Everything I Never Told You: A Novel by Celeste Ng

Author:Celeste Ng
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
Publisher: Penguin Group US
Published: 2014-06-26T00:00:00+00:00

Two weeks later, Marilyn and James drove to Toledo to retrieve her clothes and books. “I can go alone,” Marilyn insisted. By then the marble and the barrette and the button nestled quietly, forgotten, in the pocket of her dress in the closet. Already the dress was growing tight and soon Marilyn would give it away to Goodwill, with her tiny, forgotten talismans still tucked inside. Still, her eyes stung at the thought of emptying that apartment, sealing her books back into cartons, tossing her half-filled notebooks into the rubbish. She wanted privacy for this little funeral. “Really,” she said. “You don’t have to come.” James, however, insisted. “I don’t want you lifting anything heavy in your condition,” he said. “I’ll ask Vivian Allen to stop by and watch the kids for the afternoon.”

As soon as James and Marilyn had gone, Mrs. Allen turned the TV to a soap opera and sat down on the couch. Lydia hugged her knees under the dining table, cookbookless; Nath picked lint from the carpet and glowered. His mother woke him up and tucked him in, but Lydia filled up all the spaces in between. He knew the answer to every question their mother asked, but whenever he tried to jump in, she shushed him while Lydia counted on her fingers. At the museum, he wanted to watch the star show in the planetarium, but they spent the whole day looking at the skeletons, the model of the digestive system, whatever Lydia wanted. That very morning, he had come down to the kitchen early, clutching his folder of news clippings, and his mother, still in her bathrobe, gave him a sleepy smile over the rim of her teacup. It was the first time she had really looked at him since she came home, and something fluttered in his throat like a little bird. “Can I have a hard-boiled egg?” he asked, and, like a miracle, she said, “All right.” For a moment he forgave her everything. He decided he would show her the pictures of the astronauts he’d been collecting, his lists of launches, everything. She would understand them. She would be impressed.

Then, before he could say a word, Lydia padded down the steps, and his mother’s attention flitted away and alighted on Lydia’s shoulders. Nath pouted in the corner, flicking the edges of his folder, but no one paid any attention to him until his father came into the kitchen. “Still mooning over those astronauts?” he said, plucking an apple from the fruit bowl on the counter. He laughed at his own joke and bit into the apple, and even across the kitchen Nath had heard the hard crunch of teeth piercing skin. His mother, listening to Lydia recount last night’s dream, had not. She had forgotten all about his egg. The little bird in his throat had died and swelled so that he could hardly breathe.

On the couch, Mrs. Allen let out a little stuttering snore. A thread of spit oozed down her chin.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.