Strange but True by John Searles

Author:John Searles [Searles, John]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, General
ISBN: 9780062191076
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2004-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

chapter 11

BECAUSE OF THE DIFFICULTIES HIS CAST AND CRUTCH PRESENT, IT takes Philip a good five minutes to get into the bathroom, drop his pajama bottoms, and do his business. So when the telephone rings, he is not about to jump up and go running to answer it. As he sits on the toilet in the small bathroom beneath the staircase, Philip listens to the answering machine pick up on the extension in the kitchen. After the mechanical, recorded voice instructs whoever is calling to please leave a message, his mother’s voice echoes through the house. “Philip. It’s me. Are you there? Pick up.” Filtered through the machine, she sounds softer than usual, stripped of her harshness. He might actually mistake her for a sane, decent person with manners if he didn’t know better. Then she says, “Okay, well, I just want you to know that I’m on my way to Melissa’s house. I plan to settle this whole thing once and for all. By the way, I got you a book from the library. I think you might like it. Well, okay. Bye now. See you when I get home.”

Philip tilts his head back and looks at the ceiling. Even though he doesn’t believe in God, he shouts a frustrated question up to the heavens, “Why can’t she just leave the poor girl alone?”

After he flushes and washes his hands, he hobbles to the kitchen with the help of his crutch, picks up the telephone, and punches in *69. “M,” Philip says when the call rings through to voice mail. “It’s me. I don’t know how you even found out where Melissa lives. But please don’t drive over there and rail on her about last night. Call me back when you get this. Or better yet, just come home.”

He hangs up and sits in one of the stiff ladder-back chairs at the kitchen table, exhausted from what little sleep he had the night before and jittery from all the coffee he drank today. Ten cups was a lot, even for him. After his mother woke him this morning then went upstairs to her room following their lovely mother-son talk, Philip tried to focus on reading his book or writing in his journal between watching the occasional scene from whatever old movie happened to be on television. It was then that he began to feel utterly stir-crazy for the first time since he came home. A feeling that returns to him now. Since he didn’t exactly make contingency plans for his life beyond that night on the fire escape, the question of what to do next has slowly begun to creep up on him. He can’t envision himself staying in Radnor forever, or even a few more weeks for that matter. Likewise, he can’t imagine going back to New York—not after the way things ended there.

Five minutes pass.

Five minutes during which Philip sits at the table doing not much of anything except ponder his lack of options. And still, his mother has yet to call back.

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