The Accidental Tourist - Anne Tyler [97]
If Muriel couldn’t do it, they never thought to ask Macon instead. Macon was still an outsider; they shot him quick glances but pretended not to notice he was listening. Even Bernice was bashful with him, and she avoided using his name.
By the time the lottery number was announced on TV, everyone would have left. That was what mattered here, Macon had discovered: the television schedule. The news could be missed but the lottery drawing could not; nor could “Evening Magazine” or any of the action shows that followed. Alexander watched these shows but Muriel didn’t, although she claimed to. She sat on the couch in front of the set and talked, or painted her nails, or read some article or other. “Look here! ‘How to Increase Your Bustline.’ ”
“You don’t want to increase your bustline,” Macon told her.
“ ‘Thicker, More Luxurious Eyelashes in Just Sixty Days.’ ”
“You don’t want thicker eyelashes.”
He felt content with everything exactly the way it was. He seemed to be suspended, his life on hold.
And later, taking Edward for his final outing, he liked the feeling of the neighborhood at night. This far downtown the sky was too pale for stars; it was pearly and opaque. The buildings were muffled dark shapes. Faint sounds threaded out of them—music, rifle shots, the whinnying of horses. Macon looked up at Alexander’s window and saw Muriel unfolding a blanket, as delicate and distinct as a silhouette cut from black paper.
One Wednesday there was a heavy snowstorm, starting in the morning and continuing through the day. Snow fell in clumps like white woolen mittens. It wiped out the dirty tatters of snow from earlier storms; it softened the street’s harsh angles and hid the trash cans under cottony domes. Even the women who swept their stoops hourly could not keep pace with it, and toward evening they gave up and went inside. All night the city glowed lilac. It was absolutely silent.
The next morning, Macon woke late. Muriel’s side of the bed was empty, but her radio was still playing. A tired-sounding announcer was reading out cancellations. Schools were closed, factories were closed, Meals on Wheels was not running. Macon was impressed by the number of activities that people had been planning for just this one day—the luncheons and lectures and protest meetings. What energy, what spirit! He felt almost proud, though he hadn’t been going to attend any of these affairs himself.
Then he realized he was hearing voices downstairs. Alexander must be awake, and here he was trapped in Muriel’s bedroom.
He dressed stealthily, making sure the coast was clear before crossing the hall to the bathroom. He tried not to creak the floorboards as he descended the stairs. The living room was unnaturally bright, reflecting the snow outside. The couch was opened, a mass of sheets and blankets; Claire had slept over the last few nights. Macon followed the voices into the kitchen. He found Alexander eating pancakes, Claire at the stove making more, Muriel curled in her usual morning gloom above her coffee cup. Just inside the back door Bernice stood dripping snow, swathed in various enormous plaids. “So anyhow,” Claire was telling Bernice, “Ma says, ‘Claire, who was that boy you drove up with?’ I said, ‘That was no boy, that was Josie Tapp with her new punk haircut,’ and Ma says, ‘Expect me to believe a cock-and-bull story like that!’ So I say, ‘I’ve had enough of this! Grillings! Curfews! Suspicions!’ And I leave and catch a bus down here.”
“They’re just worried you’ll turn out like Muriel did,” Bernice told her.
“But Josie Tapp! I mean God Almighty!”
There was a general shifting motion in Macon’s direction. Claire said, “Hey there, Macon. Want some pancakes?”
“Just a glass of milk, thanks.”
“They’re nice and hot.”
“Macon thinks sugar on an empty stomach causes ulcers,” Muriel said. She wrapped both hands around her cup.
Bernice said,