Free Eleven Twenty-Three by Jason Hornsby Page A

door,
unappealing smoke pours out and she has to quickly remove the food
and set it on the counter next to the pot of mashed potatoes and a
big plastic bowl full of steamed vegetables, now cold. She makes
noises with spoons and a carving knife and curses under her breath.
Then she shrugs to herself and comes back into the den with me.
    “Let’s just give the roast a minute to cool,”
she says. “By the way, it may be just a tad overcooked. I hope
that’s okay.”
    “It’s fine,” I tell her. “What do you mean,
everyone is sick lately?”
    “Something in the air, maybe. A virus. Some
bug. I don’t know. Across the End for weeks now, people have been
throwing up and their eyes have been red and dry and everyone’s
been coughing a lot. It’s like some kind of smog or something is
making everyone sick. It even made the Orlando news, it’s been so
bad, and I’ve seen medical people in town, too. Asking questions.
Testing the air. Things like that.”
    “That’s…terrible,” I say. “I think I may have
seen some of those medical people on the way over here, actually.
Did you get sick too?”
    “A little bit. But I don’t go out that much
really, so maybe I was able to avoid it. But anyway, I just want
you and that girl and Hajime to be careful, that’s all. With the
nightmares, too.”
    “I’m sorry?” I say, but am sure I heard her
correctly. Tara’s dream, of Mr. Scott writing out the plotline that
will lead to our own deaths, reverberates in my mind, and I
swallow. “Nightmares, Mom?”
    “I don’t know. Nothing, baby. Let’s eat. Tell
me all about your China trip.”
    Over dinner—which is admittedly terrible but
in a good way that makes me feel nostalgic and even slightly glad
to be back home in Lilly’s End, despite the sickness floating in
the air and the nightmares that run rampant and the rain that
hasn’t stopped for more than an hour since I got here and the fact
that my mother is acting even more off than usual and will probably
cause a major scene at my father’s funeral tomorrow morning—I tell
her about my trip thus far. I tell her about the well-behaved
students and the uppity tenured professors who make several
thousand Yuan less than me a pay period. I describe the carvings
that line the underside of bridges as you take boat rides down the
ancient canals of Suzhou, and the Triads who show off their
elaborate full-body tattoos of dragons and beautiful sultry women
as they smoke Bai-sha cigarettes. I smile as I describe the KTVs
and the private booths where Tara and I get drunk with our new
expatriate friends and sing dancey renditions of the theme from Friends . She nods at all of my short anecdotes where I
describe the times I almost unwittingly paid for the services of
prostitutes, who our friend Nalan Minghui calls “long fingernail
girls.” When I go into detail about Suzhou and Shanghai at
night—about the lights and busy streets and strange
stomach-churning smells and constant stares from the elderly and
total cold shoulder from the college-age kids who are too cool to
look at the bumbling American and his voluptuous red-headed
girlfriend, my mother sips her wine.
    She keeps telling me how exciting all of this
is, and how she understands. She insists she can visualize the
places and moments I’m describing, the same way she did when she
was a kid and read Pearl S. Buck for the first time. But she
doesn’t understand, and I know it. And she knows I know it. I don’t
think she understands anything anymore outside of this
apartment.
    “Well, it sounds fantastic,” she finally
says. “I can definitely see why you’re in no hurry to move back.
Forget what I said earlier about getting a job here, baby. I think
where you’re at sounds like a great adventure.”
    “No, Mom,” I say. “What you suggested, about
moving back and starting over again here—it is a good idea.
Lilly’s End is a nice place to live. It’s just—I’m not—well, my
contract was for a year.