We stopped at a diner and Froehmer and my father ordered big plates of food, steak and eggs and corned beef hash and toast. I had silver dollar pancakes and a small glass of juice. Froehmer took his cup of coffee and slid it across the table to me. “Give that a try,” he said. “He couldn’t sit still all morning, now you’re going to pump him full of coffee?” “He’ll be all right,” Froehmer said. I took a sip and put the cup back on the table. Froehmer took it and put milk and sugar in it until it was more milk and sugar than coffee. “You’ll like it now,” he said and I did.

“I don’t remember the hunting part of it,” I told my father, “but I remember Froehmer gave me coffee for the first time at breakfast.”

“You squirmed so much you chased all the deer away,” my father said, teasing me. “I don’t know if Froehmer knew what the hell he was doing. I sure didn’t. He did his part back then though, didn’t he? But I’m the one that gave you the coffee. You don’t remember?”

I remembered. I knew who gave it to me. The same way I remembered Froehmer, about four years later, giving me my first beer. I walked in on him and my father talking in the kitchen. They were sitting at the table looking over some paper with a six-pack in front of them. They weren’t expecting me, that’s for sure, but Froehmer, as natural and smooth as anything handed me a beer and said, “Take this and join us.”

As I was sitting down, he slid the paper off the table and put it in his coat pocket. I had no idea what they had been talking about or what they’d been looking at. Looking back, I’m sure they were looking over their pad, who paid them (and how much) and more important, who owed them and how much.

I took the bottle and let it sit in front of me. I didn’t look at my father, not wanting to see if he was disappointed or not. I watched Froehmer. I watched how he held the beer casually in his hand, how he grabbed it lightly high up on the neck, with only his thumb and forefinger, and how he tipped it to his lips. I counted the seconds between each time he took a drink. I tried to imitate him, but immediately knew it wouldn’t work. I didn’t think I could get the bottle from the table to my own lips with only two fingers the way Froehmer had done.