"You're so right, Grandpa," she says, and I would have felt silly, but she
has a nice friendly laugh. "I wish I could persuade him to go back. But
it's not so easy. I guess he's got to get a job and go to night school, if
they'll accept him. He won't ask his father for money."

"You two got my life figured out?" Tom has come up behind us while we were
lying in the sand on our stomachs. "I just hope that sour grape at the
filling station gives me a good recommendation so I can get another job.
The way he watches his cash register, you'd think I was Al Capone."

We talk a bit, and then Hilda gets up and says she's going to the ladies'
room. She doesn't act coy about it, the way most girls do when they're
sitting with guys. She just leaves.

"How do you like Hilda?" Tom asks, and again I'm sort of surprised,
because he acts like he really wants my opinion.

"She's nice," I say.

"Yeah." Tom suddenly glowers, as if I'd said I _didn't_ like her. "I don't
know why she wastes her time on me. I'll never be any use to her. When her
family hears about me, I'll get the boot."

"I could ask my pop. You know, I told you he's a lawyer. Maybe he'd know
how you go about getting back into college or getting a job or something."

Tom laughs, an unamused bark. "Maybe he'll tell you to quit hanging around
with jerks that get in trouble with the cops."

This is a point, all right. Come to think, I don't know why I said I'd ask
Pop anyway. I usually make a point of not letting his nose into my
personal affairs, because I figure he'll just start bossing me around.
However, I certainly can't do anything for Tom on my own.

I say, "I'll chance it. The worst he ever does is talk. One time he made a
federal case out of me buying a Belafonte record he didn't like. Another
time playing ball I cracked a window in a guy's Cadillac, and Pop acted
like he was going to sue the guy for owning a Cadillac. You just never
know."

Tom says, "With my dad, you _know_: I'm wrong."

Hilda comes back just then. She snaps, "If he's such a drug on the market,
why don't you shut up and forget about him?"

"O.K., O.K.," says Tom.

The beach is getting filled up by now, so we pull on our clothes and head
for the subway. Tom and Hilda get off in Brooklyn, and I go on to Union
Square.

After dinner that night Mom is washing the dishes and Pop is reading the
paper, and I figure I might as well dive in.

"Pop," I say, "there's this guy I met at the bea