Read Online Eleven Twenty-Three by Jason Hornsby - Free Book Online Page A

that
lights their cigarettes with flaming twenty dollar bills; he walks
out of his aging wife and grown son’s life; she goes into the
throes of despair; the son’s college years and rocky adulthood are
permanently jaded thereafter. Nothing was the same for either of us
after he left, and every time I stared into the sagging, dead gray
oceans that were once my mother’s vivacious blue eyes, I was
reminded that I would never, ever forgive my father for leaving
us.
    And I never did. Even now, as his body rests
comfortably in the plush surroundings of what I am sure is a very
expensive coffin, I hope for the worst tomorrow, such as his corpse
falling out of the casket or his soul being damned to wander
listlessly around a very boring Purgatory with no dinner
reservations.
    I head up to my mother’s second floor
apartment carrying my usual dinner Cabernet. I stare at the sticker
she placed on her door, the one that says IN CASE OF FIRE, PLEASE
RESCUE CATS. TWO INSIDE. Mom answers the door wearing old jeans and
a blouse. Her brunette hair is disheveled and spotted with more
gray strands than I remember there being four months ago. She is
already drinking her first glass of dark wine, which means I will
be listening to her drunken rants about Dad by eight-thirty or
nine.
    “You're fifteen minutes late,” she says. “I
was getting worried. You sounded pretty groggy on the phone this
morning when you got in.”
    “Long flight,” I say, giving her a sincere
hug. My mother always smells of sullen perfume and forlorn coconut
shampoo, of the black Persian and bitchy tabby cat, of deep
grudge-inducing loss and too much sleep. “Dinner smells good.”
    “I made a roast. I hope that’s okay. It
should be ready in just a few minutes.”
    “Sounds splendid, Mom.”
    “Okay, back up,” she says. “Let me take a
good look at you.”
    She gently nudges me to an arm’s length and
looks me up and down. I feel like I am being sold into slavery. She
grimaces when I grimace, and then we fall back into a hug.
    “You look thin, son.”
    “I eat steamed dumplings and don’t have a car
there, Mom. It happens.”
    “I am so glad to see you home safe, Layne. I
don’t know what I’d do if I flipped on the news one morning and saw
your face on the screen, involved in some kind of terrible
international incident.”
    “I really don’t think you have to worry,” I
say, actually quite amused with the thought of starting some major
capitalist travesty when I go back, especially with the Olympics
coming in a few months. The Chinese don’t want any trouble from us
pale-face runaways, after all.
    “I love you, baby boy.”
    And I love my mother; I always will. But I
tend to love her with more conviction when I remember her giving
off the fragrance of notebook paper and sports cars while standing
next to my father, a wide smile beaming down on me from both of
them.
    I slip past her into the apartment, taking in
the cat smell, the orange and black and white hairs scattered
across the armrests of the couch and recliner, and the thick smoky
air already reeking of another overdone pot roast. The apartment is
how I remember it: under-lit, well manicured, and full of nothing
but appliances and furniture that imply a lonely woman lives here.
I wipe away some of the cat dander from the firm, unused sofa and
sit down, watching my mother move haphazardly from the living room
down the hallway and into the bedroom, and then back into the
living room again. She looms over me, inspecting my black t-shirt,
my wrinkly blue jeans, my deteriorating sneakers, my overgrown
black hair, and mendacious hazel eyes. I quickly look away, ashamed
of being ashamed.
    “Read any good books lately?” I ask her,
inspecting my mother’s overfilled candy jar looking useless on the
coffee table.
    “You look good, but tired,” she says,
apparently not having read any good books. “Are you getting enough
sleep over there? Are the beds comfortable?”
    “I’m fine. It