Read Online A Hole in the Universe by Mary Mcgarry Morris - Free Book Online Page A

onto the glistening white deck. She was telling him that Dennis’s dream was to have his own medical complex. He seemed to spend every free moment looking at real estate parcels.
    “That sounds interesting.” Gordon eased carefully into a canvas chair that creaked and sagged under his weight. Afraid it might break, he was afraid to move.
    “I think Dennis is tired of root canals and pulling wisdom teeth. What he really wants is to be some kind of mogul. Like that. That’s what he wants.” She pointed to the label on the beer bottle. “To have his name on something. Loomis.” She scrolled her finger in the air. “The Loomis Dental-Surgical-Big Deal Medical Park.”
    Her laugh made him squirm. “It’s beautiful out here,” he said, looking toward the gently rolling green hills. Four golfers with pull carts moved through the rose-tinted twilight.
    “Maybe you and Dennis can play this weekend.”
    “No, I don’t think so. I mean, I don’t know how. I never played before,” he added, seeing her frown.
    “Dennis’ll teach you.”
    “No. It’s too late. I’m too old.”
    “Not for golf!” she scoffed.
    “But that’s something you learn when you’re young.”
    Dennis hadn’t played golf as a kid, she said. But Dennis was a born athlete, he reminded her. Sports had always come naturally. “Like everything else. Dennis just had the touch. No matter what he did.”
    “That must’ve been a little hard to swallow, huh? I mean, you being the older brother.”
    “Actually, I was always very proud of Dennis. He was very, very gifted.” He smiled. “And in a way, it diverted attention away from me. Which I wanted!” he added. “I was always so big. All I ever wanted was to fade into the background, and that’s not easy when you’re bigger than everyone else.” He laughed.
    “Oh! Poor Gordon.” She patted his arm.
    “I didn’t mean it that way,” he said stiffly. “I’m not feeling sorry for myself or making excuses. That’s just the way it was. Actually, it wasn’t until Fortley that I finally appreciated being so big.”
    “But . . .” She sighed. “But in a way that’s part of it, when you think of it. I mean, being so big and always holding back. It all just seems so unfair. I mean, if you hadn’t felt that way, you probably wouldn’t have even gone with Jerry Cox that night, and none of this would have happened.”
    “But it did.”
    “But you didn’t mean to . . .” She gestured for the unspeakable.
    “No. I don’t think that way. I can’t,” he said uneasily. If Dennis were here, he would have cut her off by now.
    “You have to! You can’t keep being so hard on yourself, Gordon.”
    At the trial his lawyer had portrayed him as a loner, a loser, a big, goofy kid so desperate for friendship that he had unquestioningly followed the sly, handsome, popular Jerry Cox into the house that night. So what? the prosecutor had roared during his closing argument. So what if he was the most unhappy boy in Collerton? Or in the universe? What justification could that possibly be for taking the lives of two innocent people?
    “I have to be realistic, that’s all. I did what I did. And nothing can change that. Nothing.” If it were anyone else but Lisa, he would have gotten up and left.
    “That’s what you say, but that’s not really what you mean, is it?”
    “Yes. That’s what I mean,” he said coldly.
    “I look at you and I see this . . . this tightness. Like a coil. Like it’s all inside and you can’t get rid of it.”
    That she might think him still capable of violence left him speechless for a moment. “It’s hard. I—”
    “Of course it’s hard, because you’re too hard on yourself, Gordon. God’s forgiven you. I know He has. Now why can’t you do the same?” She rubbed her arm, frowning. “You didn’t mean to . . . It’s not like you wanted to . . . to do that. You were just a kid. You were scared.”
    What else was there to say? That Janine Walters had been