.
"He has his father's face.
May you like
Did you know that?
The exact same face."
