Read Online One Shot Away by T. Glen Coughlin - Free Book Online

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Jimmy
    J IMMY PACES FROM THE KITCHEN INTO THE FRONT ROOM , remembering the gleaming copper pots in the Sweetapples’ kitchen. He stops at the Bruce Springsteen T-shirt under glass. “Ma, you sure this shirt is worth something?” he asks.
    â€œI saw one on eBay for fifty dollars.” She sticks her tongue out at him.
    He puts his hands up. “Okay.”
    His mother did the dishes, vacuumed the living room, dusted, sprayed the bathroom with Lysol, and cleaned the kitchen floor on her hands and knees. Jimmy packed as much junk as he could into the pantry and shut the door, but it hardly makes a difference. It’s still four rooms and an alcove.
    The doorbell sounds just after seven o’clock. Roxanne enters with a big smile, holding a pumpkin pie covered with plastic wrap. “I made this for you.” She hands him the pie and pecks him on the cheek.
    Jimmy knows he can’t have a piece.
    â€œDon’t worry, it’s low fat,” says Roxanne. “I made it with a fat-free crust, egg whites, and I used half the sugar.”
    â€œHe’ll have to keep this away from his brother.” Trish takes the pie from Jimmy. “I’ve heard so much about you,” she says.
    This isn’t true. Jimmy barely spoke of Roxanne.
    Trish winks her approval at Jimmy over Roxanne’s shoulder. Jimmy takes Roxanne’s coat and lays it across the back of his father’s recliner. She’s wearing embroidered Lucky jeans and a sweater that shows off her flat belly.
    â€œDid Jimmy tell you we finished his college application?” asks Roxanne.
    â€œNo, he didn’t,” says Trish dramatically.
    â€œI was going to tell you,” says Jimmy.
    â€œHe should be applying to more than one college,” says Roxanne. She takes Jimmy’s arm.
    They sit on the couch that’s covered with a brown woven blanket. Trish places a plate of cheese and crackers on the coffee table. “Help yourself,” she says.
    Roxanne smiles and takes a cracker. She seems to be glowing in the grayish light. “Is that your room?” She takes his hand and pulls him off the couch. “You have to show me.”
    She goes around his room, lifting his dried piranha fish off his dresser, touching its white teeth, looking at his framed Derek Jeter rookie card that Pops bought him for his tenth birthday. “This is cool,” she says, touching his replica of the Trade Center.
    â€œI made it in shop after 9/11,” he says.
    â€œI thought it was made in China or something.” She laughs. “I mean that as a compliment.”
    The floor under his window is lined one end to the other with wrestling trophies on marble stands. “You won all these?”
    â€œYeah, my father and I were supposed to build a shelf. You want to see something else?” He pulls a shoebox from under his bed, then lifts the top. The box is almost filled with gold- and silver-colored medals.
    â€œYou should display these.” She touches the medals as if they were really gold and silver, then carefully places them back in the box.
    â€œAnd it all comes down to this season,” he says.
    â€œYou sound worried.” She comes into his arms. She presses against him.
    â€œI just have the preseason dreads.”
    â€œYou’ll be fine.” She takes his hand and places it on her sweater over her breast. “Have you ever had a girl in your room?” Her voice is dreamy, but she’s smiling.
    â€œJust my mother.”
    The doorbell buzzes. Jimmy looks over Roxanne’s shoulder. “Ma,” he calls. “Could you get that?”
    â€œI’m putting the laundry in. Just see who it is.”
    Jimmy opens the front window drape a few inches. Two men in suit jackets and loose-fitting neckties wait on the stoop. They are square-shouldered and clean-shaven. One is bald—his head shaved so close the streetlight reflects off it. A dark four-door sedan with