Big Easy Bonanza

Mommoo and Poppoo, and adored Chauncey too.
    Poppoo would say, “How are things at the bank, Chauncey? Shaping them up over there?”
    “Things are fine, Dad,” Chauncey would answer, and Poppoo would address someone else, “Chauncey’s a golden boy, the boy with everything. He’s a leader, always was. Always had the best grades, always the best in sports.”
    Chauncey would smile. “I knew I’d better be.”
    Poppoo would cuff him on the arm and they’d both laugh. Poppoo treated Chauncey like a prince, made him feel like a king who could conquer the world. All summer Poppoo would tell stories about his golden son, the apple of his eye.
    “We had this ol’ worthless Irish setter named Murphy, used to do nothin’ but come in the house and scratch fleas all day. Chauncey wadn’t but a little fella, hardly in the first grade, when he brings home this picture he drew of ol’ Murphy. I swear, I couldn’t believe a six-year-old had done it—looked like a professional piece of work it was so good. But I didn’t let on ’cause I had me a plan. I said, ‘Chauncey, you know, that dudn’t quite look like ol’ Murf to me. You gotta show him scratchin’. That dog’s always got a flea.’ Little fella looks up at me and says, just as serious as you please, ‘Daddy, where do you think I should put the flea?’
    “I say, ‘Right there. Right there behind the left ear.’ Little fella goes away. When he comes back he’s got a whole new picture and, I swear that dog’s come alive. Chauncey’s got his hind leg up behind his ear, looks like it’s goin’ about a mile a minute. So I say, ‘Chauncey, that’s so good I want to borrow it, take it down to my office, can I do that?’ Chauncey says, ‘Of course, Daddy.’
    “He dudn’t know it, but I been readin’ in the paper about a contest for a scholarship at this art school a lady was startin’ in the Quarter. So I just entered the picture and guess what, it came in second!”
    Bitty, to whom Poppoo was telling the story, made appropriate noises, and then Poppoo said, “I told him, ‘Chauncey, you’ll just have to do better next time.’ He said, ‘But, Daddy, I don’t want to go to art school.’ I said, ‘Sure you do,’ and you know what? Next year I did it again. I entered the contest without tellin’, and that year he won.” He stopped and chuckled. “That Chauncey. Always had to be number one. Nothin’ else was gonna do for my boy.”
    He let a moment go by and then he said, “Turned out he loved that art school. Didn’t you, boy?”
    Chauncey said, “I don’t remember, Dad.”
    Henry flew into a fury every time he thought of the story. He too had brought home a drawing of a dog and Chauncey had said, “Looks like a cat, son. Why don’t you make its ears longer?” Henry was too humiliated ever to show him another picture.
    He picked up the Eggs Sardou and the fruit for the New York couple. The fruit wasn’t the fresh stuff the woman had asked for. He had talked Modomme into Bananas Foster, which she was going to love, and which would put at least two pounds on her and which would get him twice the tip he could expect for an unignited breakfast. He hoped he could pull himself together enough to do the flambé.
    As he lit the rum, Modomme’s eyes lingered lovingly on him, approving, as if he were her own grandson; she was about Mommoo’s age, and she had gray hair as well (though it was sleekly cut instead of frizzed with a home perm).
    Henry made a resolution to call Mommoo and Poppoo, to see them this week. Chauncey had snubbed them. He never invited them anywhere, instead spending his time courting Bitty’s horrible parents. Henry wished they hadn’t had to suffer for Chauncey’s ambition. And that went double for someone else he wished he could call. For LaBelle, the woman Chauncey had treated more ruthlessly even than himself or Bitty or his parents.
    He poured the rum on the bananas.
“Bon appetit,”
he told the New Yorkers.

Rebellions
1
    CROSS, HEAD THROBBING, feeling in no shape to work, Skip put on work clothes—a sweater and the beige skirt. At least the ugly shoes went with the damned outfit.
    Her romantic mood had faded in the harsh light of the morning (which wasn’t overcast for once), as Steve set pancakes before her and tried to make her eat them. She had asked him to take her home, but he wouldn’t until he had fed her. Pushy, pushy, pushy.
    Staring at the doughy discs, she thought nostalgically of