The Gum Thief - Douglas Coupland [40]
Here’s my final thought: how come there are only a tiny number of planets orbiting the sun? If you were to take all the planets and squish them into a ball, it’d still only be one-billionth the size of the sun. Brother, I mean, why not have no planets at all? If you’re going to have planets, have a thousand of them for every star!
DD
PS: Can you stress the importance of education with Bethany? I’ll sell the condo in a flash to pay for it, so don’t let her plead poverty.
Thank you, Roger.
Glove Pond
“You weren’t going to serve us dinner.”
“That’s not true.”
“Do you have a surprise platter of cold cuts and Danish cheese concealed in the den? Or do I hear a rotisserie broiling Cornish game hens in the garage?”
“No need to be snarky about it.”
“So you admit it!”
“We were going to feed you dinner.”
“And that dinner would have been what . . . pancakes?”
Some of the more brazen weevils were scampering across the counter and reboarding the mothership. “I was going to make crepes.”
“You what?”
“Thin, perfectly shaped crepes—elegant yet substantial—filled with a marmalade reduction.”
“You liar. You don’t have any marmalade. I checked out your fridge. It might as well be abandoned in a vacant lot.”
“I was going to borrow marmalade from our next- door neighbour. Last spring they borrowed all of our jams and jellies for a toast party, and they owe us. How was I to know the pancake mix was a haven for vermin? Now my plans are dashed. Perhaps you could spot me a hundred dollars for Chinese food.”
“You’re nuts.”
Like an elderly man dying in his sleep, the furnace suddenly stopped. The fridge stopped humming. No cars drove by the house. Kyle stared at Steve.
Steve said, “Think of Brittany and Gloria. They deserve something better than tap water for dinner, don’t you think? Please, look into your heart and think of them.”
Kyle considered this. “You manipulative old soak. Okay, whatever. This is a college town—they always have good takeout. Do you have a Yellow Pages?”
Steve walked to a side table, picked up the phone book and handed it to Kyle.
“Chinese or pizza?” asked Kyle.
“Chinese,” said Steve. “You get more leftovers and they last longer.”
“Fine.”
Kyle ordered Chinese food and then joined Steve in the living room.
Steve stood at the bottom of the staircase, looking up. “Here come our ladies.”
Kyle looked up. “Brittany?”
Brittany had been radically transformed through cosmetics and wardrobe. What had once been a prim, orderly face was now a voluptuous Hollywood mask, with carmine Cupid’s bow lips, turquoise eyeshadow a la Cleopatra, thick, juicy false eyelashes and skin as pale and flawless as a pre-global warming Vermont ski slope winter mountain slope. Gloria had loaned her a platinum blonde wig of near drag-queen grandeur; one that might suitably have been worn to the launch of a Queen Mary voyage circa 1961. Her little black dress had been replaced with a strapless rouched ivory-coloured silk body-hugger—Marilyn Monroe being photographed for Life magazine. Within the gentle glow of a room lit mostly by unreplaced dead light bulbs, Brittany now crackled with movie star energy.
“Hello, Kyle.”
“Whoa.”
“Hello, Steve,” Brittany said. “Are we eating soon?”
Gloria was behind Brittany. “Now this is a woman. Forget today’s trampy little sluts walking around in dental floss and fabric scraps—a real woman has verve. A real woman leaves chaos in her wake.”
Kyle said, “Brittany . . . what are you doing?”
Steve interrupted: “Take that, Julie Christie! Take