The Greeks of Beaubien Street by Suzanne Jenkins

behavior.
    Jacob was as involved in the care of his daughter as he could be, changing diapers, bathing her; he played with her as though she were a doll. Marianne noticed an effeminate side of her husband that she had never seen before, not because of his interest in Gretchen, but in how he went about it. When Jacob dressed Gretchen, he always put ruffles on her, patent leather Mary Janes, ribbons in her hair. He loved shopping for her; they went to the mall baby stores at least once a week and came home with bags of dresses and shoes. He talked to her like a woman would, baby talk, with his voice high pitched. He was oblivious to anyone around and Marianne would cringe with embarrassment when he would talk baby talk in public.
    As Gretchen got older, Jacob became even more devoted to her. It was hard to understand because in contrast, he wasn’t possessive. He didn’t mind that she had friends or eventually boyfriends. He was super-protective about her, buying her the safest car money could buy, making sure it was in perfect order. He would say, “The care of the horse is in the hands of the rider, but safety is in the hands of God,” when his wife worried about her driving. Marianne was perplexed at his sudden ability to quote the bible, something he’d never done before. He’d worked split shifts so that he could be there for her feedings when she was an infant. When she started school, he arranged his schedule so he could be home when Gretchen was home. Then he took an early retirement when working during the summer while she was out of school became intolerable to him.
    Gretchen was devoted to her father, too. They talked for months during her senior year about what she would do after graduation. Going away to school was out of the question; neither of them would tolerate the separation. Marianne was concerned because her daughter was unable to make the simplest decision without conferring with Jacob. She wanted her daughter to have every opportunity, and going to college was right up there in importance. But she didn’t dare mention it. Neither would stand for her intrusion because Gretchen had become as dependent on her father as he was on her.
    After graduation, Gretchen got the job at the bank. It was perfect. It was close to home so she could walk to work if the roads were too snowy to drive. They would train her for the job, so there was no need to go away to school. Henry Ford College was practically in their backyard; she could take classes in the evenings if she wanted to.
    For a short time, Gretchen tried living in a girlfriend’s apartment on Military Road. She thought it would be a good segue into eventually moving out on her own. She didn’t really want to leave her parent’s house, but listening to her friends and coworkers yammer on and on about how important her independence was, she jumped at the chance when her friend offered. The apartment was great, in an old building with high ceilings and a fireplace. Her bedroom looked out on the Rouge River and beyond, into the woods. But it was much farther from work. It didn’t have air conditioning and during August she thought she would die at night, unable to fall asleep and then waking up hot and miserable in the morning once she finally did.
    The coup de grace was when her friend’s boyfriend would spend the night. It wasn’t the sex noise that was the worst, although that was bad enough. He was a slob. He cooked messy foods and left the kitchen a wreck, didn’t flush and left the toilet seat up, and the final straw, he took Gretchen’s Sunday Free Press and read it, leaving it in pieces all over the living room.
    Not one to complain, she was proactive and called her father that afternoon to ask if she could come home. The only stipulation from him was that she’d adhere to her former curfew. It wasn’t a problem. She rarely went out when she lived away from home and didn’t see how having to be home by eleven would change her life much at