Genetics were cruel to Frank Lipton. It wasn't that it left him with gross deformities at birth, but that his only son didn't look anything like him. The only way he knew his wife was faithful was the pinkie fingers on his son hooked badly inward like his.

Still, Frank bragged about his son. "Aside from his good looks, charm, wit, and humanity, we're nothing alike," he bragged constantly. Never mind that his son towered over his 6th grade classmates, solid and proportional. Frank was tall, but pieced together with spare parts. His legs were short and powerful, but made for a man half his size. The rest of him was sinewy and awkward. His narrow shoulders and generously portioned forehead gave him the presence of a lethally boring Sunday morning news analyst.

Looks were deceiving, though. Frank dreamed, constantly dreamed. The dreams were good dreams, dreams that made those around him better. As a child, he dreamed of saving his family from house fire. Along the way, he learned all about fire safety. As a youngster, he dreamed of scoring the winning basket in the high school basketball game. Here, he learned how many people could fit in the gym and savor his shooting prowess. His high school record consisted of 21 points-total. As the coach of his son Seth's soccer games, he taught the kids how to win. It was the only area he excelled-with the help of parents keeping him in line.

Father and son did not share the same temperament, either. Frank blamed it on his wife brainwashing his son to become neat and organized. Seth was punctual and particular; his clothes always matched, including his socks. He was also quick to anger. Frank thought alarm clocks to be of the devil and dirty clothes belonged on the floor next to the bed. He wasn't quick to anger or anything else for that matter.

Strangely, they were the best of friends, a friendship that troubled Lipton.

There is an unwritten rule somewhere that father and friend are mutually exclusive terms when it comes to rearing children, but not here. They hung out at the Wal-Mart together and feasted on sodas and chips at the local Gas 'n Grab. "Scopin' out the babes," he told his son and swore him to secrecy. After they finished, they jousted with the plastic soda bottles they just finished drinking.

Frank and Seth wrestled constantly, a bonding process. With time it became a rite of passage. To be a man, Seth had to beat the man. Frank teased his son as he got older by letting him come close to winning before turning the tables. "Beat the man," he taunted only slightly playfully and Seth swore with all his being each time he would.

None of this made sense to his wife. She frowned when they wrestled; she expected more from him. It was a pregnant term, expected. Fourteen years of marital frustration released with that term.

Half of those years Lipton spent selling cars. Selling cars in a small town had its advantages. Waterloo was small enough that everybody knew everybody, especially at church. Networking wasn't a necessity, but inevitable, even if he didn't have a German name. Parts of the job he hated, like all the parts of the job that had nothing to do with selling. The hours were bad and kept him from his son more than he liked. Because of this alone, he hated his job. His wife didn't mind because it paid the bills with some left over.

She probably expected better, though, he thought. She never said so, at least. Nobody grows up wanting to be a car salesman anyway. His mother-in-law considered this a shame and constantly reminded him. Thankfully she moved 300 miles away.

Business was bad this year thanks to a minor recession nationwide and plummeting commodity prices. Car sales had been soft for awhile. In Lipton's lifetime, Waterloo changed from a hardscrabble farming community to one envying the city lights encroaching from the northwest. Normally the death of a loved one meant cherishing that what was dear, but in Waterloo they seemed more than happy to forget their past. Suburban flight was beginning to land and they brought their money with them.

He talked to nobody that day; at least nobody wanting to buy. A handful of his customers drifted in from the service department, but only to chat. On paper, Lipton was not a great salesman. He wasn't afraid to let his customers go two or three times before making the sale. It drove his bosses crazy who consumed themselves with today's business. They'll be back, he told them and they learned he was usually right. In a business full of courteous thugs, he had only to be slightly better.

The only good news that day was his wife left to visit her mother. Tonight he and Seth had freedom to do whatever they wanted. Dusk had just come and gone before he left for the evening and the spring air was crisp. He turned his collar up and walked quickly to the car. Seth was waiting for him at the neighbor's house and the drive was a short one.

Seth ran out to meet his dad and gave him a rough embrace, knocking Frank on his heels. They almost looked like equals in the backlight of the front porch light. Seth then landed a slight punch in the stomach that Frank responded with a tender, fatherly arm around his son's shoulder while they walked to the car.

On the way home they picked up a movie. Dinner required little preparation, thanks to his wife having meals partitioned to save money. Frank didn't eat much. He watched his son eat instead, who consumed rapidly and never looked up other than to drink something. For the first time in a long time in Frank's life, there was an absence of care, at least for the weekend. All he had to do was wake up the next day and go to church. The chores would wait until Monday night before his wife came back Tuesday. His attention drifted elsewhere.

Seth seemed to have no other troubles in his life other than finishing. Frank envied this and gripped tight on his fork that had become dormant. There were no bills; no placating a wife, if not make himself tolerable; no keeping a job during slow months that each Sales Manager threatened; no having life dictated to him. There was just dinner and a movie with his dad. He once called this innocence.

Fresh country air spilled through the open dining room window just behind Frank. So too did the sounds of spring. An occasional car drove by, winding down the road to the stop light at the end of the road, the random refrain to nature's imperfect harmony. Seth's fork rapidly hitting the plate kept a beat. Frank sat straight in his chair and listened to each car that passed; the buzz of the tires slowing and stopping and the engine accelerating struck a familiar chord from the past.

In his youth, each car that passed seemed like a separate, distant verse. The rough pavement was just good enough to support the few vehicles that used them, like most country roads. He could set the clock to the sound of the cars. His dad left promptly at 7:50 in the morning to get to work by 8:00, returning home shortly after 5:00. Mr. Hadley left early in the morning for his construction job driving his flatbed Ford and wearing what seemed to be the same dirt-colored T-shirt. He sometimes came home for lunch, argued with his wife, and left. Sheriff Andersen drove slowly through the streets, sometimes to patrol, sometimes to quiet Mr. Hadley, but usually to pass time. As a child, Frank wanted Andersen's job, if only to turn on the siren.

There was something better about Waterloo back then, the strain of making a buck included. Waterloo was little more than a two-lane Route 3, connecting to the big city only if anybody felt compelled to go, and a handful of roads that connected the surrounding farms with the town. It had everything he needed back then: mom, dad, a Baptist Church, a school that fit K-12, a Dairy Queen, and Sheriff Andersen too fat to be effective, not that there was a need. There was no stoplight, no traffic to mention, no crime to speak of other than Mrs. Hadley calling the law on her husband when he needed it. The town's sweat equity was a bedrock to all that lived there and he longed for it.

Occasionally, Frank went to the hardware store as a child to hang out with his own dad. He was impressed that his dad knew everything about everybody's farm equipment. A stout lady named Angel worked with him and always gave him candy. With the doors open in summer, all the cares of the world swept away with the summer winds blowing through. The place also reeked of cedar and he loved it. There was always time to take a deep whiff of cedar chips, even at the new Wal-Mart.

Life was simple back then, even with its occasional cruelties. Tonight, the Waterloo of his youth called him back. He wished he were young again.

Of course, he forgot that his dad had died of a stroke when he was twelve years old and his mom remarried a cold, distant man. There was no mention of the girl he dated in high school that used to berate him on occasion in front of his friends, the same girl he eventually married. It only subsided a little after they started getting serious after high school. With time, she preferred to give him looks instead of words. Nobody liked the new Wal-Mart and Burger King for what they would do to family life, but they still shopped there. The car dealer he worked at they considered progress. Angel disappeared mysteriously without a trace and Sheriff Andersen everybody thought was a pedophile.

Route 3 is four lanes now, sort of, splitting into two parallel streets and meeting on the other side of town. Silently, Waterloo became a cog in the wheel of the big city. Most of the national fast food joints now located in town and crowded Route 3. Well-to-do subdivisions surrounded his home with vinyl siding that made them look cheap. His street was now smoothly paved.

A pleasant melancholy overcame him and he felt driven for the first time in years. Instantly, he tired of the life he led, more like the one he didn't lead. There was a fresh start down Route 3, a little further south where the road was still two lanes. He would just disappear, him and his son and live a life he thought was normal. He felt he owed it to Seth, to give him what he once had. Suddenly he jolted from his illusion.

"Dad, you ready?" Seth asked. It was a rude jolt. "I gotta go over to Lenny's and pick up a video game after the movie." The words almost made him ill, but he never let on.

"Yeah, son. Let's go," he said in his usual low-key manner.

"You better finish your grub first, dad. I'll get the movie ready." VCR's were still a new invention in Waterloo and Frank felt it was his fatherly duty to insert each tape.

"Naw, I'm done." His appetite had left him as his daydream started. He left the plates on the table and made his way to the living room. For an instant, he thought of moving to the dealership in Red Bud further down Route 3. The next instant, he remembered the General Manager was an old boss he despised thoroughly, or at least more than all the others.
He realized now Providence was in charge, one that crushed his dreams and shrunk his world. For the first time in his life, he found dreams to be a trick to get through adolescence. He now felt like a pawn in somebody else's game. But like all other games, he devoted himself to win, giving it his feeble best.

After inserting the tape in the VCR, he noticed a wedding picture of himself and his wife above the television. She was beautiful then, if just a bit overweight. A more recent picture sat next to it, one which she was 20 pounds heavier. But she smiled just as easily as she did at their wedding. He longed for that warmth, one that now showed only for the pictures. He would change this; he would change. No longer would he press her to lose the extra weight. He would have the pastor and his wife over for dinner. They would eventually go to Paris like she wanted.

As the movie started, he let out a deep sigh. He sat on the couch next to Seth and landed a slight punch to his chest. "You the man," he said to his son who in turn smiled brightly, not really knowing why.