Read Online Rust by Julie Mars - Free Book Online Page A

growled, “That broom’s not going anywhere”; there was silence for a few beats and then they both began to laugh, loud and long, and Donny said, in his musical Irish brogue, “. . . unless you’re riding on it, me girl.” Still, he never threw it out. In fact, Margaret still had it in her storage unit in Queens. They even had a private reference for it called “a case of the orange broom.” Whenever one of them would feel unusually, unreasonably, or inexplicably sad, he or she would admit to having a case of the orange broom, and the other would be extra kind until it passed over.
    Margaret opened her eyes again. After Donny had died, in the absence of anyone to be especially kind to her, the sadness that came with a case of the orange broom had transformed itself to rage and often self-destruction. But sitting here, on the top of a volcano, knowing that it had once, in a fit of pique, spewed molten lava all across the countryside but hadn’t done it lately, she felt happy. She opened her backpack and took out a bottle of water, which she poured into her cupped hands for Magpie to drink from.
    And then she started to draw.

    N OW THAT he knew for sure that there was a next step with Margaret, that it would be taken at precisely eight-thirty the following morning, Rico thought about her less. All in all, he was a man who preferred reality to fantasy, who only reverted to fantasy if there was no chance of reality anywhere in sight. When he did indulge in fantasy, he tended to be uncomfortable and was soon looking for a way out. For Rico, the tension between what he had—which he knew was a lot—and what he might be drawn into in his imagination, was formidable and worth avoiding. He didn’t want to entertain the notion that there was an unlived life to slip into, and he knew instinctively that if he visited it too often the color might drain out of his real one, a possibility that he simply couldn’t risk.
    So on Sunday he did what he always did on Sunday: he got up early and took Elena to eight o’clock mass at the Holy Family Church on Atrisco Boulevard. He sat in the pew with her and performed all the requisite motions—standing, sitting, kneeling over and over again—but he was not a believer, at least not in the way she was. His mother found great comfort in the Catholic Church. She often had a rosary wound through her fingers, and she lit candles every week, even though she could barely see them and Rico had to guide her hand in the right direction. She knew all the responses, of course, and beat her heart with great vigor during what was still called in his youth the “mea culpa.” He studied her out of the corner of his eye during this part, wondering why she felt so guilty about what he knew, and she knew, she had no control over. And during the Sign of Peace, she always hugged him tightly and said, “Te quiero, mi hijo, te quiero ,” to which he replied, “ Te quiero también, Elena, mi madre .” It was true. He did love her rather fiercely.
    It was on the drive home from church that she would usually speak quietly for a few minutes about Fernando, his older brother who had been dead for twenty-six years—more than half of Rico’s life. Rico remembered him well, and his feelings were mixed, to say the least. Perhaps it was the times, which were hard for a cholo born too greedy and too macho for his own good. Perhaps it was simply an accident of personality or some unavoidable genetic glitch that made Fernando turn out the way he did, which was bad—more than bad—through and through. From an early age, Rico had learned to avoid him whenever possible, to stay hidden or fuse himself to his mother or father. Even so, he took more than his share of beatings, heard more vitriol than anyone needs to, and lived his early life with only one clear goal: to be the opposite of Fernando. His daily plan included not being near his brother, not being associated with him in any way, not getting dragged