The Empire of Ice Cream by Jeffrey Ford Read Free Book Online Page A

said.
    â€œHis member was pulsing with all the energy he’d brought with him from the mountain,” she said.
    I looked down and even in my fog was surprised to see that she was right.
    â€œShe gasped as he entered her,” she gasped.
    I tried to say, “With slow thrusts, he vented his passion,” but it sounded as a series of short grunts.
    Maylee missed a line or two, herself, in which she was to have described Zel’s own pleasure, I’m certain, but filled in with panting and a protracted groan.
    For a span of time, I was lost to my life, my role in the story, transported beyond the Bolukuchet, flying somewhere above the rain.
    As I pulled out of her, Maylee said, “Time passed,” and reached down to grab the cigarettes and ashtray off the floor. We lit up and took our seats at the table, both still heaving from the encounter.
    When we had managed to catch our breath, she said, “The townspeople started to become wary of the arrangement between Zel and Jupiter. She was spending far too much time out at his shop. Something about her look had changed.”
    â€œLate one afternoon,” I said, “Jupiter was visited by the sheriff, a man who had been close friends with old Fergus. He warned Jupiter that people were suspicious and if he wanted the best for Zel, he should leave town immediately.”
    â€œYes,” said Maylee, “but what he did not know was that the sheriff had also, that very evening, warned Zel to stay away from Jupiter. As soon as it got dark, though, she sneaked out and made for his shop.”
    We both stood at this point and each walked halfway around the table to meet face to face. “She confronted him as he was clasping shut his suitcase,” I said.
    â€œWhere are you going?” asked Zel.
    â€œI must leave,” said Jupiter.
    â€œI’m coming with you,” she said.
    â€œNo, you can’t,” he told her. “It will end in tragedy.”
    â€œ I’m coming! ” screamed Maylee, with all the pain of injustice and loss.
    â€œHe simply shook his head, tears in his eyes,” I said.
    â€œHer anger at the world turned to rage.”
    â€œShe struck out at him,” I said, but did not see Maylee’s fist coursing through the air. Her punch landed square on the right side of my mouth. I staggered back and then fell to my knees. My lip was split and I could taste blood. I spit, and a tooth came with it out onto the wooden floor. “He betrayed her,” I said, my hand covering my mouth.
    Maylee bent over and lifted the tooth, her eyes widening as if it glinted like a diamond. She looked up at me. “Because he loved her,” she said.
    With this, the spell instantly lifted, more rapidly than a curtain closing, with the speed of falling rain, and, without conversation, we both staggered to the bed and fell into a bottomless sleep.
    In the morning, I woke to find her gone, but her scent remained upon the pillow. What I remembered most clearly from the bizarre play we had enacted the previous day was that when she had struck me, in the moment or two when I thought I might pass out, I had realized I must leave the district.
    That afternoon, after hurriedly packing and leaving much behind, I left the Bolukuchet and traveled for many days back to the city. At first the change was frightening, and I moved through the days like a somnambulist directed by commands that came from my dreams. Somehow I managed to make all the right moves, and it was not long before a memory of my life prior to the Bolukuchet returned to me and I began to feel at home in my new surroundings.
    As soon as I had established myself, gotten a place and employment, I wrote to Maylee, care of Mother Carushe, to see if I could persuade her to join me. Oddly enough, all of my letters, more than three dozen, returned unopened with an explanation that the address could not be located. I sent another batch to Munchter’s café, to