Read Online Morgan's Passing by Anne Tyler - Free Book Online

sauce made of tomato paste, lemon zest, bits of celery … but everything was cut up ahead of time!
Naturally
it looks easy if you don’t have to witness all the peeling and chopping.” Morgan reached across her for the salt. “There’s not enough real life on television,” Louisa said.
    â€œThat’s the whole point,” Brindle told her.
    â€œI’d like to see him try scraping the tomato paste out of that little tiny Hunt’s can, too.”
    â€œMother, you went through all this last week,” Brindle said. “That’s a re-run you were watching, and you made all the same objections too.”
    â€œI did not! I knew nothing about such programs last week.”
    â€œYou told us every bit of it: the lemon zest, the celery …”
    â€œAre you accusing me of a faulty memory?” Louisa asked.
    â€œLadies. Please,” said Morgan. It was true there seemed to be some problem lately with his mother’s memory. She had spells when she was doggedly repetitive; her mind, like an old record, appeared to stick in certain grooves. But it only made her nervous to have it brought to her attention. He scowled at Brindle, who shrugged and buttered another slice of bread.
    Meanwhile his daughters ate in a separate flurry of gossip and quarrels and giggles—seven slim, blue-jeaned girls and then someone else, a little white-haired waif with rhinestone ear studs, some friend of Kate’s. She sat between Kate and Amy and stared at Morgan narrowly, as if she disapproved of him. It made him nervous. He was never truly happy if he felt that even the most random passing stranger found him unlikable. He’d begun the meal in a fine mood, twirling his spaghetti theatrically on his fork and speaking a broad Italian accent, but gradually he lost his enthusiasm. “What do you keep looking at?” he asked now. “Have we met before?”
    â€œSir?”
    â€œThis is Coquette,” Kate told him.
    â€œAh. Coquette.”
    â€œMe and her are in the same class at school. We like the same boy.”
    Morgan frowned. “Same what?” he said.
    â€œThis boy named Jackson Eps.”
    â€œBut you’re only in fifth grade!”
    â€œWe liked him in fourth grade too.”
    â€œThis is ridiculous,” Morgan told Bonny. Bonny smiled at him; she never knew when to start worrying. “What are things coming to?” he asked his sister. “Where are we headed, here? It’s all these Barbie dolls, Ken dolls, Tinkerbell make-up sets.”
    â€œ
I
liked a boy in fifth grade,” Brindle said.
    â€œYou did?”
    â€œRobert Roberts.”
    â€œOh, Lord, Brindle, not Robert Roberts again.”
    â€œRobert Roberts was in fifth grade?” Kate asked. She nudged Coquette. “Robert Roberts was Brindle’s childhood sweetheart,” she said.
    â€œHe was not only in fifth grade,” said Brindle, “he was also in fourth, third, second … We used to have to share our reading-skills workbook; he was always losing his. In kindergarten we went shopping once at Bargain Billy’s and he stuck a label on my cheek reading SLIGHTLY IMPERFECT . He also took me to my first school dance and my first car-date and my senior-class picnic.”
    Morgan sighed and tipped his chair back. Bonny helped herself to more salad.
    â€œThen in college I broke it off,” Brindle told Coquette. “I gave him back his high-school ring with the candle wax still in it to make it fit my finger—half a candle’s worth, it looked like. I’d probably have drowned if I ever wore it swimming.”
    â€œWhy’d you break it off?” Coquette asked her.
    â€œI got married to someone else.”
    â€œBut
why’d
you break it off? I mean, why marry someone else?”
    Brindle pushed her plate away and set her elbows on the table. She said, “Well, I don’t know if … When I talk