Is that a Moose in Your Pocket? by Kim Green

Author:Kim Green
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780440334569
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2003-11-04T00:00:00+00:00

Dinner would have been an awkward affair, if it weren’t for Bruce’s impressive ability to maintain two totally separate conversations at the same time. Somehow he managed to get food on the table, indulge Emily—who emerged from her room sniffling but otherwise under control—by milking her for details about her school day, and throw me an occasional bone. I’d seen capable Bruce, and stern Bruce, and even silly, funny Bruce, but this was a new side—smooth, effervescent Bruce, who was able to deliver perfectly tender medium-rare steaks and leap tall silences in a single bound.

Finally, we finished eating. I figured he’d want to drive me home soon, and was surprised when a car pulled up outside and he told Emily to go upstairs and get her bag.

“Where’s she going?” I asked, all innocence.

“She’s spending the night at her friend Toni’s. Prearranged with Melina. That’s Fran Reilly outside now.”

Outside, I could see a tall woman with frizzy blond hair swatting at animals and children in the backseat of her SUV. She held a cell phone to her ear like it was a lifesaver. Bruce waved at her and motioned toward the upstairs, where Emily was getting ready, and Mrs. Reilly nodded and waved back. I felt she may have been craning her neck to get a look at me, but couldn’t be sure. I was sure she’d get an earful later from Emily via Toni and that I’d be lucky to come out an ounce under three hundred pounds, with bad skin, messy hair, and warts on my nose.

Emily came down a few minutes later. She pointedly ignored me and stood in front of Bruce, who enfolded her in a gigantic bear hug.

“Who’s my muffin?” he said, touching his nose to hers in what was obviously a much-loved ritual between them.

“I am.”

“What are you?”

“Your muffin.” Her voice was muffled in his tan neck.

He kissed her cheek.

“I love you, sweetheart.”

“I love you, Daddy,” she said.

Me too, I wanted to say.

“Bye,” she called.

“Aren’t you forgetting something?” Bruce asked.

“Oh, yeah. Bye, Bugle!”

“Something else.”

Emily examined me, much as one would a particularly gruesome insect in a petri dish.

“Bye,” she said grudgingly. I hoped Bruce wouldn’t demand more. I thought if he tried to make her hug me she’d sink her teeth into my jugular or something. Thankfully, he didn’t, just swatted her in the fanny as she ran out the door.

“Have fun at school tomorrow,” he shouted, but she was already in the car.

Bruce closed the door. The house seemed suddenly smaller and warmer.

He turned to me and faux-collapsed in my arms, knocking me against a telephone stand.

“God, why can’t you just send them somewhere until they’re twenty-one and college-educated?”

“You can. It’s called military school. I’ve got the number in my purse,” I said.

He rolled his eyes and took my hand, sweeping me into a waltz stance. I considered pointing out that waltzing wasn’t part of Generation X’s social education, but then Nina kicked into something bluesy and deep, a black river of a song with a torturous longing running through it like a swift current.

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