Page 6 of The Hampton Beach Café 4
That was more than she had said about her father in one go in a long time. Even her conversations with Alex rested half on his existing knowledge of the situation.
“…again, wow.”
“Yeah.”
They fell silent as the waiter brought out three small bowls of appetizers. When he finally left, Kennedy spoke.
“I think it was my dad…who did the black eye. Around then, their fights got worse, and I remember one when he was really angry, and my mom yelled something like, 'Are you going to hit me too,' and I was really confused—my dad wasn't a violent man ever. That was the last fight they had before he left. He lives in New York now. I haven't seen him in a few years.”
“What about your mom?” Frances asked and was glad that Kennedy smiled in response.
“She was really sad for a really long time,” she said. “But about three years ago, when William started college, she met a man who was vacationing here. They live in Los Cabos now but come back for Christmas.”
William, the child that Kennedy seemed to think was the result of the affair that broke up the marriage. It wasn't totally impossible…in fact, it seemed likely, but Frances couldn't wrap her mind around having a half-brother she never knew about.
“Your brother…” Frances said. “He's going to be a doctor?”
Kennedy nodded proudly. “He's brilliant, and he wants to help people. When he was ten, he couldn't decide between doctor or an astronaut. He told me at his high school graduation he was going to compromise and be a doctor who specialized in treatment of people who are going to or have been to space. He's going to be a NASA medical specialist.”
“That's amazing.”
They settled into a silence again. Frances couldn't really think of anything else to say.
“Do you have kids?” Kennedy asked after a few moments.
“No,” she said with a sniff and a tight, practiced smile. “The man I married was never that interested, and I had a career that took over everything. Before I knew it, I turned forty and…well…”
She broke off. Kennedy's mom had been forty-two when she had William. Kennedy seemed to appreciate the decision because she smiled.
“It's hard at our age,” she said. “Not impossible, though, if that's what you want. I've had William. He might be my brother, but I raised him, and I'm proud of that.”
For all their differences and historic dislike of each other, they'd been going through the same thing, just on different sides. The conversation pivoted as the food arrived, and though a thin veneer of tension remained for the entire meal, they managed to finish it in peace. The food itself was incredible, and Frances left feeling happily full—emotionally and physically.
Maybe there was hope for her and Kennedy yet.
FOUR
The four o'clock lull had become the favorite time of day for all of the Café Bruno crew. Alex often showed up then to help reset the place while Lucinda and Vincent reviewed the evening plans with Frances. The bell tinkled, and Clarkson strode in across the floor, followed by the tall and imposing figure of Lauren Daniels.
“Well, hello there,” she said, talking over Clarkson's attempt to greet them first. “How are we all?”
Clarkson smiled forcefully. “I'm fantastic, thanks for asking.”
He leaned in to kiss Frances on the cheek before apparently remembering their little talk about not seeing each other anymore, not doing things that could lead to his overly enthusiastic fans thinking they were seeing each other, in addition to her being quite unhappy with him. Aborting the greeting halfway through, he changed the course of action into an awkward half-hug.
“I'm great. How are you, Lauren?” she asked around Clarkson's shoulder.
“Fabulous as always. Where's my favorite star?” she said in her agent's voice.
Breaking away from the awkward hug and rolling her eyes, Frances responded, “Vincent's in there with Lucinda.”
“Ah,” Lauren said, winking. “His guard dog consultant.”
If that was supposed to be an insult, Lauren was going about it wrong. Lucinda would love being likened to a Rottweiler for her clients. The fact that she had maintained her client load since coming to Hampton Beach with Frances three months ago was a constant source of amazement for Frances. She was just about coping with her café related workload and trying to sort out some of her family stuff. On top of dealing with her daily role at the café, keeping a handle on a range of clients, and grappling with a gambling problem that she didn't want anyone to know about, Lucinda had more than a full-time workload.
In addition to asking her about Vince, Frances resolved to have a proper check-in on how she was going with the gambling issue. They talked about it often, and Lucinda had been talking about going to a virtual meeting to step up her resilience.
Snapping back to the present, she turned her attention to Clarkson.
