Such Kindness by Iii Andre Dubus

Author:Iii, Andre Dubus [Iii, Andre Dubus]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Contemporary, Adult
ISBN: 9781324000464
Amazon: 1324000465
Goodreads: 62585977
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Published: 2023-06-06T07:00:00+00:00

21

TRINA’S BATHROOM IS AS CLEAN AND ORGANIZED AS HER KITCHEN. On the back of her sink are two plastic cups that hold her kids’ toothbrushes and hers, the faucet wiped free of spots, the mirror too. The soap I use now is the liquid kind you pump into your hand, a luxury for people like us, and Trina has placed it on a folded washcloth to catch any drippings. Behind me against the wall is a chrome rack for her towels, which she’ll have to haul in a garbage bag to the Laundromat, and they’re folded into the rack Trina saw beside a dumpster one afternoon on our ride back from the lab. She asked me to stop and help her put it in my open trunk, and the lid knocked against it all the way back to the 8.

I wipe my wet hands off on my pants, then make my way down Trina’s stairs. The walls are papered with crayon drawings and a few watercolors, and there’s a Magic Marker sketch of a cannon shooting fire into a car with a man in it. Brian in his mother’s Pontiac so early this morning, the way he gunned that sedan out into the road without even looking. I’m going to need to keep an eye out for him, and this is what I’m thinking about as I step into Trina’s living room.

All the stolen bags of trash are gone and her place is quiet for once. Shannon’s in her room and the boys are playing outside in the storm, the TV off, no virtual men getting machine-gunned or blown up. In the kitchenette Trina’s pouring herself more coffee. She asked me if I wanted some, but I feel like I’ve already got some kind of current flowing through me, one that has nothing to do with the coffee I drank with the young mother Caitlin, the few sips I had of Mrs. Bongiovanni’s and Dawn’s. No, as I sit down at Trina’s card table against the window, the wind whistling through the panes, it’s like my blood has thinned out and is moving smoothly and efficiently through me, calling to my whole being to wake up. Wake up.

Trina has set what’s left of the sweet bread on a paper plate, and she folded the foil into an ashtray her smoking cigarette lies in now.

“You sure you don’t want any?” She walks out of the kitchenette holding a mug of coffee. I smile and shake my head. Trina’s hair is wet from the shower, her ears sticking out a bit, and instead of her hoodie sweatshirt and pajama bottoms, she’s in jeans and a tight sweater with a hole in one elbow. She sets a paper towel down, then sits across from me, reaching for her cigarette and a slice of sweet bread. “I can’t believe she gave you this, Tommy. It’s so fucking good.” She takes a drag, blows out smoke, then bites into Mrs. Bongiovanni’s pandoro, closing her eyes and swallowing it down.

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