Free Stranger in Dadland by Amy Goldman Koss

Liz’s boyfriend. Jet would be good for a few laughs, with his shaved head and everything.
    But we got to the restaurant before Dad was finished talking about his work. It was a seafood place and it smelled likeit. We got a table and were just looking at the menu, when a man and woman suddenly appeared and said, “Matt! What are you doing here? Haven’t seen you in, well, way too long!”
    Handshakes, kisses, introductions, and then, of course, two chairs being dragged over to our table. Sure, they’d be
delighted
to join us!
    I slumped down and kicked the leg of the table. Kick. Kick, kick, kick—until my father said, “Hey, Big Guy, cut that out.”
    I was three. I was Claude. I was having a tantrum, a sulk. Did I care if my father was ashamed of me?
No!
I gave the table leg another kick.
    First they had drinks and that took years. Then they had to discuss the menu
forever.
A typical adventure in Dadland, I thought. But this time I had to admit it wasn’t Cora’s fault. Maybe it had never been Cora’s fault. Or Bobbie’s, or…who was it the year before? I searched my memory until Nadine appeared. Liz and I secretly called her Sardine.
    Those women weren’t hogging Dad’s time, I realized, or keeping Dad away from us. Dadland was ruled by Dad. This was how he wanted it. He didn’t change plans just because his kids were in town. No, he did
exactly
what he would’ve done anyway. To him there was nothing special about this week, and I would always be a stranger here.
    Liz was right. Dad didn’t make room for us. I suddenly wished she were here in this stinking seafood restaurant with me. She’d have made it less awful.
    At first I’d been scared to go to California without her. Butthen I got used to the idea, and after a while I was really looking forward to it, imagining all kinds of great father-son moments we’d have, just the two of us. Boy, was I
stupid!
    Kick. Kick. And one more big
kick!
    Dad glared at me.
    The waiter brought our food but I’d lost my appetite. My father and his friends, however, were ripping the legs off crabs, prying clam shells open, tearing, dismembering, having a great time. Juice dribbled down the other man’s chin. It was the most violent meal I’d ever seen. I closed my eyes.
    No, I thought, this is definitely not Cora’s fault. Then I felt a little sorry about her crying her eyes out. That joke about clowns tasting funny wasn’t so bad, and except for her cats and her eyebrows and music and gum chewing, she was no worse than Bobbie or Sardine or the rest of them. No worse, probably, than next summer’s girlfriend would be. Cora had at least tried to say something nice about Ditz—that’s more than my own father did!
    Remembering Ditz made my chest tighten and I felt in my pocket for my inhaler. If I hadn’t come on this
stupid, stupid
trip, I probably would’ve caught her when she bolted out the door. I would have grabbed her collar as I had a thousand times before. I could see my hand sinking into her spongy black fur. I could feel my fist holding tight to her red leather collar. She’d have given a yank, then realizing she was caught, would have instantly forgotten about charging out the door and wiggled around to lick my face instead. No hard feelings.
    I went to the bathroom and gave myself two blasts frommy inhaler. That helped. I came back to the table but still-couldn’t eat my food.
    The adults didn’t notice. They splashed around in their plates, creating a funeral mound of shells in the center of the table while they talked and talked. It sounded like work stuff, mostly. Seems my dad did a project with this guy a while back. So what?
    If my dad had been a
mural
painter, dangling from scaffolding into the freeway ditch, then it would make sense that people would want to hear about it. If there were gigantic paintings by him all over town…But my father just scurried like an ant in a necktie from meeting to meeting.
    I watched him smiling, talking. He