Read Online Flights by Jim Shepard - Free Book Online

weight on them, swinging his legs up. He’d creep to the peak of the roof, rest the barrel lightly between the top of the basketball backboard and its two-by-four support, and wait.
    He liked this one, he mused, turning in bed. He pumped up the gun, increasing the tension on the firing mechanism until he felt it would explode in his hands if he handled it roughly.
    And the sun came out red and weak, and Lady was let out. She ran around the yard sniffing and urinating and went back in without seeing him.
    And his mother and sister set up for the Air Show.
    And when Dom arrived and edged from the car with two trays of rolled prosciutto and ham and a bottle of cherry peppers held lightly by his chin against his chest, he sighted down the barrel and fired quickly, thonk thonk thonk, at the hunched figure, and the jar made a musical plish and dropped away magically from beneath the cap, peppers and juice streaming and tumbling down his dark blue chest. And he swung his rifle, thonk, and Lady yelped, splaying out a hind leg, and swung it back, thonk, and Dom yelped and sent two trays of meats cascading up and over, the meats fluttering pink and the trays spinning silver. And down along the TV trays in a crooked line: pling plang plung, the sound to mix with Dom’s silver trays coming down on the driveway.
    And they all rushed him at once, Lady, Dom, his father, his mother, with scaling ladders and needle-sharp bayonets, with bright blue tunics and long white sabers, or dark blue police suits and long brown clubs, or sweaty red bodies and painted, feathered faces, and he stood and fired from the hip, levered Teddy’s Winchester up and down, kicked away tomahawks and sabers, nightsticks and savage hands.
    The sun seemed bright and cold the morning of the Air Show. Biddy had been awake and outside with his mother before seven, while it was still clear and chilly. He lay on his belly on the warming pavement of the driveway, gazing vacantly down the street at Simon’s yard. Kristi was playing with Simon, Simon in the wagon, the wagon at the top of the driveway, the driveway a long coast to the street. Simon rattled the handle. Cindy’s car turned onto the street and with a shove Kristi sent him out and down the incline, the red wagon gaining speed all the way down the driveway and it occurred to Biddy that it wasn’t going to stop. It bounced once, jiggling Simon and making him puppetlike, and swept out in front of Cindy’s car, which jerked and bucked and turned aside. The wagon continued across the street and onto the lawn opposite, pitching over and tumbling Simon out. Cindy got out of her car and stood surveying the scene, looking tiny and ineffectual in the distance. She said something to both Simon and Kristi, and got back in and continued to Biddy’s driveway. The car grew as it cruised up the pavement toward him. He didn’t move and the bumper stopped above him.
    Later, in the chaise longue, Cindy said, “Biddy, you’re going to have to watch that kid. His mother obviously isn’t going to.”
    â€œCan I taste that?” he asked, pointing to her drink.
    â€œIt’s too early in the morning for you to be drinking.” She had on a white bathing suit with light brown straps. One leg tapered along the length of the chaise longue; the other had slipped off and lay on a diagonal between grass and chair.
    â€œWhy isn’t it too early for you?”
    â€œI’m engaged,” she said, turning on the chaise longue without opening her eyes.
    â€œWhere’s Ronnie?”
    â€œHe’s coming. He’s getting some stuff at the bakery.” Her arm dangled vaguely at a plastic bottle in the grass. “Put some lotion on me?”
    â€œWhat’s he getting?”
    She took a sip of her drink, her glass intricately beaded with condensation. “Don’t you want to put some lotion on me? Want me to fry?”
    He knelt in the grass near her, the plastic