PINTA PARADE

My father can’t stop smiling after Morton.

He doesn’t take me to Long John Silvers to eat afterwards. He takes me some place special. He takes me to Hunts, where the tenderloins are three times the size of the avg. homo sapiens skull. He is telling me good job.

"This is your fourth race and you nailed it David. You nailed it!!!"

Dad is smiling. He is drinking a cup of coffee. He is telling me that I did it. 

“You are only going to get faster from now on.” Dad says, with a silver smile that looks like he is sucking on a silver dollar.

He is wearing his gray sweater with the zipper in front.

“I can feel it. I know you had a couple of tough races early in the season, but you nailed this one. You nailed it. Good things are coming.”

“So,” dad says, as  he finishes his coleslaw dipping the remnants of his Tenderloin into a midnight pool of vinegar.

‘How was your movie last night? How’s good ol David Best doing? How’s the girl who went with you and picked you up.”

I tell may father she is fine. I want to tell him that I have known Renae for over a year. I wanted to tell my father about how my eighth grade year I couldn’t stop walking past Mrs. Best office just to see Rena seated in front of David in his

When I look out the side window of hunt I can still Renae from last night smile back at me. When I pick up my Tenderloin I swear I can see her across the booth from me, dipping the golden fingers of her French fried in a pool of ketchup.

I have a minute pain in my right leg.  I place my foot up, on the booth across to me, next to my father, near where I see Renae sitting.

"You did it David,”

My father tells me, informing me that I did it again.