Free Last Call by Baxter Clare Page A

cuts straight to the point.
    “You miss your dad pretty bad?” Leslie shrugs. She doesn’t look up from the book in her lap, so Frank admits, “I do. He was my best friend.”
    The admission gets her nowhere. But for Noah’s sake Frank tries another tack. She pulls in a deep, silent breath, sounding before she dives into the benthic mess of emotion.
    “I know how you feel, Les. When I was about your age, maybe a little younger, more like Jamie’s age, my dad died, too. It was real quick. One minute he was there and the next he was gone. I felt like the whole world had ended. I thought I was gonna die too. I wanted to.”
    Leslie’s hair hangs over her face. Frank tucks a curtain of it behind a rather large ear. Les is a beauty but she got her daddy’s ears. This vestige of Noah is sharp and wickedly painful, but Frank pushes through her discomfort. She will see this through, for Leslie and for Noah.
    “You ever feel like that?”
    The head bobs.
    “Yeah. You will for a while. It feels bad for a long time. But then one day, and you don’t know which day it’ll be, you’ll wake up and you’ll forget to feel bad. You’ll remember later in the day, and you’ll feel bad, but then it’ll go away again. The hurt gets softer and softer.”
    Leslie offers no indication she’s heard.
    Frank asks, “Remember when you broke your ankle, how bad it hurt?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Does it hurt today?”
    “No.”
    “But it hurt for a while after you broke it, didn’t it?”
    “Yeah.”
    “That’s what this is like. I know it sucks big-time, but I promise it’ll get better someday.”
    A droplet falls onto the open book and Leslie whispers, “I want someday to be today.”
    Taking Leslie’s hand, Frank whispers back, “I know. But it can’t be. It’s impossible. Like having your ankle fixed right away. It took time. This will too. But it will get better. I promise.”
    Frank wipes Leslie’s cheeks with her thumbs and Leslie blurts, “I want him back.”
    “I know, Les. Me too. We all do. But we can’t have him back. Now it’s just you and Markie and Jamie and your mom. And you gotta love each other even more to fill that empty space your dad left.”
    “Nothing can fill that.” She gulps.
    Frank cradles the little chin between both her hands. She speaks the words without thinking them, and will wonder later where they came from. “Love will. You gotta trust me on this. I know it doesn’t seem like it right now, but if you love each other enough, that hole’s going to fill up someday. It may not fill completely up. No one can ever replace your dad, but I promise it won’t hurt quite this bad.” Looking into the pools of hurt that are Leslie’s young eyes, Frank knows she can’t stay much longer. “Do you trust me?”
    Leslie nods.
    “Okay. Come on downstairs. Your family misses you. Your mom needs her oldest girl and Markie and Jamie need their big sister.”
    Leslie lets Frank lead her downstairs. While Tracey dishes spaghetti at the table Frank disappears into the kitchen. She opens another bottle of wine, chugging an entire glass before returning to the dining room. Tracey smiles her thanks as Frank realizes the only empty chair is Noah’s. She fills Tracey’s glass, then her own.
    “Do you want me to sit there?”
    Tracey waves her toward it. Mark and Leslie stare and Jamie says, “It’s okay.”
    “Okay with you, Les?”
    “No one else is there.” She pouts.
    “Right,” Frank agrees.
    The talk during dinner is quiet but easy. Frank marvels how Trace and the kids neither avoid Noah nor dwell on him. Later, Frank does the dishes while Tracey tucks the kids in bed. The two bottles of wine that Frank brought are empty. She opens a third soldier that Tracey produced, a cheap but serviceable Cab. Finished in the kitchen, she waits for Tracey at the table. She swirls the wine in her glass, watching it run down the sides. Frank is thinking this is more entertaining than a lava lamp when Tracey