Read Online The Reading Circle by Ashton Lee - Free Book Online Page A

her affection off dead center. Or at least she hoped it would. Merely reading Forrest Gump together for the upcoming March meeting of The Cherry Cola Book Club wasn’t getting her where she wanted to be, either.
    â€œRemember this foolishness?” she said to him, pointing to a faded black-and-white snapshot of what looked like a deserted elementary classroom. It was surrounded by other old photos of children on the seesaw, playing dodge ball and climbing on the jungle gym, many staring at the camera with their tongues sticking out for no other reason than they were seven, eight, or nine years old. It came with the territory.
    â€œA bunch of children playing. So what?”
    Her impatience was quite evident in her tone. “No, not those. Just the one I’m pointing to.”
    They were seated on her long green living room sofa, flanked by a couple of her many potted palms, and still he could only manage a frown. “There’s nobody in that picture.”
    She briefly shifted the scrapbook, bringing it up closer to his face as if she expected him to inhale the enticing aroma of some delicious entrée. “You aren’t looking close enough.”
    He was squinting hard now, but to no avail. “It’s just a bunch of desks somewhere, Voncille. I have no idea what it is you expect me to see.”
    She produced an exasperated sigh. “When was the last time you had your eyes checked? I’m thinking it’s been too long, because you should be able to do better than that.” She placed the tip of her index finger beneath one of the desks in the foreground and moved it quickly from side to side as if trying to rub out a stain. “Zero in on this, if you please.”
    Finally, he saw what she was getting at. “Oh, that’s a little girl all crouched underneath that desk.” He couldn’t have looked more surprised. “Don’t tell me that’s you? What were you doing under there?”
    â€œIt most certainly is me,” she told him. “And everyone else in the room besides. We were all just following orders. Now do you remember?” She could tell by the way his eyes were moving rapidly from side to side that he was searching for an answer but couldn’t find one. “Oh, for heaven’s sake, Locke, didn’t you have these drills at your school growing up over in the Delta? It was all the rage in 1952 or 1953—somewhere around there.”
    The smile that broke across his face was one of relief as much as anything else. “Oh, yes, you’re right. We did. I’d forgotten all about them. Those beyond ridiculous H-bomb drills.”
    â€œHad to be the silliest things human beings have ever thought up to do. Our teacher, Miz Sallie Cowart, called them ‘duck and cover,’ ” Miss Voncille explained further and then started laughing. “Imagine. Ducking under our desks and covering our heads on cue was supposed to save us from any kind of nuclear blast. We had them here in Cherico once a week, so imminent was the threat of nuclear attack from the Russians, they seemed to delight in telling us. And when you went to the movies at the Starbright, they were practically in every Movietone newsreel with that narrator and his booming voice: ‘Today’s schoolchildren smartly prepare for nuclear war in the classroom while they take a break from learning their lessons! See how they respond bravely and quickly to their teacher’s command!’ Or something like that.”
    Locke joined her in a fit of laughter. “Hey, my school even went one step further. They decided to issue us dog tags so our bodies could be identified after the nuclear blast. Like there would be anybody around to clean up the mess and say, “Hey, over here in this corner is what’s left of Locke Marshall Linwood! Oh, and look over there—that’s little Roe Anne Stacey! Their parents will be so glad to know we’ve found