Jeffery kissed him on the forehead and turned. As he loped into the bathroom, Evan felt a tug in his chest. He wanted alcohol, and not just one drink. He felt this overwhelming desire to put on his clothes, run out of the apartment, and hit the first bar he saw.
Chapter Eleven
"Did you see that girl?" Kenny asked Evan.
"No, who are you talking about? What girl?" Evan hadn't been paying attention to anything except getting through the afternoon without going into a bar for a drink. It was Saturday afternoon, they'd gone out shopping because Kenny needed a new coat, and Evan hadn't heard from Jeffery in two days. This wasn't unusual, not completely. It happened sometimes when Jeffery was busy working on something important. Evan knew he was concentrating on the social media venture because the stock hadn't been doing well since it had gone public.
Kenny grabbed his dad's arm and pulled him closer so he could whisper. "There are a couple of people over there near the corner and one of the girls gave me a look. She's like really hot, Dad."
When Evan turned to look, Kenny grabbed his arm and said, "Don't be so obvious. I don't want her to know I noticed."
Evan smiled. "Okay, I won't look. Let's get something to eat. You must be starved." They were standing outside a small restaurant in the West Village. Evan wasn't hungry at all; he rarely ate lunch. But he knew his growing teenage son could eat two lunches a day and still be hungry.
When they entered the restaurant, the head waiter told them he'd have a table ready in a moment. On Saturday afternoons in the West Village, Evan knew they were lucky to get any table anywhere because there were so many tourists from New Jersey and Connecticut. He'd completely dismissed the girl Kenny had been talking about a minute earlier until Kenny grabbed his arm again and started to whisper.
"Don't look, but they are coming in here," Kenny said.
Evan remained still, terrified to move his head in any direction. "Who are you talking about now? Who's coming in here?"
"The hot girl with the other two people," Kenny said. "You have to do me a favor."
Evan's head went up. "What kind of favor?"
Kenny did not answer him. Before Evan had a chance to ask another question, the three people Kenny had been talking about stepped into the restaurant and stood behind them. Evan took a quick glance and saw a nice-looking young woman with long blond hair, another young woman with brown hair, and a tall young man wearing a brown leather sport jacket. He didn't think any of them were all that special. And they looked overly prepped, trying hard to be cool, as if they'd just hopped off a bus from New Jersey.
While Kenny stood there sending furtive glances to the young blond woman, the head waiter returned and said, "We have your table." Then looked over Kenny's shoulder and spoke to the tall guy in the brown leather sport jacket standing behind Evan. "I'm afraid there won't be any more tables for at least a half hour. We're extremely busy today."
Without missing a beat, Kenny interjected in a move that reminded Evan of Jeffery when he wanted something he thought was important. Kenny said, "How big is our table? Can you seat five there?"
Evan's jaw fell. He had no idea what his son was doing.
The head waiter said, "I'm sure we can. No problem."
Kenny turned to the young blond woman and said, "You're welcome to join us. My brother and I don't mind."
Evan grabbed Kenny's arm and squeezed it hard. He glared at him and said, "Your brother?"
The blond girl asked, "Are you sure there's room?"
Kenny sent Evan a look and smiled at the blond girl. "Yeah, man. We have plenty of room."
Evan rolled his eyes. He knew words like "man" and "dude" were interchangeable nowadays. It was evident that Kenny wanted Evan to pretend they were brothers so he could get to know the young blond woman. So Evan shrugged and said, "That's fine. But we can't stay long. We have that party to go to later tonight." Although this was not something Evan would ever have thought of doing, he found it amusing to see how eager his son was to get to know this young woman. He figured it wouldn't hurt to play along for a little while. He would simply sit quietly and observe the younger people.
The head waiter escorted them to the back of the small narrow restaurant. On the way, Evan leaned into Kenny and said, "I'm going to get even with you, you little shit." He wasn't really angry. Evan didn't want to bruise his ego just when he was beginning to explore his own sexuality. They'd already had the dad/son talk about the facts of life and Evan knew Kenny wasn't shy about anything. Even though Evan had explained there were benefits to abstaining from sex and waiting for the right person to come along, hoping his son wouldn't start having sex too soon, he knew in reality not many young people paid attention to this advice. In fact, they'd been ignoring this same advice since the beginning of time.