Free The Clock Winder by Anne Tyler

forgotten, even after the twins had turned out to be the brightest of her children. Timothy had spent too long assuming she was right to be able to laugh it off. “You asked me that
yesterday,”
he said.
    “Oh, did I?”
    “Do you imagine you should still be signing my report cards?”
    “Timothy, dear, I was only interested.”
    “That’s more than I am,” Timothy said. “I think it’s all a bore.”
    “Oh, how can you
say
that?
Medical
school?”
    “It’s a bore.”
    “Well, it was your decision, not mine. I was never the kind of mother to interfere in her children’s lives.” “Oh, Lord.”
    “Now, let’s just sit and enjoy the fire. Shall we? You’ve done a very good job with it, Matthew. I believe the last time you built a fire you left the flue shut.”
    The last time Matthew had built a fire was when theirfather died, in June, and their mother kept insisting the house was cold. Oh, everything she said nowadays was attached to other things by long gluey strands, calling up other days, none of them good, touching off chords, opening doors. All he could do was tip his head back against his chair and sink into his own private tunnel while she pattered on.
    “I’m ready,” Elizabeth said.
    She had changed into a bulky wool dress that fit haphazardly, and nearly all of her hair was caught up by one flaking gilt barrette. Her nylons were wrinkled at the ankles and her squashed-looking black pumps curled at the toes. She swung her vinyl handbag like a waitress just getting off work. Mrs. Emerson looked up at her and sighed, sharply. But Matthew gave Elizabeth a happy smile, and she stood in front of him smiling back until Timothy rose abruptly and took her hand. “Come on, come on,” he said. “We’re late already.”
    “Elizabeth, dear, your hair is falling down,” Mrs. Emerson said.
    They had a long drive ahead—past the city limits, out on a superhighway filmed with slippery snow. Elizabeth had to keep clearing the mist off the inside of the windshield. When she wasn’t doing that she was switching radio stations—from one song to the other, in the middle of a note, which was something Timothy rarely did himself. He felt an obligation to hear songs through to the end, even if he didn’t like them. He also finished books that bored him, and had never in his life walked out on a movie. The fact that he and Elizabeth were so different, even on this small point, deepened the sense of uneasiness that had been growing in him all evening. Here they were out on a snowy road, probably driving to their deaths, and he didn’t know anything about this girl. Everythinghe asked her was batted back at him, or turned into a joke. “Elizabeth,” he said, “why is it we never have a serious conversation?”
    “Why should we?” she asked.
    “You never say anything you mean. Never talk about your family, or that place you’re from—what’s-its-name—”
    “Ellington.”
    “Ellington. Have you got something against it?”
    “Oh, no. I liked it,” said Elizabeth, and she smiled at a lone house swaddled with blue Christmas lights. Then she began tracing spirals on her window, and just when he thought the conversation had reached a dead end she said, “I probably would be there still, if my father didn’t get so het up about reincarnation.”
    “About what?”
    “He doesn’t believe in reincarnation.”
    “Well, who does?”
    “I do,” said Elizabeth. Then she giggled and said, “This week, anyhow.”
    “You couldn’t possibly,” Timothy said.
    Elizabeth only sat back in her seat, tucking her hands in her sleeves for warmth.
    “Do you?” he asked.
    “Oh, well. It was one of those last-straw deals,” she told him. “I was enough of a thorn in his side not being religious. Reincarnation was the end.”
    “What do you want to go and believe in a thing like
that
for?” Timothy said.
    “I just think it’s a nice idea. You can stop getting so wrought up about things once you know it’s