Last night, I was living a scene from a film. It went like this:
We were leaving an Italian restaurant. The pizza was shit. The service was worse, but not as bad as their poorly mixed fountain root beer.Â
I begged my mother to hand over the keys to my cars so I could drive home. My uncle hopped in the backseat, carrying on a conversation he'd been holding since half-way through our meal. He could talk your ears off. I always say a little prayer for the receiver.
We didn't talk much in the lot; I looked at my phone, mama smoked her post-meal cigarette. She isn't allowed to smoke in my car anymore after I'd been singed on a night drive to Arcadia a few weeks ago.
She stamped it out, my uncle was still on the phone, bitching about Bank of America.
"Bank of Assholes," he said. My mom and I laughed. "I like Chase because I liked Washington Mutual."
We passed by my old babysitter's house, Sandy. I wondered about Grandma then said, rolling to the STOP sign, "Washington Mutual ruined banking in America."
"Yup," mama agreed.
"All that free shit. Free checking, free accounts. Now look at us. It's impossible to sell something that used to be free."
I turn left, and it's quiet for a while. My uncle goes on about how much he hates Wells Fargo for fucking over my mom while she worked there. We pass by my bank on the right when I rounded the corner on Grand.
"Shit," mama said, "should have stayed on Mauna Loa."
CalTrans decided to start another half-assed project on the 210 overpass. Grand was down to a lane and backed up to the church. I signaled left for Baseline.
"Are you gonna be okay?" mama asked.
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"When I leave. Are you gonna be okay?"
What she was really asking was, "are you gonna miss me?"
Sure, we were at a red light, down to one lane at nine o' clock at night. If the car ahead of him pulled up a smidge, I could have weaseled my way into the turn lane.
But yeah. I'm gonna miss her.
