Free A Boy of Good Breeding by Miriam Toews

message after six o’clock, don’t bother because I’ll be on the bus. I should—”
    Damn, thought Hosea. He still hadn’t installed one of those endless-tape answering machines. She should what? he thought. She always seemed to forget about the length of the tape. Sometimes she’d call back—sometimes two or three times—and just carry on with her monologue, entirely unruffled by the fact that she’d been abruptly cut off. This time she hadn’t called back to continue. Why not? Details like this could give Hosea chest pain. Did it mean she was angry at being cut off? Or if not angry, then (and this was worse), oh God, offended? Had she been suddenly incapacitated by an aneurism? Or was she simply in a hurry to get on the bus to see her sugarbaby, her man, Hosea? Hosea would just have to wait and see. But oh, how he hated to wait. Why hadn’t old GrannyFunk stuck her bobby pin in the book of Job when they were naming him, instead of at Hosea? Hosea! Could Lorna really love a man she called Hose? He glanced at his watch, a Christmas present from Lorna before she knew him well enough to know that he was never late for anything, and in fact already owned five working watches. Okay, if she takes the 6 : 15 bus, thought Hosea, she’ll be here at 7 : 15 . That gave him exactly half an hour to get things ready, maybe call the doctor and still make it to the bus depot to pick Lorna up. Hosea decided to make the call first.
    “Dr. Bonsoir?”
    “Hosea?”
    “Yes, Doctor, Hosea Funk here. Yes, I know. Well then, okay. Any news over there?”
    “News?” said the doctor.
    “Yes, news. Has Mrs. Epp—”
    “No, she has not. Hosea, I’m a busy man. I’m sure you understand.”
    “Why yes, yes, indeed I do, but then, quickly, before I go, how’s, uh … Leander?”
    “Do you mean Mr. Hamm?”
    “Yes, yes, that’s the one. How’s he doing? Not good. I see. Any prognosis or—”
    “No, I do not have a prognosis, nor would I be giving it out over the phone to … non-family members.”
    “I see, but—”
    “Hosea?”
    “Yes?”
    “I have to see to a patient.”
    “Of course, well then, thank-you, Doctor.”
    “Mmmmm,” said the doctor in reply.
    “Au revoir, Doctor,” said Hosea cheerfully.
    “Good-bye, Hosea.”
    Well, of course he was busy, he was a doctor, thought Hosea. No problem. He’d go back to the hospital and see for himself how things were. Hosea checked his watch. Lorna would be pulling up in front of the pool hall, which doubled as a bus depot, in a few minutes. He grabbed two old tablecloths of Euphemia’s. One he threw over the dining room table and the other he draped over his shoulder. He lugged his exercise bike downstairs and put it into its usual hiding place, behind the furnace next to the hot water tank. He yanked the tablecloth that was on his shoulder and threw it over the bike. One time Lorna had said, “You know, Hosea, you’re in great shape for a man your age and you don’t even care. That’s what I like about you.”
    Since then, Hosea had pedalled furiously every morning on his bicycle to nowhere—as Euphemia had called it—and had hid it in the basement each time Lorna came to visit.
    Hosea checked his watch. Damn, he thought. The tape!
    “You’re late,” said Lorna.
    “I know. I’m sorry,” said Hosea. He couldn’t tell Lorna the real reason he was late, and he hadn’t had time to make one up, so he stood there, thumping his breast with his big green Thinsulate glove (because he couldn’t get a proper pincer grip to tug), and hoping her love for him would sweep this latest infraction right under the rug. It had taken Hosea twenty minutes to set his new Emmylou Harris tape to exactly the right song. Fast forward, oops too far—rewind. Too far, fast forward again. Darn! Too far
again!
He had planned to rush into the house ahead of Lorna and push play on his tape deck so that as she entered the house she would hear Emmylou singing “Two More Bottles of