Enchilada Ed

13

"What are you singing?" Ed's dad lay in the living room, his legs sprawled over the couch, a vodka-and-tonic sweating on a coaster on the coffee table. A rerun of the 1971 Frazier-Ali fight played muted on ESPN. Ed peeked in at his dad from the hallway.

"Sorry," he unzipped his jacket and reached for a hanger in the front coat closet. "I'll be quiet."

"Don't apologize." Ed's dad sat up. "You're always apologizing. Like a woman."

"Sorry-" Ed immediately caught himself, "I mean-"

"I just wanted to know what you were singing."

"I don't know the name." Ed hung his jacket on the coat closet rack. "It was on the radio and-"

"You've got a terrible singing voice," Ed's dad massaged his temples. "Thank God for that. I can only take one musician in our family."

"We all know you're embarrassed by Mike."

"I'm not embarrassed by Mike," Ed's dad said icily. "I just don't want two of him."

"Gotcha," Ed started for the kitchen.

"You sounded like you were trying to put on some kind of southern accent."

"I wasn't." Ed stopped, and turned toward his dad. "It's just a country song and the guy who sings it has a twang."

"Lordy." Ed's dad laughed sardonically. "I grow up in Northeast Philly and my son is singing country music."

"It's not that bad."

"It's not that great," Ed's dad countered. "How was work?"

Work. Ed had a vision of Audra out of breath in the science building's parking lot. And then the cacti, the sea-green watering can, the black-burgundy hair.

"Awesome," he smiled, "it was awesome."

"I've never seen someone look so happy about scrubbing toilets at a Mexican joint," Ed's dad lay back on the couch. "Did your boss finally capitulate and grant you the free left over burrito, or what?"

"Yeah, sure." Ed continued to the kitchen.

The fridge was mostly empty. Ed wondered why he hadn't stopped at the Chick Fil A on his way home. He resigned himself to cracking some eggs and making an omelet. The one good thing that came out his mom's sabbatical (for the Homo edwardus, if not the Ursus maritimus), was that Ed was forced to learn to cook some basic things (including Noah's oatmeal in the mornings. As annoying as the little squirt was, it was a good thing Ed didn't salt that morning's bowl. Their dad would have found it in the trash and Ed's ass would be on the line for spoiling perfectly useful food). There was half a green pepper in the vegetable drawer (but no clue as to what happened to the other half) and some tomatoes (but no ham and no cheese). Oh well, he could at least do a simple scramble. He grabbed the egg carton, and the bottle of Tabasco from the condiment tray, and set them on the counter. He knelt on the floor beside the kitchen island and retrieved a frying pan. A thin beam of overhead light bounced off the Tabasco bottle above Ed and caught his eye as he stood up. A thought occurred to him. Ed walked to the living room. His dad's eyes were closed. The glass which had held his vodka-and-tonic was now nearly empty. Ed sat down on the loveseat.

"You awake?" Ed's voice jostled his dad's eyes open.

"Huh?" Ed's dad lifted up his head. "What do you want?"

"Nothing," Ed stretched his legs out in front of him, in the awkward manner of a gangly child.

"You're just going to sit there and stare at your feet?" Ed's dad said. "You must want something."

"Did you know that Hall and Oates are going to have a concert at the Furnace Plaza this August?" Ed asked.

"I did not know that," Ed's dad nestled his head back onto his pillow.

"Mike told me about it the other day. He's gonna take Yessica."

"You mean Yessica is going to take him." Ed's dad shut his eyes. "She's the breadwinner after all."

"I think Mike's going to pay for the tickets." Ed argued, "he makes a decent salary-"

"Which he spends entirely on overpriced sneakers and designer sweatpants," Ed's dad said. "What's the big thing this time, Yeezy?"

"They don't call them sweatpants anymore. It's athleisure."

"It's lazy."

"You're right," Ed conceded, "but I was thinking maybe you'd like to go?"

"I'd like to go where?"

"To the Hall and Oates concert."

"Why the hell would I want to go to a Hall and Oates concert?" Ed's dad opened his eyes, startled.

"I know you like them," Ed explained, "and Mike said that you went to one of their concerts when he was seven."

"Mike's mother likes them. I couldn't care less."

"But you listen to 'Sara Smile' enough-"

Ed's dad flinched.

"And them being from Philadelphia, and your 'time,' I assumed-" Ed trailed off.

"Don't make assumptions unless you have evidence to stand on," Ed's dad said in a voice that made Ed wish he had never started the conversation, "and you can tell Mike that if Yessica doesn't want to take him, I'm not going to pay for his ticket."

"Mike can afford his own ticket," Ed said sheepishly. "He'll just lay off the new Nikes for a while. I wasn't trying to give you the impression that-"

"Why else would you come and talk to me about a Hall and Oates concert, then?"

"I don't know," Ed stood up. "Father-son bonding or something corny." He walked to the kitchen. Ed didn't bother to explain that he had thought about buying the tickets himself, or that he had even wanted to see the show at all.

***

Ed spent the rest of the night reading about outlaw country on Wikipedia. He read a lot about The Highwaymen, the super group assembled by Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings and Kris Kristofferson and the sainted Johnny Cash. He fell asleep listening to their entire 1992 Farm Aid concert on YouTube.

***