Read Online You Only Get Letters from Jail by Jodi Angel - Free Book Online Page B

“I had to buy him something in order to get him to spend time with his own mother.” She hiccupped and laughed. “I mean, I found him a car, flew us out to pick it up, and I am paying for the road trip to drive it home. The experience of a lifetime. And look at him. Nothing.” She paused while everyone stared at me. “Anyway, you ever seen that cop movie where the bad guys crash that helicopter into the Golden Gate Bridge?” She had both elbows on the table and was leaning forward over her plate so that she could hold her beer with both hands. Her cheeks were pink, as though she had just stepped inside from the cold. “You know, and there’s the car that catches on fire and when the people jump from the bridge they don’t realize that they’re jumping into shark water?” She looked around the table. I picked the dark meat from a small window I had torn in the crisp skin of a thigh. My mother had fucked somebody famous when she was younger. He hadn’t been famous then, but he used to hang out at her apartment and drink red wine and talk about foreign films. Whenever she met new people, she couldn’t keep from dropping his name, even though it had all happened eighteen years ago—a few weeks in the summer—when he was still in college and she thought his lips were too thin to date him seriously.
    She drew out the pause longer than necessary to build the dramatic finish. “The actor who played the cop was my boyfriend,” she said.
    â€œReally?” Casper said. “That guy with the dark hair—kinda short, but built real good?” I could tell that he was genuinely impressed, like most people were. “That’s something. It’s like you’re practically famous then.”
    The pink in my mother’s cheeks spread to her ears and brightened like the glow of brake lights on wet pavement. “Well, it was years ago, you know, but we were close.” She winked and put her mouth over the rim of the bottle so she could drink from it without lifting her arms. She swallowed and looked over at Casper. “Very close,” she said.
    He pushed his almost-untouched plate away from him and tipped back in his chair so that the front legs rose off the floor. His shoulders were wide and I could see hard muscle under his shirt. My mother was watching him, and from across the table I saw all the places where her eyes could land. “You want another beer?” he said.
    â€œI’ll get them,” Ruby said. “I want to go check on Thumper, if it’s okay.”
    â€œYou can clear these plates up first. Put the food away.”
    My mother stood up and pushed her chair back. She was unsteady on her feet and the top of her thigh knocked against the edge of the table and made the empty bottles rock. We all reached out our hands to hold everything in place, but the table settled and she sat back down. “Why don’t we let them go out and check on the bunnies, Casper? Me and you can clear the table and get the dishes done. I’m very good at washing, and you look like a man who knows his way around a dish towel.” My mother picked up a boiled carrot with her fork and bit into it, then set it down.
    Ruby sucked in her lower lip and started gathering the silverware from around her plate. Casper held his balance backward in the chair and was quiet. Finally he cleared his throat and dropped the chair back to all fours. “I guess that’d be okay for one night,” he said. Ruby let go of a deep breath. She piled her wadded napkin onto her plate and pushed back from the table.
    â€œYou can take your own plate to the sink,” Casper said.
    I gathered up my things and followed Ruby to the kitchen. I scraped what was left on my plate into the trash like she had done and set it on the counter. She grabbed a flashlight from a drawer and I followed her out of the kitchen and toward the front door.
    â€œRuby.”