Fancy Dancer Read Online Free PDF

tea?”
    “Yeah, it’s good.”
    “My mom makes it from different tea leaves. She owns the restaurant she used to work at when she met... And before you ask, she bought it working around the clock, and he didn’t give a penny toward it. Actually, we just paid off the mortgage last year. That’s how my mother met our . . . the sperm donor. She was a waitress and he swept her off her feet. She was only seventeen at the time. She doesn’t . . . she just told me what she thought I needed to know back then when I had questions. I found out the rest over the years. I’m not getting any of this. What is it you want from us?”
    “Not a damn thing. I want to do something for you and your mother. I told you, it’s what my mother wanted. I promised her. So, tell me, what can I do for you?”
    “Not a damn thing, bro . We’re doing just fine on our own. This place,” Alex said, waving his arm about, “might not be up to your standards, but it’s how most of America lives. I wouldn’t trade it for all the palatial mansions in the world.”
    Jake didn’t like the sarcasm he was hearing in his brother’s voice. He winced.
    This wasn’t going to be easy. He looked up when he saw a man in a baseball cap standing at the kitchen door. The tag on his shirt said A-1 REFRIGERATION.
    “Mr. Rosario, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but your unit is shot. You need a new one. I can have it installed tomorrow if you want.”
    “Crap!” Alex slapped at his forehead. “How much?”
    “It will be seventy-two hundred dollars, including labor.”
    “Can’t you jury-rig it?”
    “It’s been jury-rigged so many times, there’s nothing left to jury-rig. So, what’s it going to be? I got six more service calls today.”
    “Give me a few minutes; I need to call my mother to see what she wants to do.”
    Though he knew he should try not to listen, Jake strained to hear every word his brother was saying. The bottom line to Jake was that they didn’t have that much cash on hand. He waited.
    Alex ended the call. If he was embarrassed that Jake had heard any part of the conversation, he didn’t show it. “What kind of installment plan do you have?”
    “Twenty percent down and the rest spread over two years.”
    “Okay, order it. When do you want to do the paperwork?”
    “Tomorrow, when I get here.”
    “That’ll work.”
    When the door closed behind the technician, Alex said, “Where were we?”
    “You were telling me you didn’t need anything and middle America lives the way you and your mom live. I was about to agree with you and tell you how much I like this house, especially the kitchen. Growing up, my mother and I ate at this very long dining-room table. It sucked. I don’t think she knew how to cook. My mother, that is. But she did make me hot cocoa when I was sick, and sometimes she made cookies. They were very good. She called them sugar cookies. They were like cake.”
    “Well then, let me tell you how it was here. Jonah St. Cloud had his lawyer give my mother just enough money for us to get by. He did pay Mom’s hospital bills. My mother had to keep working and pay for day care when I was little. As I got older and needed more stuff, a friend of hers convinced her to get a lawyer to ask for more money. The skunk tried to fight it, but Mom held firm, so he increased her monthly allotment. Not by much, but it did help. He only paid for a quarter of my college. Mom banked it because I worked my way through. That’s how she was finally able to pay off the restaurant. I have to tell you, to this day, my mother never said a bad word about that man. I, on the other hand, let it rip, and she’d look at me with those big eyes of hers and tell me she was ashamed of me. So, you see, I know what that feels like. It was all her workers, who are incredibly loyal to my mother, who chipped in and bought me a clunker of a car when I was old enough to drive. I had to learn to be a mechanic because it kept breaking down. Mom