At an eighty-one-year-old man in Navy dress blues. Seven rows of ribbons. Seven gold service stripes. A white cap under his arm.
And a nine-year-old boy in a navy blazer, holding his hand.
The string quartet stopped playing.
I didn’t look at anybody.
I walked across the gymnasium floor. My shoes clicked on the polished hardwood. Caleb walked
beside me.
I found an empty table. Way in the back, in the far corner, by the bleachers. Nobody was sitting there. It was the one nobody wanted. Too far from the stage.
I pulled out a chair for Caleb. He sat down.
I pulled out a chair for myself. A metal folding chair. I sat down.
I set my white cap on the table in front of me. Brim forward.
Then I looked at Caleb.
“You want pancakes?” I asked.
He didn’t answer. He was looking around the room. At all the faces staring at us.
