The Burgess Boys by Elizabeth Strout Read Free Book Online Page B

or are you dead?”
    Bob opened his eyes. “Remember how we took Zach and Jim’s kids to Sturbridge Village when they were little? The smugness of those toady women who guide you around dressed up with those dumb hats that cover their heads? I’m a self-loathing Puritan.”
    “You’re a self-loathing weirdo,” Susan answered. She was agitated, craning her neck to peer through the darkened window of the entrance. “What’s taking so long?”
    And it was long. They sat there for almost three hours. Bob stepped outside once to have a cigarette. The sky had grown dark. By the time the bail commissioner showed up, Bob’s weariness seemed like a large wet coat he was wearing. Susan paid the two hundred dollars in twenties, and Zach came through the door, his face as white as paper.
    As they got ready to leave, a uniformed man said, “A photographer’s out there.”
    “How can that be?” Susan asked, alarm springing through her voice.
    “Don’t freak. Come on, kiddo.” Bob steered Zach toward the door. “Your Uncle Jim loves photographers. He’ll be jealous if you take over as family media hog.”
    And Zach, perhaps because he found it funny, perhaps because the tension of the day was coming to an end—in any case, the boy smiled at Bob as he stepped through the door. A sudden flash of light met them in the chilly air.

3
    That first gentle assault of tropical breeze—it had touched Helen as soon as the airplane door opened. Waiting for the car to be packed, Helen felt bathed by the air. They drove by houses with flowers tumbling from their windows, golf courses green and combed, and in front of their hotel was a fountain, its gentle water rising to the sky. In their room a bowl of lemons sat on the table. “Jimmy,” Helen said, “I feel like a bride.”
    “That’s nice.” But he was distracted.
    She crossed her arms, her hands touching her opposite shoulders (their private sign language of many years), and then her husband stepped forward.
    During the night she had bad dreams. They were vivid, terrifying, and she struggled to wakefulness as the sun crept through the opening of the long curtains. Jim was leaving to play golf. “Go back to sleep,” he said, kissing her. When she woke again happiness had returned, bright as the sun that now sliced through the drapes. She lay flattened by happiness, running a leg across the cool sheet, thinking of her children, all three in college now. She’d write an email: Dearest Angels, Dad’s playing golf and your old mother is about to get some sun on her blue-veined ankles. Dorothy’s glum, as I feared she would be—Dad says the older girl, Jessie (Emily, you never liked her, remember?), is really giving them trouble. But no one mentioned it last night at dinner, and so I was polite and didn’t brag about my darlings. Instead we talked about your cousin Zach—more on that later!—miss you, and you, and you—
    Dorothy was reading by the pool, her long legs stretched before her on a chaise. “Morning,” she said, and did not look up.
    Helen moved a chair to get the best of the sun. “Did you sleep well, Dorothy?” She sat down and took lotion and a book from her straw bag. “I had nightmares.”
    Moments passed before Dorothy looked up from her magazine. “Well, that’s a shame.”
    Helen rubbed lotion on her legs, arranged her book. “Just so you know, don’t feel bad about dropping out of the book club.”
    “I don’t.” Dorothy put her magazine down and gazed over the brilliant blue of the pool. She said meditatively, “A lot of women in New York are not stupid until they get together and then they are stupid. I really hate that.” She glanced at Helen. “Sorry.”
    “Don’t be sorry,” said Helen. “You should say whatever you want.”
    Dorothy chewed on her lip, staring back toward the expanse of blue water. “That’s nice of you, Helen,” she finally said, “but in my experience people don’t really want someone to say whatever they