Sourland by Joyce Carol Oates Read Free Book Online Page A

amazing—horrible—thing he’d ever seen—the poor man just kept walking—trying to walk—with both his hands he tried to stop the bleeding—Gerald shouted out his car window—there was more than one of them—the attackers—Gerald never likes to identify them as black—persons of color— and the victim was a white man—I don’t think the attackers were ever caught—Gerald opened his car door, and shouted at them—he was risking his life interfering—he’s utterly reckless, he has the most amazing courage—the way Gerald describes it, it’s like I was there with him—I was in middle school at Katonah Day at the time—just totally unknowing, oblivious—I dream of it sometimes—the stabbing—how close Gerald and I came to never meeting, never falling in love and our entire lives changed like a tragic miracle…
    You’d have thought that Mr. Karr would try to stop his silly young wife saying such things that weren’t wrong entirely—but certainly weren’t right—and Rhonda knew they weren’t right—and Rhonda was a witness staring coldly at the chattering woman who was technically speaking her stepmother but Mr. Karr seemed scarcely to be listeningin another part of the room pouring wine into long-stemmed crystal glasses for his guests and drinking with them savoring the precious red burgundy which appeared to be the center of interest on this occasion for Mr. Karr had been showing his guests the label on the wine bottle which must have been an impressive label judging from their reactions as the wine itself must have been exquisite for all marveled at it. Rhonda saw that her father’s whiskers were bristly gray like metal filings, his face was ruddy and puffy about the eyes as if he’d just wakened from a nap—when “entertaining” in his home often Mr. Karr removed his glasses, as he had now—his stone-colored eyes looked strangely naked and lashless—still he exuded an air of well-being, a yeasty heat of satisfaction lifted from his skin. There on a nearby table was Gerald Karr’s new book Democracy in America Imperiled and beside the book as if it had been casually tossed down was a copy of The New York Review of Books in which there was said to be—Rhonda had not seen it—a “highly positive” review of the book. And there, in another corner of the room, the beautiful blond silly young wife exclaiming with widened eyes to a circle of rapt listeners Ohhh when I think of it my blood runs cold, how foolishly brave Gerald was—how close it was, the two of us would never meet and where would I be right now? This very moment, in all of the universe?
    Rhonda laughed. Rhonda’s mouth was a sneer. Rhonda knew better than to draw attention to herself, however—though Daddy loved his sweet little pretty girl Daddy could be harsh and hurtful if Daddy was displeased with his sweet little pretty girl so Rhonda fixed for herself a very thick sandwich of Swedish rye crisp crackers and French goat cheese to devour in the corner of the room looking out onto a bleak rain-streaked street not wanting to think how Daddy knew, yes Daddy knew but did not care. That was the terrible fact about Daddy—he knew, and did not care. A nasty fat worm had burrowed up inside Daddy making him proud of silly Brooke speaking of him in such a tender voice, and so falsely; the stepmother who was so much younger and more beautiful than Rhonda’s mother.
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    Here was the strangest thing: when Rhonda was living away from them all, and vastly relieved to be away, but homesick too especially for the drafty old house on Broadmead Road where she’d been a little girl and Mommy and Daddy had loved her so. When Rhonda was a freshman at Stanford hoping to major in molecular biology and she’d returned home for the first time since leaving home—for