Every Little Thing Read Online Free

disappearing, reappearing. Easy on the eyes and then blinding when the tree-line shortened.
    They were twenty minutes from the cabin when he asked his father, “I’ve got a new neighbour. Someone Crosbie. Matt or Mark or something. How do you know the man?”
    â€œHe said he’d bought the place!” He turned to Cohen’s mother, “We’ll have to pop in on him, see how he’s doing?” She nodded.
    His father’s eyes found Cohen’s in the rear-view mirror. “How’d you make the connection?”
    â€œHis daughter. She’s like—”He couldn’t put her into words, she was like a vacation; you just had to be there. “She came over for...a toaster. Said you mentioned the house next door to her father—”
    â€œA toaster ?” he laughed. “Sounds about right. They’re a wild lot, the Crosbies. All jacked up on life, you know? They’ve got no boundaries, no one’s a stranger. Not in a hippie sort of way, just, I dunno.”He shrugged his shoulders. “Me and Matt,we worked at the university bookstore, when we were first years. We wound up roommates for a semester and everything. We’ve always kept in touch, drinks at Christmas and that sort of thing. Which is probably why he ended up a client of your mother’s.” He took a sip of coffee from his travel mug, laid it back in a cupholder. “His wife passed away in January. Cancer.”
    Cohen’s brother sneezed and it scared Cohen enough he jumped.
    â€œBad. It was bad . She’d been battling it for quite some time. Long enough that his daughter moved back home to help him care for her. You know, to help her die . Comfortably. Horrible stuff.”
    His father clicked his indicator to turn into a passing lane. He checked his blind spot three or four times and it looked like he was shaking his head for no good reason. “Your mother and I were at the funeral and a few months later we went out to Grayton to have supper with the guy. Just to see how he was holding up. He mentioned his daughter was moving here, into town, to do her PhD. Your mother wasn’t having that.”
    She closed her eyes slowly, shook her head. “Can you imagine being left alone in the house your wife died in? It’s just, not right. You move. You do.”
    â€œHe’s semi-retired, working from home.” Another sip of coffee. “Your mother planted the seed of the house next door to yours, so his daughter could be three minutes from the university, in a neighbourhood we could vouch for. I guess they’re after moving in together by the sounds of it? She’s got a science degree of some kind.”
    â€œChemistry,”Cohen said, like he was proud of her.
    His father shrugged his shoulder, cracked a few knuckles. “Poor girl was a mess at her mother’s wake, that’s all I know. I mean, she sat outside in the rain like something from a heartbreaking movie. She couldn’t even look at the casket. I think she went home early. Twenty minutes in. I think it’s a nice thing they’re here together. Still living together I mean. For both his and Allison’s sakes.”
    â€œAllie.”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œYou called her Allison. Her name’s Allie. She seems big on the distinction.”
    A wink in the rear-view, “In love already, are you?”
    His brother said something about having chemistry with the chemistry graduate. A lame joke for the sake of it, but their father busted his gut over it, and Ryan rolled his eyes.
    They pulled into the driveway just after nine. Unpacked and unenthused, they were all in bed by 10:30, after a few games of poker. They had no idea, as their heads hit the pillows, that they were about to become the kind of family you see on the five o’clock news, looking stunned to be there, getting ravaged by senseless questions like What really happened that day? and How did it make you