Swimming Sweet Arrow: A Novel by Maureen Gibbon

Author:Maureen Gibbon
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: General, Fiction
ISBN: 0316355569
Publisher: Back Bay Books
Published: 2009-12-19T08:00:00+00:00

15

WHEN Del started staying away one or two nights a week, I had lots of time alone. Because I did not want to think about Del, I made myself think about other things and other people. Sometimes I thought of my mom, who had sent me a picture of her and her ex-Mormon. Even though my mom was smiling in the picture and wearing a turquoise ring on almost every finger, the picture worried me. I thought the ex-Mormon looked skinny and mean, and it made me sad to think of my mom being with him. It didn’t make me feel much better to think of June, but those nights when Del was gone, I mostly ended up thinking of her out there in that house with Luke and Ray.

I thought I understood some of June’s motivation. She wanted to be loved, and she wanted to be the center of attention. But I wondered what it meant to her to sleep with two brothers. What did it serve in her? Maybe she wanted cock from one brother who was full and thick in her arms and one who was thin enough to have the face of a hawk. Or maybe she really could talk to Luke. Maybe a hundred things. I knew enough about June to understand that the key for her was brothers, but there had to be something she needed from each and something she got from each. As for Luke—well, I knew from Del how two brothers could grow up together and keep hate in a trundle bed between them, pulling it out when it was needed, when there was no one else to hate.

It all made me think of the stories I heard about Kevin Keel. Everyone knew the who-what-where-when of Kevin Keel, but they never knew the why. Why did he become what he was? Nobody could tell me that story, just like they couldn’t tell me why he stayed in a place where everyone knew him as a hell-raiser, a user, and a killer. Maybe he did not know how to be anything else, and it served his fear to stay, or maybe he figured that whatever his story was, it was his, and he might as well stay no matter what people thought of him.

All I knew for certain was that none of us did anything for long unless we wanted to. June and Luke wanted the lies and danger and hurtfulness, at least in part. They might not have known they wanted those things, but something pulled them to that water and they did not draw back.

I pictured the two of them in my mind like they were in a movie, and I ran the movie over and over in my head those nights I was alone. I pictured June waiting until Ray’s car pulled away in the morning, and then crossing the hall soundlessly to stand beside Luke’s bed. He was the first one to speak.

Why so quiet? He’s long gone.

Aren’t you afraid, ever?

Of him? No, I’m not afraid of him.

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.