Wichita (9781609458904) Read Online Free Page A

apparently too little lawn maintenance,” Abby explains, turning cautiously into the driveway beneath the low-hanging limbs of an elm badly in need of trimming, “too much sleeping with the ladies in the life-drawing classes.” The tone is a familiar blend: anxious, exasperated, resigned, ruefully admiring. Seth is pretending to lash the car along like a jockey. “He was basically told to get out of Dodge.”
    Seth hops down from his hood-ornament perch while the car is still moving then circles back to the hatch, which he bangs on until Abby releases the lock. Getting out, she and Lewis exchange wry, here-we-go looks as Seth takes up Lewis’s small suitcase and slings the book bag over one shoulder, hops on a skateboard and rides into the garage and up a wheelchair ramp. He slams his shoulder against the door to the kitchen, somehow seizing the knob with his free hand, and when he opens it, three small mutts squeeze past, the remnant of a pack of strays Abby adopted after Lewis left home to live with Virgil and finish high school in New York. The dogs greet her with wild, keening ecstasy, writhing on the gritty garage floor and exposing their gums and sharp little teeth.
    Now Seth trots down the wheelchair ramp to stand with his arms crossed, half bellhop, half B-boy. Moths and clear-winged flies batter the bare bulb above his head and in the flickering light he looks like a mosaic of some forgotten pagan deity.
    â€œThank you, honey,” Abby tells him on her way inside. Pausing to lay a soothing hand on his arm, she gazes up into his eyes with such naked maternal love that Lewis feels queasy and intrusive bearing witness to it.
    â€œBrother!” Lewis calls and Abby moves mistily along.
    â€œBrother!” Seth replies with frowning mock gravity, stepping forward with hand outthrust in a little send-up of stern masculine bond-renewal. Lewis can see the facial tattoo clearly now. From a distance it looks like tight dark beard growth on his jaw and cheek but reveals itself up close to be microscriptural pictograms and vaguely runic letters invented by Seth and the tattoo artist. Nonsense, in other words. He loves to be asked what it means and improvise absurdist proverbs. What it actually means is he’ll probably never have an acting career.
    Lewis can also see the scar and dent on Seth’s brow from the time he was bashed by a brick in Golden Gate Park. He was living on the streets following a breakup with Candy, an older punk woman who had a nine-year-old daughter and a job as a stripper. They met at a hardcore show and got married at City Hall a week or two later then maxed out Candy’s credit cards in a coke binge that ended with her declaring bankruptcy and losing custody of the daughter. Eventually the marriage was annulled, to the enormous relief of Virgil, who had been keeping top secret the existence of one “Candy Chopik.”
    Lewis likes to think he’s blasé about the scar, but seeing it afresh is like glimpsing a crack through which evil seeped into their world, the attempted murder of his brother by a group of fellow street punks, who lured him into the bushes with the offer of a joint then left him for dead. Why? Some vague bad blood between them, some vying for status. The doctor warned Seth that if he didn’t stay in the hospital and recover properly, he risked having seizures, even dying.
    Now, instead of shaking hands, Seth throws his ropey, muscular arms around Lewis, nearly knocking him over, as much by the surprise as the impact. Seth has always been a limp, reluctant hugger, leaving the impression that he deems the practice hippie-sentimental. Once as little boys they spent a week apart and when Lewis came home, Seth cried, “Lewis!” and ran into his arms. That’s how far back Lewis has to go for a similar moment.
    Seth stands peering into his eyes as for a sign of some sort. Then, standing aside, he makes a courtly flourish with