Free The Sharp Time by Mary O'Connell Page A

Paul. “I’m Sandinista. Nice to meet you.”
    “My pleasure, my pleasure,” he says. “Sandinista: Your parents must be Clash fans. I love that album! You’re lucky that they gave you such a beautiful, unusual name. It’s unforgettable, actually.”
    But Henry Charbonneau misses the dig. He isn’t paying attention because a woman has entered the store wearing stiletto boots. He winces at every sharp clackaclack of the boots, worrying about pockmarks on the gleaming hardwood floor of the Pale Circus, while he makes a big show of looking at the Big Chief tablet, checking the sales. And in what I imagine is an effort to look whimsical and carefree to his new lover, Henry Charbonneau puts himself at extreme risk by popping a circus peanut in his mouth. All the while there is Bradley arranging the sweaters, his hands moving through the racks, fingers chapped from smoking weed in the cold, the crucified Lord on his left thumb, his face a raw radiance of pain.
    I know this was my face the day that the words mother and car accident became key ones in my vocabulary, the day that I was not paying attention, paying attention, paying attention, the exact look I had on that drizzly September day when the state social worker told me that my new and motherless life would be … just like living in a dorm! Well, sort of like living in a dorm, an empty dorm. My new life with the house to myself would have to suffice, because, well, there were no guardians in place for me, and it was lucky—well, not lucky , but maybe fortunate—that I was eighteen and so while still eligible for some services as a juvenile I would not have to go to a foster home, the words foster home springing out of the social worker’s mouth with the same cadence of horror one uses when saying rape or leukemia . My mom had bought our house outright with an inheritance from my grandfather, so there was no mortgage and I would receive enough social security to pay for utility bills and car insurance and groceries, and the social worker assured me that my school would work with me, that the school would be sensitive about my situation. And Uncle Richard, my mom’s older brother, and his new wife, Pam, came up from Florida to help me with banking issues, with setting up bill payment over the Internet, the sadness of transfers—deeds, titles—accompanied by a strange smile of expectant happiness on Uncle Richard’s face, as if I were not properly expressing my elated gratitude, as if I were neglecting to pump my fist in the air and shout, “The Taurus is mine, motherfuckers!”
    So I’m feeling short of breath just thinking about it all, and the bruise on my ribs hurts, a little sun radiating a burst of pain, and I’m not really paying attention to anything. But what I see out the window is this: a monk is staring at the Ziggy Stardust boots in the display. One of his hands is teacupped against the window glass, and he’s smiling—beatific and amazed—and indeed it would be the greatest day in the world if the monk came in the shop and bought the Ziggy Stardust boots. He could go down the street, his sandals dangling in his hand, the hem of his robe rising up and showing off the silver lightning bolts that race up the sides, the cherry-red platform soles.
    Bradley is watching the monk, and I look over and see that Henry Charbonneau and Paul are looking at him too, and we all dearly want him to buy these boots, we all want something offbeat and beautiful to come crashing through the day, and I start to love everyone in the world—well, not everyone— and that’s when a granola woman—poncho, scuffed suede Birkenstocks—walks into the Pale Circus. She browses through the jackets before she pulls out a buckskin-fringe number and gives a happy little nod: Oh, yeah, baby, this is it .
    Bradley saunters over to the counter with the granola woman and, with a burst of understated drama, reveals his genius. Bradley rings her up in full view of Henry