Chapter 32

Thanksgiving was a delightful dinner with the five of them, while Arlo and Krissy played in her playpen. It wasn’t the rollicking family fests that Tam and Jake had become used to since they became engaged, but it reminded Don and Lanh of the Thanksgivings that they had in the military where friends gathered, and the menu was chosen at the last minute depending on what the base commissary had available.

After dinner, Tam and Lanh were cleaning up the kitchen and were speaking with Kim-ly on speaker as they worked. The three remembered days gone by when Tam and Kim-ly taught tiny young Lanh how to load the industrial dishwasher at their uncle’s restaurant. After Don got a chance to say hi to his son Danh, he went and sat with Jake and Karole and discussed the Power of attorney papers. “Are you sure you want to do this?” asked Don. “This is something that can be abused.”

“Ah’ve known you pert’ near a year and a half,” sighed Karole, “That’s longer ‘an any other man, includin’ ma’ daddy ... ah juss ... ah juss wanna know fer sure that Krissy will be taken care of.” She grabbed Don’s wrist, he could feel her shaking, “Ah usta sit up nights terrified what woulda become a me should ma momma go an’ git herself kilt. Ah used to dream of living in an orphanage. Then ah heard there weren’t such thing no more.” Like Lanh, when Karole is emotionally charged her accent becomes more pronounced.

Jake was shocked not at what she said, but at how she said it. “You sound like you were looking forward to the idea of an orphanage.”

“Well, yeah! When your life is one trailer after another and a string of drunk rednecks and hillbillies cummin’ and going, and each one is just there to get drunk and get laid, life is uncertain. My momma had a string of beaus, and as ah got older, they began ta eye me up. Ah lived in terror of which one was gonna...” She looked nervously from Don to Jake and back, “To me an orphanage was like a dorm where everyone was in the same boat, and we all became friends, and no one would be makin’ fun of me ‘cause I were so tall an’ my momma was such a drunken slut.”

The house went silent, even Krissy and Arlo went quiet when Karole said that. Don patted the back of Karole’s hand and said, “There, you finally said it. How does it feel?”

“A lot better than I thought it would,” grinned Karole.

“What are you saying,” said Jake softly.

“Karole blamed the way her mom acted on herself,” said Don.

“Ah did, ah blamed m’self. Ah thought that I was the causa her behavior. That’s it, ah’m done talkin’ about that woman!” said Karole, a sense of relief washed over her, “and I’ll thank you fellas to never mention her around Krissy ever agin. All she needs to know about grandma is that she’s a nice Asian lady what lives in Minnesota.”