Free The Realm of Last Chances by Steve Yarbrough Page A

evidently weighed in his favor. His father had died at Saint-Mère-Église on D-day, when his parachute deposited him into a house set on fire by a pathfinder’s flare. He and his two brothers were raised by their mother, who taught first grade in Fairfax. He attended Tech on an academic scholarship and, while not at the top of his class, did well there. He earned the money for his frat fees by performing brake jobs three afternoons a week at Firestone. “I convinced her I was worth a second look. Took a lot of hard work, plenty of elbow grease, but it was the best thing I ever did. And though I hate to admit it, I’ve always been glad her father lost that finger.”
    A self-made man:
that was what Kristin’s dad said Mr. Connulty was, on one of the rare evenings that summer when neither girl visited the other, the Connultys having gone to Virginia to see their relatives.
    “What other kind of man is there?” her mother asked.
    Her father was drinking his whiskey, and the television was on, the sound turned low as it so often was in those days. On the screen, President Nixon was finishing a speech, his lapels bunched up under his chin because he’d raised his hands above his head to flash the victory sign.
    “There are plenty of other kinds,” her father said, reaching for his Tullamore Dew.
    “So just name one.” Her mother had a book in her lap andcontinued to look at it as if she were reading, though Kristin knew she wasn’t. When she was reading, she didn’t talk or even listen to what anyone else was saying.
    Her father also had a book in his lap, Leon Uris’s
QB VII
. He closed it and laid it on the floor. “Take me, for instance,” he said. “I’m not a self-made man.”
    “So what kind are you?”
    “Well, I’m the kind who follows a well-trod path.”
    “Really?”
    “Or maybe I should say a worn path. Aren’t you always trying to make your students enjoy that Welty story?”
    “I don’t try to make them. I try to help them.”
    “Whatever. Anyhow,” her dad said, “
my
father taught school. And what do I do?” Rather than wait for her answer, he said, “And look at you. I married a beautiful, brilliant woman who also teaches school, just like my own mother did. In other words, I didn’t wander off the path into the forest.”
    He drained his glass, got up, walked over to the sideboard and poured himself a second drink, bigger than the first. Kristin had never seen him do that before. He turned his back to her and her mother, pulled aside the curtain and gazed at the Connultys’ house, though no one was there, not even the dog. They’d taken George with them to Virginia.
    “If Tom Connulty had followed in his father’s footsteps, he would’ve joined the army about five years ago, and probably would’ve died in some rice paddy.” He let the curtain fall, went back to his chair and sat down, the cushions sighing beneath his weight. “And he wouldn’t have married a woman like Sarah.”
    Her father didn’t say why he wouldn’t have married Mrs. Connulty, and her mother didn’t ask. Instead, she looked at her wristwatch, set her book aside and announced dinner would be ready soon.
    Whenever Kristin spent the night over there, Patty’s mother made them special treats: homemade potato chips with greenturnip dip, fried pickles with blue cheese dressing, buttermilk pies, pecan cakes with praline glaze, pear fritters. She’d sit at the table with them, always saying she’d try just one of whatever they were having. Then she’d leave them alone. The next morning she’d fix elaborate breakfasts of chicken and waffles, cheese grits or sweet potato pancakes. After they finished eating, she’d ask what their plans were, or if they wanted her to take them anywhere, and if the answer was no she’d wash the dishes and do some cleaning and then turn on the soaps.
    At first Mrs. Connulty didn’t talk a lot when the two families convened for one of their frequent dinners, but as that