The Family Unit and Other Fantasies Read Online Free Page B

mind as much, Barry thought, because they didn’t work at home, they only passed Steen’s on the way to and from their jobs, whereas he actually entered the place three or four times a day, since he never shopped in bulk—where did he live, the suburbs? What did he have, kids?—and went in for one item at a time: salt, a sponge, this morning, milk. Truth be told, he liked to leave his apartment, which sometimes seemed suffocating and was where he spent all day writing freelance brochures for U.S. stamps, and besides, going up and down the stairs was the only exercise he got, being somewhat plump and pasty, so why not spread it out?
    Then something cheered him up on the way to Green Harbor, distracting him from the endless length of the trip.
    He realized he would be passing Elegamento’s, his usual newspaper store, and that today was the second week of the month and thus the time for new magazines to come in. He rarely if ever bought magazines, preferred to just stand and read them right there in the store, but he always bought
something
—usually a single small pack of tissues—to pay Elegamento’s for its time. (With irony, he thought that tissue packets represented free-market capitalism at its best, since their price from one end of town to the other ranged from twenty-five cents to a dollar, and Elegamento’s, at sixty cents, was right in the comfortable middle—another reason he liked the store.) If the owners seemed to witness his behaviour with something less than pleasure, they always at least recognized him, and that was all that mattered.
    But when Barry reached Elegamento’s, he read the sign, dumbfounded: “Coming Soon: A New Drugall’s.”
    There was no prevarication, no pride; there was no brown wrapping paper, either; Elegamento’s was simply closed, shut, kaput, he thought. Inside, the place was dark, but he could see that all was in suspended animation, the magazines—last month’s, not new—candy and paperbacks just sitting there, like those recreations of parts of Pompeii he had seen on TV, only without any ash. A small pile of mail lay on the floor near the door, apparently the universal symbol for an absconded owner.
    Barry was more than dismayed; he was mad. Where would he be known for reading magazines for free now? The nearest place was News Buddy, six blocks over, and it was so narrow you couldn’t move your arms enough to open a magazine, let alone read one!
    At least Elegamento’s was honest about what had happened: its landlord had obviously jacked up the rent and a chain was taking over. No wonder they’d blown off that month’s bills, they were mad as hell—as mad as Barry. How many Drugall’s were there in the neighbourhood now anyway? Ten? (The stores had originated ninety miles north of New York and were spreading everywhere, like an illness or an awful catchphrase.) Each one was alike—how much eczema shampoo and imitation aspirin and scented toilet paper did one neighbourhood need? (And why were the interiors always heated to what seemed like a hundred degrees? And why was there always a long line, even when you were the only one there?!)
    He bet Steen’s would be one soon, too, or some other national outlet for clothes, coffee, or whatever else. In the twenty-odd years he had lived in the neighbourhood, he had seen individuality and small ownership dwindle—and who knew in what homogenized hell it would all end up? What had happened to his little microcosm of Manhattan, the two or three blocks around his apartment house? Who had stolen his little city?
    Barry’s vision briefly blurred and affected his balance. His fingers scrambled in his pocket for a pill but found none. These fits of anxiety, depression, and paranoia— other people’s words, not his—were eased but not erased by the prescription. He resented having to take the pills in the first place: he was only being honest, after all—chain stores
were
taking over everything, it was true! Still, not even