The Inheritance (Volume Three) by Reed Zelda

Author:Reed, Zelda [Reed, Zelda]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 2014-11-09T16:00:00+00:00

Chris spends the night.

In the morning his shoes are in the foyer, tucked messily next to Ashleigh’s flats.

My father’s shoes decorate the opposite wall. Expensive black or brown Oxfords, lined next to a pair of turtle shell shoes he only wore with his tuxedo. Shoes he bought for his wedding to my mother, his first truly pricy pair, he wore to every subsequent wedding. I can almost see Gina or Darlene scowling at the ominous air the shoes brought with them. They were a shined omen, a guarantee that what he had with them wouldn’t last, but my father refused to give them up. They were his first marker of success.

I find an empty box in the hallway closet and pile his shoes in it. They’re in such good shape I can sell them but I don’t have that sort of effort in me.

I donate them to the Goodwill, in my father’s name. A drop of white in a legacy of black.

I wonder if the papers will report on this.

I grab breakfast at a café downtown, a tourist trap with obscenely high prices but the smell of pancakes draws me in. I order a stack of blueberry pancakes with a side of hash browns and whipped cream. I feel all of sixteen again, eating alone on a Sunday morning, until the waitress offers me a Bloody Mary and pours me a glass without proof of age.

“It’s a little early to be drinking,” a voice says behind me.

I stick the black straw between my teeth as Anthony Serafin rounds the small cafe table, blue on top with a silver rim. He’s grinning at me but there’s less light in his eyes. The left one’s blackened, purple and dark blue festering around it. I imagine the men who dragged him out of Neal’s party, throwing him on the back lawn of the yacht club, one pressing him against the ground as the other packs a punch.

“What are you, my mother?” I say, looking past him.

The café’s on Michigan, the bright windows showcasing the throngs of tourists running left and right, maps tucked beneath their arm as they swing bags full of t-shirts, mugs, and posters of the city’s skyline.

Anthony laughs and pulls out the chair across from me.

“Don’t sit down,” I say.

I’m not surprised when he doesn’t listen. There’s no camera wrapped around his neck, no notepad stuck between his fingers, just his cell phone gripped in his palm.

“That was some party,” he says, leaning across the table.

I don’t answer him, sucking in a palm-sized gulp of my drink, allowing it to fill my cheeks.

“You don’t want to talk about that…Okay…”

“I don’t want to talk to you at all.”

His grin spreads a little wider. “Then what are you doing right now?”

I roll my eyes and have another sip, waving over the waitress. She bustles over, her hips swaying uncontrollably.

“Can I have my food to go, please?”

“She doesn’t mean that,” Anthony says. “But could you get me a pastrami sandwich, on wheat?”

The waitress glances between the two of us.

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