Light of Falling Stars by J. Robert Lennon

Author:J. Robert Lennon
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: The Light of Falling Stars
ISBN: 9781936873654
Publisher: Dzanc Books
Published: 1997-08-31T04:00:00+00:00

* * *

He came out into the yard, which now, illuminated by full sun, sparkled like broken glass. He squished through the mud to the porch, took off his shoes and socks, and went inside.

Anita was at the table, sipping from a mug of something. She looked up at him and her face darkened. She managed a weak smile.

“When did you get home?” he said.

“Just now.”

“I didn’t hear a car.”

She put the mug down and folded her hands. “Kathy dropped me off at the end of the drive. Her car can’t handle the dirt road.” Kathy was her coworker, who’d been giving her rides since Paul had started working. She’d never had problems with the dirt road before, though. Both of them knew this, and after a moment under his scrutiny, Anita hung her head. This gesture had the effect of sucking every last bit of energy from his body, and with great effort he removed his muddy shirt and tossed it onto the porch.

“What happened to your shirt?” she asked, trying to sound cheerful and failing.

“I fell in the mud.”

She nodded, not bothering to ask where he’d been since she got home. She stared into her mug. Paul walked past her. “I’m going to take a bath,” he said. “Just so you know where I’ll be. In case there’s anything you want to tell me.”

He showered briefly, to get the mud out of his hair. It fell to the floor of the tub in thick dark chunks and dissolved in the water. Afterward he stepped out and drew a bath, then sat in it, and finally lay down, his nose and mouth just above the surface and the rest of his head underwater. He could not get warm.

He heard her come in. She said something he didn’t catch, and then repeated it, a little louder. He cut her off. “Are you sleeping with somebody?” he said.

She said something else now. “What?” he said. “I can’t hear you.” Then he felt her hand in his hair, pulling him up. She brought her face down to his.

“Yes!” she said. “I am!”

“Thank you,” he said, and sat up.

“I’m sorry.”

“Ah! Sorry. Good!”

“Paul—”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” he said. The feeling of exhaustion would not go away. He started to sink again but left his ears above water this time.

“I’ve been unhappy,” she was saying. She sat on the toilet, her knees pressed together. Her voice bounced around the room, off the walls, off the surface of the water, which seemed to modulate it a half-tone too high. Or perhaps that was just the way she said it. “You promised me a family and it didn’t come. And then, all this.” Her arm swung out, toward the woods. “Everything just went to pieces, Paul.”

“Not me!” he said. “I didn’t go to pieces.”

“We can’t all be as steady as you, Paul.”

“Oh, that’s true. I suppose you’ll tell your lover that. ‘Paul was a rock through all this, poor brave guy.’”

“Paul—”

“So is it serious?”

“I don’t know.”

“So it just might be a casual thing, then? Just a little snack? Well that’s certainly a relief.

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