Free A Dual Inheritance by Joanna Hershon

deal.”
    “Why can’t I just say thanks? I have to pretend you haven’t done me a few favors?”
    “I’m just saying forget it. Let’s talk about something much better. Who’s the girl?”
    “What girl?”
    “I saw you talking with a girl maybe two weeks ago. You haven’t mentioned it, so I’m curious. I was rushing to a class and I saw you across the Yard. You were sitting on a bench. Tall girl? Good-looking? At least from what I could see.”
    Hugh threw his cigarette into the wind. “I don’t know,” he said. “I’m trying to think. Could it have been Flossie King?”
    “Not Flossie.”
    “I don’t know,” Hugh said, as if he were thinking it through. “I can’t think of who that would be.”
    As Ed drove the highway, as the buildings grew squatter and uglier, he thought about how—when he had seen Hugh with this girl—he hadn’t, in fact, been in any kind of rush. It had been a strangely empty twenty minutes or so, when he was trying to decide if he was hungry enough to buy a roast beef sandwich before shutting himself in the library for the night. He was putting off studying, putting off eating, and all the while he had a twitchy feeling, but he couldn’t decide—even when he asked himself—what it was that he really wanted to do. In short, he was momentarily stuck, and when he saw Shipley he’d felt briefly relieved, for he now knew what he would be doing for the next gradient of time, and he knew it would shift his mood. He could say hello to Shipley and get swept up in some pointless argument, which would—especially if a few drinks were involved—break into incredulity at least once on both of their parts, which only heightened the stakes of the argument.
    But before he could say hello, he’d noticed that Hugh was speaking with a girl, a stunning girl—he’d also downplayed that part of his observation—and that it was clearly no light conversation. First it had seemed that she was angry, but after watching for a minute it looked as though she was struggling to breathe.
    Then Hugh had stood up and taken her by the shoulders, and—how could Ed explain this?—he’d looked scared. Ed watched them for another second, but it quickly started to feel as if he was not supposed to be watching, that no one should be watching, and that—though they were doing nothing but standing together—they should have been given complete and utter privacy.
    “I wonder who you mean,” said Hugh.
    “I’m sure it’ll come to you. Probably when you least expect it.”
    Ed had woken up this morning with a keen urge to drive his new car and figured that—especially with some company—he didn’t need a destination. A Sunday drive. Wasn’t that considered a normal—even acivilized—thing to do? Though he didn’t feel particularly civilized. He wanted to know why Hugh was avoiding talk about this girl and why he was getting the distinct sensation of being placated. It made him want to drive faster.
    “Do you really not remember your mother?” asked Ed, in a tone that sounded aggressive, even to his own ears.
    “Very little,” Hugh said. “I wish I did. What made you think of that ?”
    “I don’t know,” said Ed. “I don’t want to say you were lucky that she died so young, but—”
    “Then don’t,” Hugh said.
    Ed looked at Hugh, and there wasn’t a trace of a smile.
    “Forget I said that,” Ed said.
    He suddenly remembered a place he’d heard about—a pond closer than Walden, a place that reliably froze each winter, no matter how mild the weather. Ed imagined sliding out on his shoes, looking down at the expanse of frozen water, out at the kids who’d inevitably be testing new skates.
    In his mind’s eye he could see himself speeding instead of slipping, feeling the air there just like he felt the air here on the highway, nearly raw on his face. They drove in wind-whipping silence and the road stretched out in front of them and, though the idea had never held all that much