Out of Orange by Cleary Wolters Read Free Book Online

carried himself lightly, but he was not effeminate—sort of like a skinny rock star but without the long hair. He actually looked a little like Henry, but looks were all they had in common. Phillip was the straight version, he was an artist, and instead of being the temple of self-control, he drank too much, chain smoked, and did recreational drugs like it was the eighties.
    He had recently become my best friend. We had a lot in common. We were both unfashionable scotch drinkers, meat eaters, and cigarette smokers. We had both followed our girlfriends to Northampton from Provincetown; his current girlfriend was an old schoolmate of mine from Boston and a former lesbian I’d had a crush on; Phillip and I worked at the same restaurant, the same shifts; we were both about to graduate from our twentysomethings with nothing to show for it; and we were surrounded by a population of students whose bright futures were practically guaranteed by their pedigree, provenance, or trust funds.
    As soon as Phillip hung up the phone, the quiet of my hotel room tried to swallow me. My wild imagination started churning away again, and I was spooked anew. I took the manila envelope full of cash from my Tumi bag and secured it in the room’s safe, then prepared myself for a dash to the lobby. I peeped out the eyehole of my door before opening it, opened it, and found the hall was still deserted.
    I couldn’t keep this secret from everyone, not after everything I had just been through. I had done something so completely out of the ordinary, survived something I thought was amazing, and it was behind me. I was all the way back in Northampton, back in the fold of my friends, and far, far away from my co-conspirators in my drug-smuggling adventure. I could never have told anyone about my trip with my co-conspirators around.
    I had fantasized about my return to Northampton the whole way there. Honestly, I had been fantasizing about my return to Northampton since I had left in January. The story line I was returning with had changed quite a bit, but I was still returning victorious. It was just a different kind of victory than I had planned on whenI’d set out for Chicago with Phillip. My bullshit cover story would be fine for most everyone else. But I would tell Phillip the real story. He had been there in Chicago when I got the sudden invitation to meet my soon-to-be brother-in-law and he knew about the rather odd job offer too. He knew what I had run off to do and it wasn’t to work as an art critic.
    The snow was falling when I left the hotel and it had become much colder. The gas lanterns that flank Main Street had come to life, and halos formed in their light, caught by the falling snow. An inch had already fallen and there was as much as a foot expected. At the moment, it was very close to being a whiteout. I could only see halfway up the hill when I got to the intersection of State and Main, and when I squinted, all I could really see were the lit entries of a few still-open businesses. The buildings themselves had vanished into the murky dark.
    I walked out of the cold and damp wind into Spoleto. Once inside, I could see as little of the world outside the picture windows as I had been able to see of the restaurant’s interior from the street. But the sweat on the windows that had told of how warm the restaurant would be inside, now that I was inside, told of how very cold it was outside. The world looked bitter, watery, and white. I scanned the main room of Spoleto and the immense rectangular granite bar, which took up a large part of the space. There was no more of the waiting-to-be-seated crowd, and the seats at the bar I liked were open.
    I walked to my old barstool, the one I used to take my shifters at when I was done with work, and sat down. Larry, a permanent resident of Northampton and my favorite waiter, was bartending. It took him a moment to realize who had just asked him for a short Dewar’s and soda, but as soon as he did,