No Defense by Rangeley Wallace Read Free Book Online Page A

upstairs to look at the ten-page astrological chart she’d
prepared. In her living room, by the light of the thirty or so
candles she preferred to light bulbs, I read about houses, squares,
past lives, retrograde planets, and ascendants.
    Somehow Adrienne had gleaned from this star
and planet data that I was idealistic, romantic-though I would have
only one true love, she predicted-impulsive, proud, energetic, and
hardworking. I put those attributes in the positive category. On
the somewhat negative side, Adrienne had written that I was
stubborn and loyal to a fault, that I held a grudge far too long,
and that I should learn to let well enough alone.
    It was dusk. The muted light of Adrienne’s
candles illuminated her second-floor windows as Eddie, Jessie, and
I pulled into the driveway. After the initial argument and the
detour to the tree and the memorial, neither Eddie nor I had spoken
of the possibility of moving to Tallagurnsa and taking over the
Steak House. I had the sense, though, that my father’s offer had
become a living, tangible thing. I could almost feel it hovering
over us in the car, as we walked up the front steps, and as we
stood on the front porch.
    While I searched through my purse for the
front-door key, Jessie sat in one of the wicker porch rockers and
Eddie, his tie stuffed in his shirt pocket, raised the lid of the
small metal mailbox hanging to the right of the front door. He
pulled out a bunch of mail. A Salem hung from the corner of his
mouth while he shuffled through the pile: two bills, a magazine, a
catalog, and a letter. He put everything but the letter back in the
box.
    “Here it is!” he said, holding up the letter
to his face as if he might be able to read what was inside without
opening it.
    “Universal Media?” I asked.
    “Who else?” he said. “ They write me, they ask for all my latest work, they tell me how
great syndication is, and then they ignore me for a month.
But here it is. At last.”
    “Open it, Eddie,” I said, laughing. “Come
on, come on, come on!”
    He stood there studying the envelope. His
jaw muscles tightened.
    “Don’t you want to know?” I asked.
    “Yes, and no.”
    “Well, give it to me then.” I put my
hat, Jessie’s toy bag, and Eddie’s jacket on the empty porch
rocker, took the envelope and ripped it open. How our lives would
change if Universal Media made Eddie a good offer. I began to read.
I didn’t have to read too far. I sighed heavily and looked at him.
He could see the rejection in my face. I wished that I hadn’t
opened the letter, but I had been absolutely sure the envelope
carried good news that would make Daddy’s Steak House proposal
irrelevant.
    “Let’s go inside,” I said dully. I inserted
the key in the lock, turned it, and pushed open the front door.
“Come on in, Jessie.”
    Jessie leaned back as far as she could in
the rocker, then rocked forward forcibly and flung herself out of
the chair.
    I shook my head. “You’re gonna fall right
smack on your face one day, young lady.”
    She ran past us into the apartment.
    Eddie hadn’t moved from his spot in front of
the mailbox. He took a drag on his cigarette and looked at me, not
a trace of feeling in his eyes. “I give up,” he said.
    “Oh, Eddie, come on. You’ve only tried two
syndication groups in two years. You can’t give up-you’re too good
and you know it.”
    “Maybe not,” he said. “Maybe they know
something I don’t.” He leaned against the wall and stared out at
the street.
    “The City Paper loves you, and you
have a fan club of devoted readers,” I said. ‘Just because
Universal Media doesn’t appreciate you proves they’re stupid,
that’s all.”
    “Stupid or not, it means I have to get a
second job just so we can stay even. And ‘even’ isn’t exactly where
I’d hoped to be by now. I noticed in the Sunday paper that they’re
looking for people to do caricatures out at Six Flags over
Georgia.” He grimaced.
    “We’re not that