Free Dive by Adele Griffin Page A

answer. “You have to be a hundred percent ready for them.”
    “Hope you feel a hundred percent ready to see me,” Mom says, flashing me a kindergarten-teacher smile and turning on the radio, which is set on a good hits station.
    Just this afternoon, I’d told Mallory how I didn’t care if I ever saw Mom again for the rest of my life. She’d called me a liar and she’d been right, because actually it’s not bad at all to be with Mom, sitting in the front passenger seat of her buggy car and listening to a good hits station. It reminds me of old times. We sing along with the music and of course Mom knows all the words.
    The restaurant is far away and made out of glass and different from any other place I’ve been. First thing I see is a waterfall splashing into a pool right in the middle of the room. It makes people’s voices echo into a big waterlogged noise.
    Mom is wearing a red dress with white dots on it, but other ladies are looking show-offish, too, in tiny skirts and tall heels. Everywhere are fat guys chewing steak or cigars, and the piano singer lady is practically topless. The whole restaurant could be described as super fancy in a rated-R way.
    “Your eyes are saucers,” Mom says as we sit at our table. “You’ll have to do a better job not to stare.” She wriggles in her seat. “Isn’t this funsie?”
    I try to recall if I ever heard Mom use that word funsie before, and I decide no.
    The waiter brings us menus and Mom says, “A nice bottle of red to start, please.” I’d forgot about Mom and red wine. She used to drink it every night, even with fried-egg sandwiches.
    When the wine comes, Mom toasts to how grown-up I look and says how I remind her of Dad.
    I tell her that I can’t really remember what Dad looks like anymore. “I haven’t seen him since fourth grade,” I say.
    “He’s been no kind of father.” Mom’s eyes get mean. “Old Frank. What a burnout.”
    “He sends birthday cards with money in them,” I say. “And he calls me on Christmas.”
    “Oh, throw that one at me.” Mom’s laugh is out of tune. “Last Christmas I was on a boat in the middle of nowhere, Ben. There weren’t any phones.”
    “I wasn’t comparing you two,” I tell her. And I don’t think I was but maybe I was.
    We go quiet as we read our menus.
    The prices aren’t listed next to the food, so I have to guess what’s the most expensive. I figure it has to be the shark. I bet sharks are hard to catch. I also ask the waiter for some sweetbread to start, in case the shark tastes bad.
    Mom barks out laughing when she hears my order and calls me a brave man. She orders a steak filet and takes a lot of time explaining to the waiter how she wants it cooked.
    After the waiter leaves, she starts right in, telling me about the vet clinic and her scuba and how the weather here is good for her sinuses. I am sort of listening and also watching the restaurant people. It’s the kind of place where you might expect some gangsters to show up and start a shootout. In fact, there’s one guy at the table ahead of us who could pass for a gangster no problem. Could even be a gun in his side jacket pocket. Gangsters call it packing heat.
    “And I counted, Ben,” Mom is saying. “Isn’t that awful? But it’s true. Eighteen months. It made me want to cry.”
    “What?”
    “That we’ve been apart for eighteen months. Ben! Haven’t you been listening to me?”
    “Maybe I can come see you this summer,” I tell her. “Like if I have some free time after scouts camp, unless Lyle wants to rent that cabin upstate. Last year he did, I told you about it, right? How it was on a lake and we rented canoes? But if we don’t do that, I’ll come over here to visit you and Dustin. Okay?”
    “Don’t put yourself out,” Mom says, sarcastic. She looks into her glass and swirls the wine around. “I’ve always imagined a special bond between us, a mother-and-son bond,” she tells the wine. “I gave birth to you, Ben.