Read Online The Unfortunates by Sophie McManus - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Sophie McManus
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sun-drenched shoeboxes. I fall in love and then they’re gone.”
“Doesn’t that make you a good agent? When you pitch it, you mean it?”
“You’d think. But no, they said I don’t have the right tone. ‘Too much enthusiasm doesn’t project discernment,’ that’s how they said it.”
“Who are you getting your advice from, Nell Turner? The Duchess?”
“The Duchess? My mother-in-law?”
“You haven’t heard? Whoops.”
“I love it. You like not smoking?”
“I do. Even though it makes me sad.”
“You don’t want the old life,” she says, “but you miss it anyway.”
“Is that what we’re talking about? Smoking? Let’s cheer up. Tell me a bad joke. Make it better than last time.”
“Okay. I bought a box of animal crackers. It said, ‘Do not eat if seal is broken.’”
“That’s awful.” Victor’s slim, tattooed forearm is pressed against her spine. His tattoo, a mountain lion—or is it a dog?—nobly astride the back of a giant shrimp, together riding the crest of a wave.
“Now you tell me a joke.”
“I can never remember jokes. I’m thinking, I’m thinking!”
“I am sorry I lost your book.”
“I have one! A dentist, a priest, and a hangman go to a gun show. Turn over please.”
“A dentist, a priest, and a hangman.”
“They get to the firing range. They have AK-47s. They stand side by side and the priest says, ‘Dentist, how long has it been since you—’ Shit, I can’t remember. No it’s—no. It goes something, something, something, alligator. Forget it.”
They laugh, but an unexpected and urgent worry for her mother-in-law springs up in her chest. It has the same texture as the worry of her dream.
6
After dinner with his mother in the dining room—“The napkins are maroon,” she’d said, with a quiet and sage disgust, as if their color foretold all humanity’s pending griefs—George spent the night at a nearby hotel. He’d promised to return to Oak Park for breakfast and goodbyes and to make sure there was nothing more he needed to request in person on her behalf—the quality of the soundproofing between rooms, for example, she’d need the night’s sleep to discover. But alone at the hotel, with the television chattering in the cabinet and the curtains pulled, as the evening wore on, a vital nervousness began to net his thoughts. So much to be done, and none of it in that gray room! Well past midnight, he called the car service and asked them to pick him up as soon as they found a man to drive out to him; yes, extra for the distance and the hour. How could he stay a moment more? She doesn’t need him. He’ll be back soon enough. She’s already having a good time, outfoxing the staff, inventing demands. That routine, rolling into the closet. As he’d followed her down the hall, he’d experienced an unfamiliar, mixed-up feeling. But then he entered the closet and she said, “Oh, it’s only you.” And so at 4:00 a.m. he stole across the dim lobby and slid into the backseat of the car. Fast to cover the miles, fast back to life. Still, five hours on the road, two in asphyxiating traffic with the city just out of view! At last, the car turns onto the George Washington Bridge and Manhattan appears in the weak early sun across the wide churn of the Hudson. Tuesday morning. He’ll go straight to work, put in an appearance, ensure everything is clanking along on schedule and then attend to his libretto. From the backseat of the car, with the partition to the driver closed so the air-conditioning circulates an optimally tight flow around him, the skyline is stalagmite, elemental, each building a slice edge of steel. Looking at the city from the bridge, it’s hard to believe anyone’s in there. How nice, he thinks, the city would be if the streets were empty. To slide through gray midtown without seeing another soul, without hearing a sound but the click of the traffic lights. The car plunges into the stink and speed of summer in New
“Doesn’t that make you a good agent? When you pitch it, you mean it?”
“You’d think. But no, they said I don’t have the right tone. ‘Too much enthusiasm doesn’t project discernment,’ that’s how they said it.”
“Who are you getting your advice from, Nell Turner? The Duchess?”
“The Duchess? My mother-in-law?”
“You haven’t heard? Whoops.”
“I love it. You like not smoking?”
“I do. Even though it makes me sad.”
“You don’t want the old life,” she says, “but you miss it anyway.”
“Is that what we’re talking about? Smoking? Let’s cheer up. Tell me a bad joke. Make it better than last time.”
“Okay. I bought a box of animal crackers. It said, ‘Do not eat if seal is broken.’”
“That’s awful.” Victor’s slim, tattooed forearm is pressed against her spine. His tattoo, a mountain lion—or is it a dog?—nobly astride the back of a giant shrimp, together riding the crest of a wave.
“Now you tell me a joke.”
“I can never remember jokes. I’m thinking, I’m thinking!”
“I am sorry I lost your book.”
“I have one! A dentist, a priest, and a hangman go to a gun show. Turn over please.”
“A dentist, a priest, and a hangman.”
“They get to the firing range. They have AK-47s. They stand side by side and the priest says, ‘Dentist, how long has it been since you—’ Shit, I can’t remember. No it’s—no. It goes something, something, something, alligator. Forget it.”
They laugh, but an unexpected and urgent worry for her mother-in-law springs up in her chest. It has the same texture as the worry of her dream.
6
After dinner with his mother in the dining room—“The napkins are maroon,” she’d said, with a quiet and sage disgust, as if their color foretold all humanity’s pending griefs—George spent the night at a nearby hotel. He’d promised to return to Oak Park for breakfast and goodbyes and to make sure there was nothing more he needed to request in person on her behalf—the quality of the soundproofing between rooms, for example, she’d need the night’s sleep to discover. But alone at the hotel, with the television chattering in the cabinet and the curtains pulled, as the evening wore on, a vital nervousness began to net his thoughts. So much to be done, and none of it in that gray room! Well past midnight, he called the car service and asked them to pick him up as soon as they found a man to drive out to him; yes, extra for the distance and the hour. How could he stay a moment more? She doesn’t need him. He’ll be back soon enough. She’s already having a good time, outfoxing the staff, inventing demands. That routine, rolling into the closet. As he’d followed her down the hall, he’d experienced an unfamiliar, mixed-up feeling. But then he entered the closet and she said, “Oh, it’s only you.” And so at 4:00 a.m. he stole across the dim lobby and slid into the backseat of the car. Fast to cover the miles, fast back to life. Still, five hours on the road, two in asphyxiating traffic with the city just out of view! At last, the car turns onto the George Washington Bridge and Manhattan appears in the weak early sun across the wide churn of the Hudson. Tuesday morning. He’ll go straight to work, put in an appearance, ensure everything is clanking along on schedule and then attend to his libretto. From the backseat of the car, with the partition to the driver closed so the air-conditioning circulates an optimally tight flow around him, the skyline is stalagmite, elemental, each building a slice edge of steel. Looking at the city from the bridge, it’s hard to believe anyone’s in there. How nice, he thinks, the city would be if the streets were empty. To slide through gray midtown without seeing another soul, without hearing a sound but the click of the traffic lights. The car plunges into the stink and speed of summer in New
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