Light from a Distant Star by Mary Mcgarry Morris Read Free Book Online Page A

had stopped by at noon with Raymond Doyle, a boy in her class she couldn’t stand. They were going fishing at the pond, but Bucky didn’t have a pole. He asked if he could borrow one of the two he’d seen in the barn. She wanted to tell him that if he didn’t get the bikes out of the barn, then they’d have to dump them somewhere. But she couldn’t very well say it in front of Raymond, so she asked Bucky to come in the house for a minute. As she held open the door, Henry started up the steps and for some stupid reason she told him to wait, that they’d be right out.
    “Whoa, Nellie!” Raymond whooped and she glared back at him.
    “Sure,” Bucky kept saying inside. “Okay, all right. No problem.” He’d come back later and move the bikes himself. But that’d be it, he said, the end of the bike club. From then on, all the profit would be his. He had until tonight, she warned, opening the door. He came down the steps, fumbling with his belt buckle, which sent Raymond hanging over his handlebars, hooting with laughter. Henry had dragged the two poles out of the barn, one for Bucky, the other for himself. No, she told him. He couldn’t go. Not without permission, and as it slowly occurred to her that they were laughing about her and that it was lewd, she felt the strength of her authority fade.
    “You’re gonna be in big trouble for this!” her shaky voice threatened as they rode off, the older boys laughing with Henry pedaling double time in their draft. Anything, even under threat of doom, would be better than another boring day with his sister.
    So here it was five o’clock and Henry still wasn’t home. Both in their distraction and trust, neither parent had asked yet where he was. Nellie felt sick to her stomach. She was praying he’d make it home from the pond before they both got in trouble.
    From the kitchen Mr. Cooper’s voice carried like a whoosh of air, soft and hard to grasp. Sandy laughed nervously, uneasily, at everything he said, while Benjamin’s assurances grew more expansive.
    “No need to rush … however long it takes, Andy … don’t want you feeling pressured here …”
    “But—” Sandy started to say. Just then the doorbell rang, once, twice, three times, followed by an insistent
tap tap tap
on the glass.
    Certain it was Henry, Nellie ran to the door. It was Dolly Bedelia in her purple bathrobe and bare feet. Wet hair dripped onto her shoulders. She’d been taking a shower when the water turned ice cold, she complained as she followed Nellie into the kitchen.
    “I was just, like, putting the shampoo in!”
    “Oh, Dolly!” Sandy grabbed the emergency flashlight she always kept plugged in to its charger. “I’m so sorry. It’s that old tank.” She opened the cellar door. With the flashlight shining up into Sandy’s face, Nellie saw how lined it was, how old her pretty mother suddenly looked.
    “Same problem Lazlo had,” her father said, shaking his head, content to let her mother handle the problem.
    Mr. Cooper just sat there with a dazed smile, looking up at Dolly. Bubbles glistened in her hair. The front of her robe was soaked, revealing every swell and hollow of her body.
    “Benjamin!” her mother called up the stairs. “Get some matches.”
    “Matches, matches,” her father muttered, fumbling through drawers, unable to find any.
    “Maybe in the pantry closet.” Nellie went to look. “There aren’t any,” she called back.
    “I got some. Here.” Dolly pulled a book of matches from her pocket and gave them to her father, who hurried down the stairs, holding them out in front like a flag. “I just started shampooing. That’s, like, what I do first. Then after, I wash. I mean, you know,” she said, waving a hand down the front of herself. As if for the first time, she seemed aware of the thin purple cloth so darkly plastered against her naked wetness. Slipping into the chair, she crossed her arms on the table.
    “Isn’t that always the way, huh?”