The Son of a Certain Woman by Wayne Johnston Read Free Book Online

Medina said.
    “No,” my mother corrected her, “not like patron saint. It has a different meaning. It means someone who frequents a particular place.”
    “Patron. I’m not calling anyone a
patron
,” Medina said. “No one says the
patron
is always right. They line up like customers, just like at Woolworth’s. That old buzzard who works there checks them out like customers. So Pen, did you wake up one morning with the urge to be a patron of the Gosling Library? It would be a lot more fun to be a patron of the East End Club. Jesus. Eight books a week.”
    “Tomes,” my mother said. “That’s what big books are called.”
    “It must be nice to know what things that people never talk about are called,” Medina countered. “What are small books called?”
    “There’s not really one word for them. Slim volumes, I suppose.”
    “Slim volumes. Hmmm. What good do you think reading all these books will do you? I never hear anyone who works at the hospital saying, ‘Oh my, Medina, it’s been a long day. I can’t wait to get home to my tome.’ Or, ‘What are you doing this weekend, Mary?’ ‘Well, my dear, there’s a slim volume with my name on it just waiting for me on the kitchen table.’ At work they never stop going on about it, the Gosling this, the Gosling that. It’s crazy on Fridays, everybody trying to get off early before the lineup at the Goslingstarts. In the morning all you can hear is people talking about how they polished off too many tomes and what time they got to bed. Some of them can’t get through a day without a straightener, a few pages of a slim volume on the sly. You pick the hardest-looking books, Pen. Your books really look like
books
.” She picked up a large, thick, black book from the floor. “You could kill someone with a book this heavy. Look, it’s got a ribbon like a prayer book.”
    “It’s to mark your page,” my mother said, tugging gently on the ribbon. “It’s a book of poetry. A lot of the books are poetry anthologies. Or the collected works of one poet. Tennyson, for instance. This one is an anthology of nineteenth-century English poetry. I never liked poetry when I was in school, but I do now.”
    “Poetry? Like Valentine’s cards?”
    “More like … Shakespeare.”
    “Oh, Shakespeare. At work there’s no better way to start an argument than to mention Shakespeare. Pen, you’d be better off getting a good night’s sleep than staying up till dawn reading books.”
    “Some people go to university for ten years or more after they finish high school,” my mother said.
    “Yeah, doctors. I see them every day. They don’t see me.”
    “Not just doctors,” my mother said. “Professors who teach and write books about the books they read.”
    Medina sniffed. “Jesus, if you start writing books
about
books.…”
    “She’s merely trying to better herself,” Pops spoke up again from the sunroom.
    “Who will she be better than when she’s finished?”
    “She’s got a good head start on you.”
    “I never see you reading books, Pops,” Medina said. “What are you trying to do, worsen yourself?”
    “I’ve had my fill of books.”
    “So you’ve bettered yourself to the hilt, is that it?” Medina quipped. “You could read another thousand books and still show no improvement.”
    “The time comes when one gives up on books.”
    “I’ve often wondered what one does when the time comes.”
    “You haven’t forgotten the books you read, Pops,” my mother said. “You even quote them from time to time. And you almost always get my allusions.” She smiled at him. Medina’s colour rose and I watched her eyes dart back and forth between Pops and my mother.
    “He gets your what?” Medina asked.
    “Allusions,” Pops said. “Literary allusions.”
    “What the fuck are they supposed to be?”
    “Remarks about particular books,” my mother offered. “The characters in particular books. Lines from poems.”
    “It’s true,” Pops said.