'You're not my father,' said Lionel softly, and at once his eyes filled with tears. 'Don't call me son.'
Strange put his hand on Lionel's shoulder. 'You're right. I never did have the kind of courage it takes to be a father to a boy for real. But there's sometimes when I look at you, when you're making one of your jokes at the dining room table, or when I see you dressed up, lookin' all handsome and ready to go out and meet a girl, and I get a sense of pride… There's sometimes when I look at you, Lionel, and I get the kind of feeling that I know a father must have for his own.'
Strange pulled Lionel to him. He felt Lionel's heart beating hard against his chest. He held Lionel for a little while and let him break away.
'Mr Derek?'
'Yes?'
'The way it is with you and my mother… What I'm tryin' to say is, I know what time it is, see? I know you're tryin' to not disrespect her by staying in her room while I'm here, but I was thinkin'… I was thinkin', see, that you disrespect her even more in some way by not waking up in her bed.'
'Huh?'
'What I'm sayin' is, I'd like it if you just went ahead and stayed the night.'
'I'll, uh, talk to your mother,' stammered Strange. 'See if that's all right.'
Strange went down the hall to Janine's room. Inside, Janine was sitting on her bed, the toes of her stocking feet touching the floor. Ronald Isley was singing 'Voyage to Atlantis' from the clock radio set on her nightstand, and she had turned the light down low.
'Everything okay?' she said.
'Fine,' said Strange. 'He wants me to spend the night.'
'Do you want to?'
'Yes.'
'You feed Greco?'
'I opened a can of Alpo for him before we left my house.'
'Come here,' said Janine. She smiled and patted the empty space beside her on the bed.
Quinn got out of bed, covering Juana to the neck with her own blanket and sheets. He had been watching the numbers change on the LED display on Juana's clock for the last two hours, and he knew that he would not fall asleep.
He was sober now. He stretched and walked naked to her window, turning the rod of the miniblinds to open an angle of sight. He looked out the window to the sidewalk on 10th, illuminated by street lamps. A young black man was walking down the sidewalk in an oversize, hooded jacket, glancing in the windows of the parked cars he passed.
Quinn made some immediate presumptions about the young man, all of them negative. Then he tried to think of other explanations for why the kid would be out at this hour on the street. Maybe the young man had been unable to sleep, like Quinn, and was simply taking a walk. Maybe he was just leaving his girlfriend's place, was feeling bold and proud, and was checking out his reflection in the windows of the cars. These were logical scenarios, but they were not the first scenarios he had thought of when he had seen the young black man.
Quinn thought of the first time he had seen Juana, when she had walked into the bookstore on Bonifant.
Strange had been right about something, whether Quinn had been fully conscious of it at first or not: he had approached Juana initially to make some kind of point, to himself and the world around him.
'God damn you, Terry,' whispered Quinn. He closed his eyes tightly and pinched the bridge of his nose.
22
On Sunday morning, Strange ate breakfast with Janine and Lionel at the Three Star Diner, on Kennedy Street in Northwest. The Three Star was owned and operated by Billy Georgelakos, the son of the original owner, Mike Georgelakos. Strange's father, Darius Strange, had worked for Mike as a grill man at the diner for twenty-five years.
Billy Georgelakos and Strange were roughly the same age. On Saturdays, when Mike and Darius both had of their sons with them, Billy and Strange had played together on these streets while their fathers worked. Strange had taught Billy how to box and make a tackle, and Billy had introduced young Derek to comic books and cap pistols. Billy was Strange's weekend playmate, and his first white friend.
When Mike Georgelakos died of a heart attack in the late sixties, Billy had dropped out of junior college and stepped in to take over the business, as there was no insurance or safety net of any kind for the family. He had not intended to stay, but he did. The neighborhood had gone through some changes, and the menu had moved closer to soul food, but Billy ran the place the same way his old man had, breakfast and lunch only, open seven days a week.
Strange knew that Mike Georgelakos had bought the property long ago – the Greeks from that generation were typically smart enough to secure the real estate – and consequently the nut at the Three Star was very low. The diner had sent Billy's two sons to college and had managed to support his mother as well. The other thing Billy did like his old man was to cut the register tape off two hours before closing time. With a cash business like this, you could hide a whole lot of money from the IRS.
'Pass me that hot sauce, Lionel,' said Strange.
Lionel slid the bottle of Texas Pete down the counter, past his mother to Strange. Strange shook some out onto his feta cheese-and-onion omelet, and a little onto the half-smoke that lay beside it.
'Good breakfast, right?' said Strange.
'Mm-huh,' said Janine.
'The breakfast is tight,' said Lionel, 'but they could play some better music in this place.'
'The music is fine,' said Strange. Billy played gospel in the diner on Sunday mornings, as many of the patrons were coming straight from church. His father had done that, too.
'Why you name your dog Greco?' said Lionel. "Cause of this Greek joint right here?'
'Nah. I knew this other Greek kid back when I was a boy, kid named Logan Deoudes. His father had a place like this, John's Lunch, over on Georgia, near Fort Stevens. Anyway, Logan had this dog, a boxer mix, called him Greco. Bad-ass dog, too – excuse me, Janine – and I always liked the name. Decided back then, when I got a dog of my own, I was gonna name him Greco myself.'
Billy Georgelakos walked down the rubber mat behind the counter, carrying a pot of coffee he had drawn from the urn. He wore a white shirt rolled up to the elbows and had a Bic pen wedged behind his right ear. Billy was big boned, with large facial features, most prominently his great eagle nose. With the exception of two patches of gray on either side of his dome, he had lost most of his hair.
'Want me to warm that up for you, Janine?' said Billy, chin-gesturing in the direction of Janine's coffee cup.
'A little bit more, thanks,' said Janine. Billy poured her some coffee and filled Strange's cup to the lip without asking.
'How's your mom doin', Derek?'
Strange made a so-so, flip-flop movement of his hand. 'Etsi-ke-etsi,' he said.
'Yeah,' said Billy, 'mine, too. Tough old women, though, right?'
He walked down to the grill area to talk with his longtime employee Ella Lockheart, who had come up in the neighborhood as well.
'You speak Greek, Mr Derek?'
'Little bit,' said Strange mysteriously. Billy had taught him one or two useful expressions and a whole lot of curse words.
'Dag,' said Lionel.
'You got somethin' planned today?' said Strange to Janine.
'What'd you have in mind?'
'Want to stretch my legs. I'll be gettin' real busy tomorrow, and I might stay that way. It's cold, but with all this sunshine I was thinkin' I'd take Greco for a walk down in Rock Creek. Maybe go by the home and visit my mother after that.'
'I'm up for it,' said Janine.
'Lionel?'
'I got plans,' said Lionel. 'That Wilderness Family trip sounds good and all that. But if you don't mind, I'd just as soon spend my day lookin' at the women up at the mall.'