Gatekeeper's Secret
Copyright© 2026 by Fick Suck
Chapter 30
They got a table, and they got menus. What they did not get was someone to take their order. As they tried to start a long-delayed conversation, they kept getting interrupted by a busboy asking them if they wanted anything to drink. Finally, Grady walked over to the hostess who seated them and asked for the manager. She disappeared and returned with an old man. His hair was cotton white, which contrasted with his black skin and his deep wrinkles.
“How can I help you, young man?”
“I’m Grady Wolcott, and I’m here with my date, our first date really. We’ve been waiting over twenty minutes, and no one has taken our order, sir. I’ve never had this experience here before, and besides being hungry, I’m a bit concerned.”
The old man squinted and looked at Grady closely. “You’re Jedidiah and Henrietta’s grandson, aren’t you?”
“Yes sir.”
“They were good people, and they were good to me. I’m Rollie Jenkins, Jr.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, sir. You’re one of the closest things we have to a legend around here.”
“Good to hear, but there are a lot of damn stupid people around here too,” Rollie said. “Here’s what we’re going to do: you’re going to sit with your lady and I’m going to fetch you a rack of ribs and some sides. Jedidiah kept a rolling account here and we’ll just put it right on the tab.”
Grady was astounded. “He had an account here? I got to come here on my birthday and maybe one or two other times a year. He was here all the time?”
“He and your grandma were good, reliable customers, son,” Rollie said, giving his hostess a look like she should have known better. “He’d bring his lawyer or his accountant, and often your grandma on weekdays for lunch. We would just sit around and talk about things until school let out. He was an interesting man.”
“I feel cheated,” Grady said. “I’ve got a lot of meals to catch up on since he decided to exclude me. Thank you, Mr. Jenkins.”
“Anytime, son.”
Grady sat back down with an exclamation of “unbelievable. Jedidiah had an account here as well. Dinner is coming.”
“This is what I like about you, Grady,” Linh said. “You get things done. Since I came back, everything is about Grady did this and Grady did that. I don’t remember you like this from before.”
“A lot has changed, Linh. What happened to you?”
“Do you remember Wade Sykes?” she asked. When Grady acknowledged the name, she continued. “He asked me to the Fall Harvest Dance and declared that we were boyfriend and girlfriend. He wanted to bring some weed to the dance, but when we got to the parking lot, he asked me to sneak it in. I shoved it in my purse, thinking nothing of it. We never got a chance to smoke it at the dance because the chaperones checked everywhere. When the dance was over, my mom picked us up and all he got for his troubles was a kiss on the cheek and a glare from mom that would melt glass. The next day, she went through my purse and found the weed.”
“She went ballistic, huh?”
“The way she carried on, I was already injecting heroin and was six months pregnant with a cartel baby,” Linh said. “She wouldn’t listen to explanations; she had a total meltdown. The next day, she drove me to the airport and put me on a plane to live with her sister. My aunt is crazy, and I don’t mean good crazy. Almost every moment of my life was regimented. I went to a private school with many Asian kids with a very narrow idea of what is education – Ivy League or you’re a failure. My aunt made me take after-classes at the Buddhist Temple, and last summer I was sent to the Buddhist convent. I cried every night.
“I graduated last month, and my aunt sent me home. Mission accomplished. I got an acceptance to the University of Pennsylvania.”
“You’re going to Philadelphia?” Grady asked with awe in his voice.
“Mom says it costs too much money, and a state school is just as appropriate,” Linh said with a shrug. “I didn’t really want to go there, except for the fact I would be away from her.”
“Wow, that’s quite a story,” Grady said. “Here’s dinner.”
A woman slid a large platter of ribs on the table and followed it up with a bowl of baked beans with chunks of pork belly, coleslaw, and four corn muffins. With silent agreement, they both tucked into their food.
Two gleaming stripped pork bones and a sheen of baked bean goo on his plate, Grady sat up and asked, “What happened when you got home?”
“Same shit, only worse,” Linh said. “Mom put me on complete lock down, like I was going to run find Wade and snort two years’ worth of cocaine in one sitting. What happened to Wade? Do you know?”
“He got busted for battery and gun possession about six or eight months ago,” Grady said. “I imagine he’s been transferred to adult prison by now. Stupid is as stupid does, I guess. How did you convince your mother to go out tonight?”
“You verbally slapped her in the face, and your words set her back on her heels,” Linh said. “When you left, I let her have both barrels. ‘I never did what you think I did’ and ‘you never believed me, your own daughter.’ She did not let me come out tonight. I picked up her cell and called you to come get me. For an exclamation point, I told her on my way out the door that she had already lost me.”
“Whoa, girl, a tale for the ages,” Grady said. “What’re you going to do, now”
Linh picked up another rib and stripped it bare with her teeth in only a few bites. Grady had never seen someone angry eat, but he was convinced she was ripping into that rib like she wanted to rip into her mother. He picked up another rib, chewing it slowly to savor the flavors of the dry rub and the smoke.
Linh put down her rib bone. “I want to go back to the home I had before all this happened. I can’t; it doesn’t exist anymore. I lost my high school years with the people I expected to spend them with, and they’re all changed and gone. No prom, no first kiss, no regrettable decisions or embarrassing memories. You’ve changed, but for the better.”
“Thanks for the compliment,” Grady said. “You’re back and I, for one, missed you terribly.”
“You never asked me out, Grady.”