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looking up from her dessert, which was Jell-O Instant chocolate pudding with a generic brand instant whipped topping.
    “It’s too bad,” Mom sighed. “I think your group’s very good. I just don’t see how any other band could have been better.”
    Dad looked up from his homework. “Believe me, son,” he dared to venture, “you’re better off not having the aggravation of dealing with that YMCA dance.”
    “What aggravation?” Marty asked coldly.
    “Well, you’d have to worry about getting all your equipment there—”
    “We’ve done that lots of times already,” Marty interjected. “It’s no problem.”
    “You’d have to make contingency plans in case somebody got sick,” his father continued.
    “Nobody’s ever been sick.”
    “All the more reason for somebody to be now,” he went on. “Then you’d have to make sure you got your money, see that everybody got the right share, settling with the musicians’ union…”
    “Wow,” Marty muttered. “You sure can find a lot of good reasons to do nothing.”
    It didn’t slow down his father even a half-beat.
    “What if you were so good other people wanted to hire you?” he continued. “Then you’d have to worry about scheduling your job around school.”
    “You’re right, Dad. Maybe I’d better just take to my bed right away. The longer I stay alive, the more problems I’m going to have.”
    “Believe me, son, you’re better off without all those headaches,” his father concluded.
    “He’s right, Marty,” Dave added sardonically, putting on his father. “If there’s one thing you don’t need, it’s headaches.”
    Marty finally stopped arguing, even though quitting made him feel a little like his father.
    Lorraine McFly turned her attention to Linda, who was finishing her pudding. “You didn’t have to eat that, you know,” she said. “We’ve got cake.”
    Linda raised her eyebrows. “What cake?” she asked. Lorraine pointed to the three-layer cake on the kitchen counter. On the top was written WELCOME HOME UNCLE JOEY . Above the letters was a tiny black bird flying out of a barred window. It was hardly subtle, but Uncle Joey’s situation wasn’t a secret.
    “It looks like we’ll have to eat this cake by ourselves again,” Lorraine smiled grimly. “Uncle Joey didn’t get a parole.”
    “Maybe we should just try putting a file in something,” Dave suggested.
    “It’s a shame,” Lorraine continued. “They practically assured him he’d get out this time. Then there was that shake-up in prison management. I guess that hurt him more than anything. Everybody has his own axe to grind.”
    “It’s probably just as well,” Marty said. “If he came out, there’d be a lot of decisions to make. He’d have to find a job and fill out tax forms…”
    “True,” Dave chimed in. “He’d have to worry about getting from place to place, having enough change to make phone calls…It’s probably better that he’s gotta stay in the joint.”
    Lorraine frowned, looked at both of them angrily. George McFly did not look up from his homework.
    “I wish you’d show a little more respect,” Lorraine said. “He’s my brother, you know.”
    “Well, I think it’s a major embarrassment, having an uncle in prison,” Linda murmured.
    “We all make mistakes in life, children,” Lorraine said philosophically.
    “Yeah, but Uncle Joey made them consecutively,” Dave smiled. “And while on parole. That’s not only a mistake, that’s plain dumb.”
    Lorraine didn’t answer. Instead she took another helping of potatoes.
    Looking once again at the clock, Dave wiped his mouth and pushed his chair back. “Damn,” he said. “I’m gonna be late again.”
    “Please watch your language,” his mother warned.
    “Hell, yes,” Dave said, getting up and starting for the front door. A moment later, they heard his car start up and roar off. Marty wished he owned his own car, even a heap like Dave’s. At least he would be