My Life Among the Apes Read Online Free Page A

people, lovely people. Mostly from Mumbai. Originally, I mean.”
    â€œReally.”
    â€œThe builders have some connections there. And there are a lot of Indian people living on the other side of the highway. Maybe you’ve seen the Hindu temple, it’s quite handsome.”
    â€œDo you represent this one as well?” I asked, pointing to my house.
    â€œYes, I do. Would you care to take a look? It has an ensuite master bathroom.”
    â€œI know. I mean, I’ve been inside. The door wasn’t locked.”
    She frowned. “The tradespeople can be so irresponsible. Did you see the basement? Unfinished but very easily done. It would make a good play room for children. Do you have any kids?”
    â€œNo. Not yet, anyway.”
    â€œIt’s best to get into the market as early as you can. In housing, prices are always going up. Of course, it is more than an investment. It is your home. Do you know what mortgage you are able to carry?”
    â€œI’m not really sure. I mean, I haven’t worked out the fine details.”
    â€œWhat is the down payment you can make?”
    I think of the money from my grandfather’s estate, which was invested in blue chip funds. I haven’t touched it except for taking Candice to Cuba last winter. “I’ve got about sixty thousand dollars,” I say, although actually it’s closer to forty.
    â€œThat’s quite good. Better than most who buy here. With the low interest rates, you would have to pay only nine hundred dollars a month mortgage, plus the tax, heating, and other usual bills. Could you manage that?”
    â€œIf I was careful.”
    â€œIt is good to be careful, I think,” she says and smiles. I’ve never seen a lovelier smile. I’m convinced she really wants me to be happy. “I must tell you that several families have come to see this house in the last two weeks. It won’t last long. Here, let me give you my card.”
    She snaps open her purse, takes out a card, and hands it to me, just as her cellphone starts to ring. I nod to her, but she is already too involved in a conversation about plot surveys to notice, and retreat back across the road, swiping up my beer as I go.
    I CONSIDER TELLING EVERY DOCTOR I visit of the various symptoms I have been experiencing lately. Depression punctuated by fleeting moments of desperate exhilaration. On my last call of the day I give in to the need and confess to a family physician whose patients call him “Doctor Dan.” Without a word he takes his pad, writes a prescription, and hands it to me.
    Rexapro.
    â€œThis is one of our competitors’ products,” I say. “I think it will suit you better.”
    â€œOurs has fewer contra-indications.”
    â€œThis one is more generally effective, a wider umbrella.”
    â€œReally?” I’m disappointed. The vice-president said that ours worked the best for the most people.
    â€œYou know what their rep gave me?” Doctor Dan says. “A cappuccino machine. Makes pretty good foam.”
    BACK AT THE RANCH, I tuck the prescription into the Gideon Bible in the drawer by the bed. I have my usual sumptuous dinner and head out for a night on the town. Along the strip of highway, cars slide past, their lights receding in the dark. It takes me no time to reach Bob’s Place, and although it’s early in the week, there are a dozen Harley-Davidsons gleaming in the lot. I go up the chipped cement steps and open the door; the music that has been vibrating though the glass windows now blasts me in the face, along with the rank smell of beer. In the dark I can just make out the bikers at their tables, big guys with greying ponytails, leather vests or jackets, beefy hands around their mugs. Also a few women, who match them in bulk and smoke-scarred voices when they laugh. I wonder if they’re pissed off about tattoos becoming so popular. The band is crowded into the far