Страница 18 из 48
Gun control, I thought. Gun control.
"Let me leave you two to your discussion," I said lightly. I smiled at both of them with all the warmth of an alligator, then went to ask the reference librarian if she could find out about pond-scum removal. She thought for a minute and then gave me the phone number of the county agent. Porter Ziegler would surely find the answer from that individual, a man who seemed to know everything about the out-of-doors.
When I went back to the main desk, Robin was gone. Janie, looking a little sullen, was checking out some books for a bearded man who had made the library his second home. We had often speculated about Horton Aldrich. He was clean, and he never smelled, but he was noticeably shabby, and gaunt. The address he'd listed when he'd gotten his library card had turned out to be the address of the local Salvation Army store. Mr. Aldrich was prone to laugh to himself while he read the paper, which was maybe not so odd, considering the state of the world. He seldom talked directly to anyone, staff or patron, but he was nearly always through the doors right after they were unlocked, and he trotted out of them when the closing employee walked toward them with the key.
Today, Mr. Aldrich seemed to be in a jittery mood. I wondered what had happened to upset him. But he was so peculiar, I would have asked about his well-being only if he'd been bleeding or sobbing. My policy—my chickenhearted policy— about Mr. Aldrich was, Let him be. I always tried to smile at him, I tried not to look nervous when he decided to have a conversation with me, and I made sure no other patron hogged the Atlanta paper, thus preventing Mr. Horton from reading it right away, because I'd noticed that really made his day bad.
Everyone in the world wanted to use our computers today, and the phone rang every time I put it down. I got about halfway through filling out the book order, when it should have taken me thirty minutes to do the whole thing. Phillip called at eleven o'clock, right on time, to tell me who'd phoned the house. He'd met Sandy and Marvin Wy
"You better have a sandwich and a piece of pie. Then you'll know what kind it is," I said.
"Shouldn't I save all this for Mr. and Mrs. Wy
"Honey, I would say ‘Sure' if I had any idea they were going to be eating, or caring what they ate," I said. "And you know there's no way two ski
"Okay, that'll be lunch for me."
"Good. Who's called?"
There was a long list, including my mother (naturally), Melinda (no surprise), and Sally Allison, my friend, who was also a newspaper reporter. (Maybe I should say Sally Allison, the newspaper reporter, who was sometimes also my friend. That was definitely more accurate.) I remembered that I'd called Sally to ask her out to lunch, and I'd left a message for her to call me back. Cara Embler, Poppy's back-fence neighbor, and Teresa Stanton, president of the Uppity Women, had also tried to reach me. And, to my surprise, so had Bryan Pascoe.
Phillip seemed to be pleased that he'd been useful, and he was also happy to have HBO and MTV and lots of food. When I asked him about the state of the bathroom, there was a long moment of silence.
"Um, it'll be picked up within about ten minutes," he said defensively.
"Okay," I said, reminding myself again that I was not his mom. However, I was his older sister, and he needed to do what I asked of him. But for now, I backed off.
"I hope it's okay that I made a long-distance call on your phone?" he asked.
"Did you call your mother?"
"Okay, make that two long-distance calls."
"You called your mother and who else?"
"Um, Britta—you know, the girl who gave me a ride?"
I tried to give a mature, balanced answer. "Hell no" would not do. "Phillip, unless you're calling your parents, I don't think you should run up my phone bill," I said, keeping my voice calm and even.
"Hey, if I had any money, I'd pay you back!"
Okay, hostility alert.
"I know you would." Keep the voice calm and even, Roe. "But since you don't, you'd better hold off on the phone calls. Does Britta have an E-mail address?"
"Yeah."
"Okay, fine. E-mail her to your heart's content, but don't visit any Web sites you have to pay for."
After a silence, Phillip said, "Okay, I'll do that from now on."
I smiled at the patron standing at the counter, who beamed back. So that was a double-purpose smile. I was really pleased at ending the conversation with Phillip on a good note.
I noticed that Janie was staying away from me, which made me happy. I figured she wasn't as oblivious as she seemed. Perry came in to begin his work hours, and he gave me a pat on the shoulder.
"Sorry about Poppy," he said. Perry had had a troubled life, but he seemed to have found his foothold now. To my surprise, I'd become his buddy, especially since his recent acknowledgment of his sexual orientation. I felt a little uncomfortable in the role, but I was so happy for Perry—and for his mother, Sally—when I watched his attitude grow more positive and cheerful, his demeanor more confident, I became resigned to assuming it.
"Had a great date last night," he said casually but very quietly.
"Local?"
"Yes," he said. "We went to the movies."
We talked about the film they'd seen, without Perry telling me his date's name. That was the norm in our conversations.
About fifteen minutes later, Perry's mom showed up. My friend Sally, who had always been incredibly put together, was begi
Well, bless her heart. Sally had had a hard life, and she was doing her best.
"Son," she said coldly, looking at Perry.
"Hey, Mom," he said.
Uh-oh, trouble in paradise.
Sally asked me if I was ready to go to lunch. It was about 11:15, early for lunch.
"I didn't know we had a date," I said. "I called you to ask you out for your birthday, but we didn't ever get to set a date and time." Sally stared at me blankly. I became flustered. "Did I just forget? I can't believe it! I don't think I've ever just out-and-out forgotten a lunch date before." I rummaged around in my memory, trying to dredge up any conversation I'd had recently with Sally.
"Didn't we set up lunch for today when we talked yesterday?" Sally looked as surprised as I was.
"Sally, we didn't talk yesterday." I was sure of that. "I called you at work. You weren't at your desk. I left a voice-mail message."
"Of course we talked," Sally said. She looked more upset than the situation warranted. "I called you here, and you told me we would go to lunch on Tuesday, that you had something you wanted to tell me."
"Sally, that was weeks ago," I said, finally recalling the conversation. "That was right after I'd bought the new house, and I wanted to tell you I was moving."
Sally looked angry and frightened.
I turned to look at Perry, just because I had to put my eyes somewhere, and I couldn't bear to look at Sally. What on earth was happening?
Perry's face gave me a big hint.
"But today would be great," I said brightly. "Just let me go get my purse. I'll bet you did call, and I just got so upset with everything that's been happening to my family that I got all mixed up. You know me," I babbled on, walking rapidly back to the employee lounge. "I can't keep anything straight to save my soul."