Nick stayed with Kaylin all day at her house helping her clean and care for Francis whose wheezing was getting progressively worse. Kaylin found she couldn't hide the black, mucous from Nick's eyes, but he never complained. Francis brushed his fingers along the bruise on Kaylin's face and turned her head to look at the scabbed over gash behind her ear. No one said a word, but Francis moved his eyes to Nick whose eyes held the anger of the previous night, and he understood. Francis knew his son's faults and had heard the argument, heard the sound of his granddaughter being hit, but his belief not to intervene held him at bay. It wasn't until he saw the damage to her face, saw the heat in this boy's face, that he realized something had to be done. Francis smiled at Nick, and put his hand on the boy's shoulder as he walked by.
This day, nestled in the house was like a bubble, shutting out the reality of the outside world. They all knew that eventually Aaron would come home, the truth of the factory closing would hit both their households, the summer would come to a close, but for this one day, they acted like a family, the dying old man, the bruised girl, and the boy who loved her.
As the day wore on, Francis napped, and Kaylin took Nick upstairs. She could hear the old man's breathing machine click and beep, so she knew he was sound asleep. It was then that Kaylin showed Nick how much she loved him, and with stifled pleasure they gave themselves to each other for the first time.
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Kaylin was browning meat for Hamburger Helper, and Nick sat at the table playing Gin with Francis when the screen door was heard. They all looked around, and Francis started for the foyer, waving Kaylin and Nick to remain. "Dad," Aaron said, seeing the old man approach from the kitchen, "everything OK?" Francis, never one to speak much, took his grown son's arm and led him outside out of earshot of the two teenagers preparing dinner only a few feet away.
The dinner was a quiet one, with Francis' coughing the only sound to be heard other than the familiar clinking of the dinner wear. Francis and Aaron had been gone a long time, and when Francis returned, he took his seat in silence. Nick and Kaylin had been sitting in the kitchen waiting for their return and took this as a sign to start dinner. Francis was seventy and every bit the gruff stereotype of a former coal miner, he spoke very little and his few actions were measured and part of a strict routine: it was no use asking him about his conversation. As the table was arranged, Aaron came in and joined them, looking humbled and getting a glass of whiskey from the cabinet. He seated himself not at the head of the table, but across from Nick who sat next to Kaylin along the wall.
The hailstorm that they expected from Aaron never came; his thoughts were elsewhere. His father had chided him like when he was younger and minced no words telling him that he was earning the respect of his friends, but loosing the respect of his family and his God. Aaron's mind was aching from his inevitable job loss, his intervention with his father, and the pain in his daughter's eyes whenever she looked at him. At some point she had become a woman. She had gone from a chubby little girl with ringlets who always hugged him when he came home, no matter how late, no matter what he must have smelled like (grease, booze, smoke), to a woman with all the attributes he had once loved in her mother. At thirty-six, his life had slipped away from him before he had a chance to realize it. He stared at the glass of whiskey he sipped from and then looked to the boy seated across from him who was chewing slowly, taking in the man.
Without a word, Aaron finished his dinner, stood up and went to his room.
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