The Risk Pool

mind. The opposite hypothesis makes far more sense—that Drew Littler was perfectly aware of my father and of himself. With such a large fork, he could easily have removed half the meat from the platter with one forceful thrust. Instead, he made a point of his hoggishness, taking each slice singly so there could be no mistaking his intent, by arrangingeach slice artfully, by not surrendering the silver fork until he was good and ready. When he finally did surrender it, he turned his attention to the gravy boat, which he emptied over the mound of gray beef.
    “Mind your own business,” Eileen said to my father, who looked ready to spontaneously combust. “There’s plenty more.”
    She pushed back her chair and took the empty gravy boat with her. I could tell that she too was miffed with her son’s behavior, but she never publicly took my father’s side in matters of conflict.
    My father helped Eileen to some of what little remained of the roast, then me, then himself, leaving one thin slice in the center of the big platter. For a vigorous man, my father hadn’t a large appetite, and the portion he took for himself was comically small, a pointed contrast to Drew’s heaped plate.
    Eileen returned with the gravy boat and we ate. My stomach had shrunk to pellet size and I’d have given a lot to be able to return to the platter some of the roast my father had given me, because I could see where we were headed with that one remaining slice of beef. Each mouthful was a struggle.
    Drew had no such difficulty. With his steak knife he sliced through several layers of meat at a time and raised them, dripping gravy, to his mouth. He never changed hands with his fork or set his knife down. He seemed almost not to chew. His Adam’s apple bobbed once and the food was gone. We all watched, my father openly, Eileen and I surreptitiously, engaging each other in small talk, trying in vain to draw my father into it, to disturb his focus, but all the while adopting that focus ourselves. There was no point in trying to draw Drew into any conversation while there was food around, and in the end the talk died.
    Drew ate.
    In steady, workmanlike fashion he devoured what was before him without looking up from his plate, exhibiting the same concentration he used under the weighted bar in the garage. My father ate much more slowly and I knew why. It was a matter of timing. He did not want to be finished before the boy. He was working it so the two of them would swallow that last bite of roast at exactly the same time, with just the one remaining slice of meat between them in the center of the table. I doubt Eileen saw the strategy of it or she’d have either taken the slice of meat herself or gone to carve more, but I’m quite sure Drew knew where theywere headed, knew it without having to look up, just as he knew my father was trying to shame him.
    He must have understood all this, because Drew Littler couldn’t have
wanted
that last slice of beef. He just had to have it. I was sure of that as I watched the blue vein in his forehead work over that last mouthful of food. And when he reached, I saw that my father was holding his own fork like an ice-pick, tines down. At first, I thought he intended to stab the back of the boy’s hand. Instead the fork pierced the meat, pinning it to the platter so that Drew’s came away clean. Then, suddenly, it was on my father’s plate.
    I thought for a second I would wet my pants.
    “There,” Eileen said. “Are you happy now, you two children?”
    My father kneed me under the table. “You gonna let her call you names?”
    “Sure,” I said.
    “That’s where you’re smart, unlike some people,” my father said.
    “Some people are smarter than you think,” Drew said.
    “I doubt it,” my father said. He relit a cigarette he’d extinguished at the start of the meal. Then, after a thoughtful drag, he put it out again in the center of the still untouched slice of beef.
    “You think it’s smart to waste good food,” Eileen said, getting up to clear away the dishes. “That’s your idea of smart?”
    My father ignored her. “You enjoy your dinner?” he asked me.
    I said I did.
    “How about you?” he asked Drew.
    “It was all right,” the boy said.
    “Just all right.”
    “The potatoes were lumpy,” he said.
    “Just all right,” my father repeated. “I thought it was a very good dinner, myself. Of course, that’s just me. But it was the best meal I’ve had in a long time.