Read Online Deathwatch - Final by Lisa Mannetti - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Lisa Mannetti
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yapped and ran around me like a puppy.
She began pushing her sister in circles on the dry grass. "It's almost ready," she announced heading for a circular moonlit table set with big clear goblets, folded napkins, spoons; then: "Is it ready yet, Stuart?"
"Nearly."
"Ice cream. Cartwheels. Best white dresses," Ruth shook her head. "Even you--in a linen suit."
"She's had so little--I don't consider this an indulgence at all," I said, waving my hand over the freezer. The girls were having a race now; Ellie pumping the chair wheels hard, Abby hopping on one foot to make it fair.
"That child is in love with you," Ruth said. Her face was swathed in a veil of white gauze. I saw it sway lightly from the puff of air when she spoke.
I'm looking at a ghost, I thought.
"What's the age of consent in the South, Stuart?" Ruth said. I heard one sharp creak of the rockers, the soft pat of her toes.
"Twelve or thirteen, maybe." My lips tightened in a narrow line, I kept my eyes on the hand turning the ice cream freezer. I wouldn't look at her. "I don't really know, it wasn't--isn't--a thing my family held with."
"Ever had a girlfriend?" she asked.
I gasped. "Ruth, please--" I begged.
I heard the rocker moving against the boards again. I saw her hands lifting the crown of her veil--as though she meant to remind me of her dreadful staring face. "People with nothing are relentless," she said. "Answer me."
"It's why I drank." I swallowed uneasily. "Why I started drinking and kept on with it. The first Christmas I came home from college we were both seventeen. We got engaged. It was fine between us all that month. Then I got back to school--it wasn't other girls--there weren't any in my class. Well one," I laughed. "But she had a mustache and could lift a hundred pound sack of grain one-handed over her head." I felt Ruth's eyes on me, pushing me deeper inside the old memory. "Livvy--Olivia, that is, who was my fiancée, wrote me every day. You know, the kind of gushing letters...." I suddenly sat on the porch rail, staring at my hands. "Letters about how it was all going to be when we got married. Even," I breathed, "even what kind of furniture we'd have. Our babies she said--they'd have her thick blonde hair and my blue grey eyes."
"Yes," Ruth said. "It's just the kind of thing a girl spins out in her mind. Scared the hell out of you, I bet." The rocker snapped forward.
"I felt like there was a chain around my throat." I laced my fingers together. "The more she wrote, the worse it got, the worse I felt. At the end there--just before I wrote her--she was sending sometimes two letters a day. All that love and good will and sweetness--it pulled on me. The nicer she was the more obligated I felt, and I didn't want to write her more than once a week maybe, or have her write so much. But she did." I paused, drawing my cigarettes from the flap of my white linen jacket. "I didn't answer for a long time. The mail was like a drift of white in my letterbox. My roommate used to joke me about it. ‘Must be a relief to see a bill from Klegg's Department Store or The Blue Angel Cafe,’ he'd laugh handing me the pile."
"Finally you wrote and told her," Ruth prompted.
"I didn't want to be engaged anymore--didn't think I wanted to get married. Not when I finished medical school, maybe not ever." I lit the cigarette; the air was so still it stayed in a thick cloud around my head, and the thought crossed my mind, that Ruth and I were alike: our faces shrouded by the mix of shadow and white.
"How'd she do it," Ruth said.
"Livvy--she jumped from the Tide Basin bridge. Drowned."
"Was your letter in her pocket?"
I nodded, sucking in the smoke, feeling half-drowned, myself. "Everyone knew," I whispered. The flush of guilt and shame washed over me all over again. There's no more terrible feeling in the world, really.
"You drank to kill the guilt," Ruth said. "And I guess, like Andrew, you found out pretty quick it doesn't work."
Abby's high laughter
She began pushing her sister in circles on the dry grass. "It's almost ready," she announced heading for a circular moonlit table set with big clear goblets, folded napkins, spoons; then: "Is it ready yet, Stuart?"
"Nearly."
"Ice cream. Cartwheels. Best white dresses," Ruth shook her head. "Even you--in a linen suit."
"She's had so little--I don't consider this an indulgence at all," I said, waving my hand over the freezer. The girls were having a race now; Ellie pumping the chair wheels hard, Abby hopping on one foot to make it fair.
"That child is in love with you," Ruth said. Her face was swathed in a veil of white gauze. I saw it sway lightly from the puff of air when she spoke.
I'm looking at a ghost, I thought.
"What's the age of consent in the South, Stuart?" Ruth said. I heard one sharp creak of the rockers, the soft pat of her toes.
"Twelve or thirteen, maybe." My lips tightened in a narrow line, I kept my eyes on the hand turning the ice cream freezer. I wouldn't look at her. "I don't really know, it wasn't--isn't--a thing my family held with."
"Ever had a girlfriend?" she asked.
I gasped. "Ruth, please--" I begged.
I heard the rocker moving against the boards again. I saw her hands lifting the crown of her veil--as though she meant to remind me of her dreadful staring face. "People with nothing are relentless," she said. "Answer me."
"It's why I drank." I swallowed uneasily. "Why I started drinking and kept on with it. The first Christmas I came home from college we were both seventeen. We got engaged. It was fine between us all that month. Then I got back to school--it wasn't other girls--there weren't any in my class. Well one," I laughed. "But she had a mustache and could lift a hundred pound sack of grain one-handed over her head." I felt Ruth's eyes on me, pushing me deeper inside the old memory. "Livvy--Olivia, that is, who was my fiancée, wrote me every day. You know, the kind of gushing letters...." I suddenly sat on the porch rail, staring at my hands. "Letters about how it was all going to be when we got married. Even," I breathed, "even what kind of furniture we'd have. Our babies she said--they'd have her thick blonde hair and my blue grey eyes."
"Yes," Ruth said. "It's just the kind of thing a girl spins out in her mind. Scared the hell out of you, I bet." The rocker snapped forward.
"I felt like there was a chain around my throat." I laced my fingers together. "The more she wrote, the worse it got, the worse I felt. At the end there--just before I wrote her--she was sending sometimes two letters a day. All that love and good will and sweetness--it pulled on me. The nicer she was the more obligated I felt, and I didn't want to write her more than once a week maybe, or have her write so much. But she did." I paused, drawing my cigarettes from the flap of my white linen jacket. "I didn't answer for a long time. The mail was like a drift of white in my letterbox. My roommate used to joke me about it. ‘Must be a relief to see a bill from Klegg's Department Store or The Blue Angel Cafe,’ he'd laugh handing me the pile."
"Finally you wrote and told her," Ruth prompted.
"I didn't want to be engaged anymore--didn't think I wanted to get married. Not when I finished medical school, maybe not ever." I lit the cigarette; the air was so still it stayed in a thick cloud around my head, and the thought crossed my mind, that Ruth and I were alike: our faces shrouded by the mix of shadow and white.
"How'd she do it," Ruth said.
"Livvy--she jumped from the Tide Basin bridge. Drowned."
"Was your letter in her pocket?"
I nodded, sucking in the smoke, feeling half-drowned, myself. "Everyone knew," I whispered. The flush of guilt and shame washed over me all over again. There's no more terrible feeling in the world, really.
"You drank to kill the guilt," Ruth said. "And I guess, like Andrew, you found out pretty quick it doesn't work."
Abby's high laughter
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