Round Rock - Michelle Huneven [68]
“Tell him thanks,” Libby said, “but I need more notice.”
“Come on, where’s your sense of adventure?”
“I can’t jump every time you say so, Lewis.”
He looked at Red and rolled his eyes. “I’m not asking you to jump—Red is. Just kidding. But seriously, Joe left today and the old man’s moping.”
“I still need advance notice.”
Lewis said, “Okay, okay,” and “Goodbye,” and slumped in the armchair opposite Red’s. “I told you. She’s on a kick.”
“Oh, well.” Red was philosophical.
Now, they were two men with bad posture lost in thought. Lewis had to admit sitting there like that felt good. Guts bulging, mouth-breathing: a form of meditation for sunk white guys. All they were missing were a couple six packs and a wide-screen TV. Red’s eyes grew hooded and even his freckles started to fade. They sat without moving for six, nine, twelve minutes, until the phone rang.
“If Red’s really sad,” Libby said, “is that invitation still open?”
RED AND LIBBY took both jars of eggs, the neglected and the cradled, and examined them endlessly, as if rotten eggs were the prima materia. The eggs that had been held were now dark gray, with a rim of white froth. The yolks, when they rolled into view, were still a deep yellow, but their sacs were pocked with gray lesions, knots of stringy membrane. When Lewis shook the jar, there also seemed to be something solid in there, too, like butter forming in a jug of cream. “A whole clot of rot,” he said.
“Joe says it’s the Alien,” Red said.
“A homunculus in vitro,” said Lewis. “The child of your applied touch and affection.” Lewis picked up the other jar. “Ah, the slower, younger brother.” The control eggs still looked like regular eggs, only slightly cloudy, with the smallest fringe of now-pink froth. “I wonder which jar stinks worse.”
“We should probably set them lightly in the Dumpster,” Red said, “and have done with the whole business.”
“Seems a shame to waste two perfectly good Mason jars,” Libby said.
“And a much greater shame to bring them this far and never smell the final product,” said Lewis. “Let’s take them out to the groves and throw rocks at them. Then run like hell.”
“What a boy thing to do,” said Libby.
Lewis held a jar at eye level. “Mustn’t we conclude from this that human touch is harmful and degrading? That prolonged contact leads to putrefaction?”
“You would say that,” Libby said.
AFTER dinner, they walked around the boarded-up bungalows so Libby could look them over and pick the one to move onto her land. On closer inspection, the houses were sturdy, simple, ingenious. The architect, said Red, had been a friend of the ranch’s former owner, and he’d used structural elements he’d seen in India and Japan: raising their elevation, extending the beams, placing windows for cross-ventilation. The same architect, said Red, eventually designed the first motel in San Luis Obispo. To open a door, Red pulled out nails with a cat’s paw. He swept a powerful flashlight over bubbling wallpaper and boarded windows. The air was sour, musty, old.
Lewis started sneezing and had to wait outside. He watched as stars came out in the soft violet sky: a tricky pastime. A tiny sparkle. Then nothing. Nothing. Nothing. He’d look away, glance back, and there it was, a pinhole to another, brighter realm.
Libby came up behind him, snaking her arms around his waist.
He leaned against her, her breasts squashed cozily against his back. “You coming over tonight?” she whispered.
He closed his eyes. “I have to work.”
Her body stiffened and her arms withdrew. A chasm of air opened between them. “I need to see you alone,” she said. He closed his eyes. Here it is, he thought.
He’d had a good run with Libby. Three months of happy, have-at-it, laugh-it-up sex. He’d known all along it couldn’t last forever. “Okay,” he said. “Why don’t you meet me later at Happy Yolanda’s for a drink?”
“A drink?” she yelped.
“I can drink water or juice,” he said. “Milk, Coke, whatever. A Virgin Mary. A virgin martini.” He laughed, bumped her arm. “A virgin