Everybody Scream! Read Online Free Page B

She tipped her head back and squinted her eyes further as she blew out a stream of smoke.
    “Rough night?” No reply. Del thumbed the buttons of an air filter system. He’d never been a smoker of anything, particularly the harsh crap Sophi favored–bad for the throat. “Want some eggs, toast, something?”
    “I’m all set. What time’d you get in last night?” she croaked.
    “Before you.”
    “Ohh–I guess that’s why I saw you in bed when I came home.”
    “That’s probably it.”
    “I know you got in before me, Del, you don’t have to be evasive. I’m not grilling you.
    I’m just making cheery breakfast conversation, like on VT.” She sipped the black coffee.
    “Evasive? I wasn’t being evasive. I got in just after midnight, and read for an hour or so.”
    “You didn’t have to put in that ‘read for an hour or so,’ Del. Christ, are we a little paranoid, or what?”
    “Paranoid? I’m not being paranoid.”
    “Defensive, too.”
    “Anything else?”
    “Testy.”
    “Who wouldn’t be, after that diagnosis.”
    “Did you know a kid got killed on the Dreidel last night?”
    “No–when’d that happen?”
    “Right before shutdown, wouldn’t you know. I talked to the kid who runs the ride and he seemed straight, he swears he always locks all the belts himself. The belt came open; it wasn’t broken. We figure the stupid punk played with it himself.”
    “How old was he?”
    “Seventeen.”
    “Oh God...man...this has been some season, huh?”
    “It’ll be okay, nobody will touch us. He was just some Choom kid, not some politician’s son or anything.
    “Boy. I hope for your karma that it was his fault.”
    “My karma’s got nothing to do with it, Siddhartha–it was his karma.”
    “Has the town been told?”
    “Yeah, always, don’t worry, Maxie is handling it. I’m not trying to alarm you. Just making cheery breakfast conversation.”
    Del started out of the room to dress. “Most women talk about the curtains they want to buy.”
    “Oh yeah? On what planet is that?”
    “VT, I guess.”
    When Del returned, Sophi was where she had been, though her coffee cup seemed to have refilled itself, the cigarette butts had multiplied in the ashtray (Del had won it for her in a carnival game) and she had dragged toward her the magazine Del had flipped through earlier. Her forehead was in her palm, hair a hiding mantle like a nun’s habit.
    Del stood watching her while he adjusted his black string tie and the clasp, like a silver belt buckle adorned with turquoise, a gift from Sophi, that held it. “For somebody who’s trying so hard to further her career and better her life and go forward, you sure do a lot to weigh yourself down and go backward. So ultimately, where do you end up going?”
    “You tell me, Mr. Success.” Sophi didn’t look up. “Where are you going?”
    “Nowhere. But I’m not trying to, now. When and if I do, I won’t let myself be my own obstacle and my own worst enemy.”
    “I’m not a fucking alcoholic, numb nuts. I don’t have a drink to get rolling in the morning…”
    “You have.”
    “I use it to relax. I work hard so I relax hard. Don’t lecture me today, pal; you go relax your way and I’ll relax mine. You have your own modes of escape, don’t you? Aren’t you a little too attached to yours?”
    Del didn’t respond. He’d known from his first words that sooner or later she would turn things around on him, and had known that it might not be a good idea to say any of this and expect her to agree with him. He wanted to say that she had her lovers too in addition to drink, but he knew she would reply–and correctly so–that her lovers had been outnumbered by his five to one. All he dared risk in conclusion was, “I don’t like to see you poisoning yourself.”
    “What am I now, a snakebite addict? Am I really so pathetic, Del?”
    “There are worse things. That doesn’t make it good.”
    “I love it when somebody doesn’t get drunk or