“You don’t need to pack, mija,” Poppy told Zoey, patting her arm. “You’re staying home.”
Zoey’s heart floated up to the ceiling at the word. She was home? Home. Home! That meant Zoey could look forward to school in the fall without dread. They’d be at the Jersey Shore with Poppy long enough for her to try out for extracurricular activities. Maybe she’d make a junior varsity sports team. Or join the debate club, like Mami.
“So you’ll be commuting?” Zoey turned to Dad. “Are you taking the train or driving? Are you going to get back really late every night? If I make the girls’ soccer team, do you think you’ll be able to get back in time for my games?”
Dad frowned. “Kiddo, you’re talking at least a four-hour round trip with traffic. It’s too far to commute every day.”
Confused, Zoey’s eyes darted between Dad and Poppy. “I don’t understand. Are we moving or not?”
“I’m going to New York City. I’ll crash on Ryan’s couch while I get settled,” Dad said matter-of-factly.
Dad’s words completely knocked the wind out of her, like the time she and José had gone water tubing in Delaware and she’d been flung off, smacking hard into waves made in the boat’s wake.
Now suddenly Zoey felt like she was back in the water again, out of control and watching Dad speed off to a new adventure alone. But maybe she was overreacting, Zoey thought, trying to calm herself. Surely Dad didn’t mean he was really leaving them. He just needed a day or two to find their new apartment, Zoey reassured herself, and started breathing again.
But beside her, José’s mouth thinned into a grim line.
“You’re leaving.” There was no question in José’s tone, just accusation.
“It’s only temporary,” Dad said, avoiding eye contact and scrolling through his phone.
Zoey stared at Dad, silently willing him to look up. Despite all of his harebrained schemes, this was the first time he had ever talked about living without them. No, without her, Zoey realized with a jolt. Dad was only leaving her, since José would be at college soon.
“How long?” Zoey asked, her voice small. Moving suddenly sounded better than being abandoned by the only parent she had left. But Zoey was afraid if she said that out loud, then José would get all protective and shout at Dad. The last thing any of them needed was another huge fight.
“I don’t know, kiddo. I have the job on a trial basis. When the probation period’s up, I’ll come to get you.”
He turned his wide blue eyes on Zoey then, and she knew what he needed her to say. That she’d be okay. That everything was great. “Peacemaker” was Zoey’s role in the family, the same way José’s was “realist.” Whenever José yanked Dad down to reality, Zoey dusted Dad off and launched him back toward the stars. Mami used to do both, could balance Dad out with a single loving phrase, but ever since she’d died, the Finolio siblings split the job between them. If Mami were here, she would’ve asked Dad to join her in the kitchen, then convinced him in soft whispers not to leave while they cut up flan for dessert.
Zoey glanced away, frantically trying to think of a way to make Dad stay. For the first time ever, she didn’t want to just tell Dad that she was okay with his “big news.” Her gaze landed on a gold-framed photo of Mami on the boardwalk with Poppy and Abuela, in front of the bright red sign for Gonzo’s. Every letter was lit by a necklace of tiny yellow lights. Suddenly Zoey had an idea of how she might convince Dad not to go.
“Wait, hang on, Dad. You can’t leave because we have to save the bowling alley—”
“Zoey!” Poppy interrupted sharply.
Zoey hesitated, but only for a moment. “There’s this mean guy who wants to evict Poppy and turn his bowling alley into a hotel! But I’ve been thinking, and maybe we can save the bowling alley if we fix it up. You could stay and help with the repairs. We’ll get new customers and make enough to pay off the mortgage and—”
“Zoey! That’s enough. I told you I don’t want you worrying about grown-up problems. That’s what the adults are for,” Poppy said, shooting some major side-eye at Dad. “The bowling alley is my concern, and only my concern.”
Dad nodded, exhaling loudly. “Listen to your Poppy, Zoey. He knows what he’s doing. Just like I know what I’m doing. We’re all working through something here. I have a good feeling about selling motorcycles—I just can’t afford to move us all to Manhattan yet. And lots of kids spend the summer with their grandparents. This is just temporary,” he said again, giving Zoey’s hand a quick squeeze. “I should have enough for my own place in the city by the time José goes to college, and then you can come bunk with your old man. Sound good?”
No, Zoey thought, gawking at her father. What sounded good to her was staying put together as a family. Mami had always said, “Lo más importante del mundo es la familia.” The most important thing in the world is family. Had Dad somehow forgotten that?
“What happened to your dream of starting that food truck, Finolio’s Famous Grilled Cheeses?” Zoey asked, desperately grasping for another reason to make him stay. “Isn’t that why we moved here to begin with? Let’s feed all those hungry people at the beach! You make the best mozzarella-muenster-provolone blend in the world!”
Dodging Zoey’s gaze, Dad checked his phone again. His free hand combed uncomfortably through his thick brown hair. Poppy crossed his arms at the same time as José and raised his eyebrows. “Michael, aren’t you going to answer your daughter’s question?”
Dad finally put his phone down on the table. “Look, I didn’t realize how expensive buying a new truck would be. Or how many regulations applied. I’d basically need a full kitchen. And developing a whole menu around just one dish, especially a simple one like grilled cheese, turned out to be a lot harder than I thought.”
I could help, Zoey thought excitedly, imagining tomatoes, caramelized onions, all the toppings they could add to create a whole line of famous grilled cheeses. Maybe even ropa vieja on rye. But before she had a chance to pipe up, Poppy interrupted.
“Excuses, excuses, excuses,” he muttered in disgust. “¡Ya basta! I am so sick of your excuses, Michael! In the twenty years I know you, you never change! The only thing I can count on with you is that you will never—nunca—amount to nada!” Poppy banged his fist on the table, and Zoey jumped along with the water cups.
Dad’s jaw twitched beneath the shadow of his beard. “I can’t help it if things don’t always go as planned.”
But his choice of words only seemed to further infuriate Poppy, whose face turned purple. A vein popped out on his neck, zigzagging from his shirt collar all the way to his ear. “Ya sé.”
“I’m teaching them to follow their dreams,” Dad said slowly, glaring at Poppy. Next to Zoey, José scoffed.
“No dreams, tontería! You have every privilege in the world and you waste it! You know how hard it is for my family coming to a new country to build our lives? No. You don’t know. You were born here. You can do anything. But you don’t. And you are no longer a young man with no one to support, Michael,” Poppy said, his accent growing thicker in his exasperation. “You are a father of two who quits every single job he starts. And it’s not like you even have one—” Poppy pointed his index finger at Dad’s shirt “—big passion you try to make work. Oh no, you are not a painter or a poet or a chef like my Jasmeen! No, you have dream of the day, like my restaurant in the bowling alley used to have soup of the day. You’re not special—you have specials!” Poppy shouted, waving his hands for emphasis. “Today grilled cheese, tomorrow motorcycles. But qué va, mijo, you are forty-four years old! Time to grow up.”