Free Fellow Mortals by Dennis Mahoney

out of their being selfless.”
    “What does that even mean?” Ava asks.
    The light’s turned purple outside, dusky warm and giving the room a saturated hue. A phoebe cheeps. Ava squeaks her chair without moving and the Finns, stock-still, make no sound at all.
    “Joan,” Henry says. “What do you think he needs?”
    She looks up spooked, shaken by her name, having sat there comfortably forgotten with her meal. Henry stares at her with open-faced sincerity and hope.
    “A friend?” Joan asks.
    Ava sighs and shakes her head.
    “Absolutely right,” he says, drumming on the table. “It’s exactly that simple.”
    Joan looks relieved.
    *   *   *
    Ava’s ready to sleep at nine o’clock, the arches of her feet full of buckshot and thorns. Before they go upstairs, Joan leads Henry into the kitchen. She’s been working on her puzzle all afternoon and has the border and the lower-left corner nearly done. Henry laughs, assuming she’s been having a marvelous time, and his laughter automatically convinces Joan she has. They all say good night and go their separate ways, Nan and Joan with cups of tea and a criminal forensics show, Ava to the bedroom with Henry at her heels.
    “Tell me the truth,” she says, stopping him the second he’s in the room.
    “What?”
    “You pushed yourself today.”
    “He needed help to clear a path. It wasn’t dangerous .”
    “You promised me a year ago. You promised not to push…”
    “I know, I know,” Henry says, defeated far too easily for Ava to pursue a proper argument. “I promise…”
    “Don’t,” she says. “Don’t.”
    He had promised with cigars.
    “I didn’t mean to worry you,” he says. “Ava, look at me. I didn’t—”
    “Let it go. I’m glad it went well, I’m glad you’re okay. But I’m really too exhausted for a long conversation,” and with that she turns away and leaves him at the door.
    It feels later than it is, deeper into summer—almost like fall is right around the bend. The room’s muggy and she can’t raise the window any higher. She would like nothing better than to sleep outdoors with the June constellations moving overhead and the grass still warm from the afternoon sun. The room’s cramped and the ceiling’s too low to hang a fan. She’s tired of the wall paint—gingerbread tan—more suitable for winter when it cozies up the bed. She can’t stop yawning and her eyes have a leak. She sits and feels the mattress sag. They ought to flip it, ought to buy a new box spring. She wonders how it feels starting over altogether. Brand-new wardrobe. Bright white sheets. Working with an architect, drawing up plans.
    Wingnut pauses in the middle of the room, neither wagging nor alert but lazily content. He’s filthy from the woods and needs a bath. So does Henry, who has the pine-sapped look of someone who’s sweat and dried several times in one afternoon. He peels off his shirt and stretches out his arms, works a rotator cuff and groans when it pops.
    “He isn’t living very good,” Henry says. “I think I ought to bring him something.”
    “We have enough to pay for already, feeding two extra mouths.”
    “They barely eat.”
    “And only one of us is working.”
    “I’m still getting paid.”
    “But only one of us is working ,” Ava says, and shuts her eyes.
    She’s noticed how he looks when he riffles through the mail, separating bills like a cardsharp handling a deck, knowing all his pals are out delivering their routes. Even his body misses work; he’s gained ten pounds since the fire, and it’s taken an afternoon of threatening his heart to make him look spent instead of restless.
    “Did I do something wrong? Aside from moving logs?”
    “I’m tired and my feet hurt.”
    “Give me those.”
    He kneels and rubs his hands together, building up heat.
    “You’re exhausted,” Ava says. “I ought to be giving you a massage.”
    “I’m fine,” he says. “I told you—it was really easy work.”
    He lifts her