House Broken Read Online Free Page A

to the airport in San Francisco and missed lunch.
    The setting sun pierced the haze and reflected off the matrix of glass and steel outside, throwing lurid shafts of orange light into the room. Flying in, she’d seen the smog that enveloped the city, held low by an inversion. Her eyes burned during the taxi ride and even now the back of her throat was raw. She had difficulty understanding why anyone, let alone thirteen million people, chose to live here. She’d trade palm trees and smog forredwoods and fog any day of the week. She took a sip from the Starbucks cup on the bedside table, recrossed her legs, and resumed tracking her shadow as it moved glacially across the brace on her mother’s leg.
    Five years earlier, shortly before Helen turned sixty, she’d announced her intention to leave her native South Carolina, declaring the last of a string of interchangeable Southern gentlemen to be much less fun after a hundred dates than after three. Besides, she said, she’d had her fill of snakes, sweet tea, and red-faced women who rested their chins on their bosoms. Her first choice was to live with Florence and her husband, Renaldo, in Manhattan. She packed and waited for Florence to offer her a closet-sized room in their walk-up. When the invitation failed to appear, she brushed it off, telling Geneva that New York was too expensive and “chock-full of Yankees.” Dublin was her next choice. This time she didn’t wait to be asked. She sent her belongings ahead of her and flew to Los Angeles for the easy glamour of room-temperature life amid palms. She purchased a condo a few miles from Dublin’s house in Sherman Oaks.
    In the hospital bed, Helen lay slack as a marionette doll abandoned by a puppeteer. Someone had brushed her platinum-blond hair away from her face, which accentuated her cheekbones and magnified the bruises under her eyes. Her lips were chapped and colorless. She would hate that, Geneva thought, recalling how her mother reapplied lipstick at the table after every meal. Without makeup, Helen appeared more vulnerable. Maybe “war paint,” as she called it, was exactly that—it emboldened her, or at least made her appear stronger. In the beige confines of the hospital ward, she lay stripped of her accessories. No war paint, no spectator pumps, no oversized sunglasses. And no Dutch courage.
    A nurse in a kelly-green uniform entered with several paper cups on a small tray. She introduced herself to Geneva and gently tapped Helen’s uninjured left shoulder. The doctors had immobilized her right shoulder after repairing torn cartilage and resetting the joint. When Geneva received news of the surgery she knew her mother’s recovery time had doubled. She wouldn’t be able to lean on a walker for weeks.
    â€œTime for your medication, Mrs. Riley.”
    Helen opened her eyes a little. “Am I still here, for Pete’s sake?”
    â€œYes, you are. And your daughter has been waiting for you.” The nurse nodded at Geneva on the far side of the bed.
    Helen’s face lit up as she slowly swiveled her head. “Florence?”
    â€œNo, Mom. It’s me.”
    â€œOh. Geneva. I didn’t realize.”
    The note of disappointment was slight, but it pierced Geneva like a dart. She turned away and pretended to admire the view. Her mother lifted her head an inch, then sunk into the pillow. “Is my water over there somewhere?”
    Geneva picked up the cup, adjusted the angle of the straw, and handed it to her. “I got here a while ago.”
    â€œHave you spoken with your sister? She was so upset about my accident!”
    Geneva had two sisters, but her mother spoke of only one. After thirty years, her mother’s erasure of Paris still registered.
    â€œI called Florence yesterday after I spoke with your doctor. She’s fine. I mean, we’re all upset, Mom.” She noted a defensive tone had crept into her speech: I’m a