Page 58 of The Sky in Summer
“Hi, Jesse Two Fingers!”
“She was a bank robber in the nineteen fifties. You can’t see it here, but she is missing a few fingers.”
“Would you say two?” I tease.
She gives me an adorable look. I think of that word so often when I look at her.
“It’s a valid assumption,” she answers.
“Me now,” Tyler says, holding his picture to his chest. An old Asian man stares at the camera and he sits on a straight backed chair. He wears pants, but no shirt. It is a beautiful photograph of the ravages of age.
“Who the hell isthat?!!!”
“This is Paul Smith. I can’t think of a Chinese name!”
“That’s okay, son!” my father calls.
I don’t want to burst his bubble, but that guy is not Chinese.
“Hi, Paul!”
“What’s his story?” Layla asks.
“He had the most children of any man in the twentieth century.”
Good one. I think he made it up, but he may be a natural at the game.
“Ohhhhhh. You are good, Mr. Silver,” my mother says, looking at him through narrowed eyes.
I can bank on her intuitive mind. I am betting on the lie.
“Okay,” she says, taking out the photograph.
It is a long shot of a dancing woman. She looks happy as shit. But she is modestly dressed compared to the people in the background, and her makeup and hair are flawlessly done.
“Who the hell isthat?!!!”
“Meet Betty White. No relation to the actress we know today, but an actress nonetheless. And she is otherwise known as Sister Ignacious!”
The cat calls and whistles interrupt our response for a few beats.
“Hi, Sister Ignacious!”
“That is clearly some deep bullshit,” Aargon says.
But our mother just stares him down and continues the narrative.
“Betty joined the Holy Sisters of Mt. Carmel shortly after this picture was taken. Years later she became the Mother Superior of the entire order, nationwide.”
Leave it to Aurora to come up with something creative. If she is lying, that is. She hardly has to try at all to make everything she says sound like fact.
“I don’t even know if you are lying through your teeth!” Gaston says to his bride. “After all these years.”
“Oh, Dad, I gave you the wrong envelope,” Scarlett says, passing another manila envelope to him and taking the one he had.
“Wait! I will need a full minute to come up with a story! Or not. What kind of fuckery is this?”
We all laugh, but it is the teenagers who are charmed by the man and his use of profanity at the table. They respect him for it.
