Agyar Read Online Free

looked like. She is about five feet ten inches tall, has red hair and the pale complexion that goes with it. Her face is thin, with strong bones and very bright blue eyes. She had a thin red scarf wrapped around her throat. Her camel-colored coat was thick, elegant, and short. Beneath it she wore dark trousers and low boots. What I
noticed right away, however, was that she had a few bald patches on top of her head. I couldn’t imagine what would cause that, but I made up my mind not to ask unless she brought it up. In any case, the patrons didn’t notice either one of us much.
    She saw me at about the same time I saw her, and walked up to meet me. “Agyar,” she said.
    “Kellem.”
    “How long have you been in town?”
    “A little more than a month.”
    “Really? It took you a while to find a place?”
    “Yes. I didn’t know you were in a hurry.”
    “I’m not. But you’re settled in now?”
    “Pretty well.”
    “Good. Hungry?”
    “No. You?”
    “Always.” She smiled without humor. “But let’s just walk and talk.”
    “Sure. Your place?”
    “Funny, Agyar.
    “You know where I live.”
    “That’s different, as you well know.”
    I shrugged. “Lead on, then.”
    She did, taking us a block away from the Ave, onto a side street called Drewry where there was no traffic and most of the houses already had their lights out. Someone once told me it never really got cold in Northeastern Ohio, but either that someone lied or he was Canadian. A pair of squirrels woke up as we walked by their tree, then went back to sleep. Mama raccoon ducked back into her sewer. She smelled like the rats had.
    “Any trouble finding a place to stay?” asked Laura.
    I shrugged. “As I said, I took my time. There was no problem keeping everything locked up in the train depot.”
    “How did you come across the house?”
    “I just walked around and listened to gossip. I heard about Carpenter deserting a house, tracked him down, got invited to a party, found out where the house was, and moved my things in. I had no trouble gaining entry, because no one lived there. So to speak.”
    She chuckled. “Does Carpenter know?”
    “No.”
    “Well, thanks for coming so quickly.”
    “I had nothing pressing. What’s on your mind?”
    “Settling down.”
    “Not a bad idea. I’ve done it myself, once or twice.”
    “Do you believe in omens?”
    “Does the Pope believe in bears?”
    “What about dreams?”
    “Dreams. I’m not certain about dreams. Why?”
    “I’ve been having some odd ones.”
    “What about?”
    “Children. That is, my own.”
    “Have you any?”
    “Not in the conventional sense.”
    “And that’s the sort you’ve been dreaming of?”
    “Yes.”
    “And it seems significant?”
    “Very.”
    “In what way?”
    “I’m not going to live forever, you know.”
    “An axiom, Kellem, without substance.”
    “Maybe, but that’s not how it’s been feeling.”
    “Is that why you’ve brought me out here? Because you’ve been having dreams?”
    “I brought you out here because I knew how to reach you, and I needed to reach someone.”
    “To talk about your dreams?”
    “Not exactly.”
    “Well?”
    There were a pair of kids, a boy and a girl, both
about seventeen, across the street talking about what they were going to do when the year ended. She’d go to school in town, probably at Twain, and he was going to apply to MIT in Boston. The calendar year would be ending in another few weeks, but I decided they probably meant the school year. That was all right, one is as arbitrary as the other, and the year as measured by the progression of seasons doesn’t really mean anything in a city. Their conversation faded into the background din of man and nature, who keep changing each other and making noise while doing so.
    “The dreams have been affecting me,” she said. “I’ve done some strange things.”
    “Taken chances?”
    “All of that.”
    “What sort of chances?”
    “The sort you take