All the Dead Yale Men by Craig Nova Read Free Book Online Page A

back,” I said. “Turn around. Walk away. Don’t say a thing. Not a word.”
    â€œI just wanted to apologize,” he said.
    â€œDidn’t Cal beg you to be quiet?” I said.
    â€œHe might have said something about that,” Blaine said. “It was one of those confusing moments, you know?”
    â€œGet out of here,” I said.
    Cal concentrated on those stationary birds, the squawking they made, so at odds with that scent of oil, of smoke that came from a funnel, from the stink of bilge that ships pumped into the harbor. Then Cal turned, his head moving as though Blaine had a sort of magnetism.
    â€œSo,” said Cal.
    â€œI didn’t mean anything,” said Blaine. “You know. Office politics. Nothing important.”
    The houses down below seemed brutal in their arrangement, more like teeth than a row of houses. And that coldness from the brick, the glitter in the street from the glassphalt. Like something that would always cut.
    â€œHave you got the job yet?” said Cal.
    Marshall ran along the side of the bridge, his jacket open, his tie over his shoulder. He took Blaine’s tie and jerked him back, like a dog on a leash.
    â€œWhat the fuck are you doing here?” said Marshall.
    â€œI wanted to apologize,” said Blaine. “It’s all a misunderstanding. Don’t you see? I didn’t do anything . . . ”
    â€œCome on,” said Marshall.
    My hand sat in that green-and-white guano.
    â€œYou’ve ruined your pants,” said Cal.
    â€œSo what?” I said.
    â€œThat fucking Blaine,” said Cal. “And my wife. She’s just shy, I guess.”
    The slimy guano made it easier to move my hand closer to his fingers, to his wrist. I was going to tell a joke, too, about the two Russian women who were athletes . . . Would that give me enough time, between the punch line and the laughter?
    â€œAnd what are my kids going to say? You know my daughter is fourteen. DA watching porn at work, you know, that’s how it’s going to play in the Herald ? How about that at school? AtBuckingham, Brown, and Nichols. What is she going to say? And my wife? She’s already talking about divorce. I called before coming over here. What chance do I have with the kids? With getting to see them?”
    I put my hand on his.
    â€œPlease,” I said.
    â€œIt’s thirty-two feet per second per second,” said Cal. “Isn’t that the acceleration of gravity?”
    â€œThat’s what they taught us at school . . . ,” I said.
    â€œThirty-two feet . . . ,” he said.
    â€œYou remember Coulomb’s law?”
    â€œI’m hurt pretty bad,” he said.
    â€œI’ll stick with you,” I said.
    â€œSorry.”
    The bird shit was so slick that he slipped through my fingers: it was as familiar as dropping a chicken greased for the oven. His hand went through my fingers with a little sound, a kind of intimate squish. He fell at an angle, like a skydiver, arms out, tie over his shoulder like that flag of condemnation now, flapping in a trembling shudder, and as he fell, it seemed that the layers of smoke, the movement of birds, the bits of trash that blew in the air, were a sediment of trouble, a kind of airy strata, like you see where a road has been cut through a hill. He turned halfway around, arms out, and then hit a white bird that folded its wings and went down, too, like a pilot fish in front of a shark.
    Even from the bridge, a hundred yards in the air, he hit the pavement with the sound of a ham dropped from a loading dock. A slap and a crunch, breaking bones and a fleshy explosion.
    My hands left smears on my pants. Marshall and some of the others stood around, eyes over the bridge, as though if they just followed the path through the air accurately enough they could bring him back.
    Then Tim said, “Well, there’s a Dutch job for the books. Bird shit, porno, and office politics.