Free The Burgess Boys by Elizabeth Strout Page A

JOKE.
    “Oy,” Bob said, struggling to sit up.
    “I’m going to work.” Susan called this to him from the kitchen. He heard cupboard doors slam. And then the back door slammed and he heard her drive off.
    He sat with just his eyes moving about the room. The drawn blinds were the color of hard-boiled eggs. The wallpaper was a similar color, with a series of swooping long-beaked birds that were thin and blue. There was a wooden hutch that had Reader’s Digest Condensed Books along its top shelf. There was a wing chair in the corner with its arms worn so the upholstery had rips. Nothing in the room seemed designed for comfort, and he felt comfortless.
    A motion on the stairway caused a rush of fear to pass through him. He saw the pink terry-cloth slippers, then the skinny old woman aiming her huge glasses at him. She said, “Why are you sitting there in your coat?”
    “I’m freezing,” Bob said.
    Mrs. Drinkwater walked down the rest of the stairs and stood holding the banister. She looked around the room. “It’s always freezing in this house.”
    He hesitated, then said, “If you’re too cold, you should tell Susan.”
    The old lady moved to sit down in the wing chair. She pushed at her big glasses with a bony knuckle. “I wouldn’t want to complain. Susan doesn’t have much money, you know. She hasn’t had a raise at that eye shop for years. And the price of oil.” The old lady twirled a hand above her head. “Mercy.”
    Bob picked the newspaper off the floor and put it on the couch next to him. The picture of Zach stared up at him, grinning, and he turned the paper over.
    “It’s on the news,” Mrs. Drinkwater said.
    Bob nodded. “They’re both at work,” he told her.
    “Oh, I know, dear. I came down to get the paper. She leaves it for me on Sundays.”
    Bob leaned forward and handed her the paper, and the old lady continued to sit in the chair with the paper on her lap. He said, “Ah, so listen, does Susan yell at him a lot?”
    Mrs. Drinkwater looked around the room, and Bob thought she wasn’t going to answer. “Used to. When I first moved in.” She crossed her legs and rocked one ankle up and down. Her slippers were huge. “Of course her husband had just run off back then.” Mrs. Drinkwater shook her head slowly. “Far as I could tell, the boy never did anything wrong. He’s a lonely boy, isn’t he.”
    “Always has been, I think. Zach’s always seemed, well, fragile—emotionally. Or just immature. Or something.”
    “You think your children will be like the ones in the Sears catalog.” Mrs. Drinkwater rocked her foot harder. “But then they aren’t. Though I admit, Zachary seems more alone than most. Anyways, he cries.”
    “He cries?”
    “I hear him in his room sometimes. Even before this pig’s head stuff. I feel like a tattletale, but you’re his uncle. I try to mind my own business.”
    “Does Susan hear him?”
    “I don’t know, dear.”
    The dog came to him, sticking her long nose into his lap. He stroked the rough hair of her head, then tapped the floor so she would lie down. “Does he have any friends?”
    “Never seen any come to the house.”
    “Susan says he put the pig’s head there by himself.”
    “Maybe he did.” Mrs. Drinkwater pushed at her huge glasses. “But there are plenty others who’d have liked to. Those people, the Somalians, they’re not welcome here by everyone. I don’t mind them myself. But they wear all that stuff.” Mrs. Drinkwater spread a hand in front of her face. “You just see their eyes peeking out.” She looked around the room. “I wonder if it’s true, what they say—they keep live chickens in their cupboards. Mercy, that seems strange.”
    Bob stood up, felt for his cell phone in his coat pocket. “I’m going out to have a cigarette. If you’ll excuse me.”
    “Of course, dear.”
    Standing under a Norway maple whose yellow leaves arched over him, Bob lit a cigarette, squinted at his phone.

5
    Jim, sunburned