Sex and Death Read Online Free
Author: Sarah Hall
that he super sort of didnât give a shit?
His most recent contact with his sister was an email [email protected], back when her rare visits home were brokered by her staff, who would wait for their boss in a black-ops Winnebago out on the street. Ten years ago now? His mother was dead already, or still alive? At the time George wondered if Pattern couldnât just send a mannequin to holiday meals in her place, its pockets stuffed with money. Maybe make it edible, the face carved from lamb meat, to deepen the catharsis when they gnashed it apart with their teeth. Anyway, wouldnât his sister like to know that there was now one less person who might make a grab for her money? She could soften security at the compound, wherever she lived. Dad was dead. Probably she already knew. When youâre that wealthy, changes in your biological signature, such as the sudden omission of a patriarch, show up instantly on your live update. You blink in the high-resolution mirror at your reflection, notice no change whatsoever, and then move on with your day. Maybe sheâd have her personal physicians test her for sadness later in the week, just to be sure.
The question now was how to fire off an email to his very important sister that would leapfrog her spam filter, which was probably a group of human people, arms linked, blocking unwanted communications to their elusive boss, who had possibly evolved into a smoke by now.
Simple was probably best. âDear Pat,â George wrote. âMom and Dad have gone out and they are not coming back. Itâs just you and me now. Finally we have this world to ourselves. P.S. Write back!â
George went to California to pack his fatherâs things, intending a full-force jettison into the dumpster. Heâd only just started surveying the watery, one-bedroom apartment, where he could not picture his father standing, sitting, sleeping, or eating, mostly because he had trouble picturing his father at all, when a neighbour woman, worrisomely tall, came to be standing uninvited in the living room. Heâd left the door open and cracked the windowsso the breeze could do its work. Let the elements scrub this place free of his father. He needed candles, wind, a shaman. And on the subject of need: after sudden travel into blistering sunshine, he needed salty food to blow off in his mouth. He needed sex, if only with himself. Oh, to be alone with his laptop so he could leak a little cream onto his belly. Now there was a trespasser in his fatherâs home, suited up in business wear. It was enormously difficult to picture such people as babies. And yet one provided the courtesy anyway. An effort to relate. Their full maturation was even harder to summon. He was apparently to believe that, over time, these creatures, just nude little seals at first, would elongate and gain words. A layer of fur would cover them, with moist parts, and teeth, and huge pockets for gathering money. Was there a website where the corporate Ichabods of the world showed off their waterworks, gave each other rubdowns and whispered pillow talk in an invented language? Perhaps a new category beckoned.
âOh my god. You canât be George,â the woman said.
George sort of shared her disbelief. He couldnât be. The metaphysics were troubling, if you let them get to you. But day after day, with crushing regularity, he failed to prove otherwise.
The woman approached, her nose high. Examine the specimen, she possibly thought. Maybe draw its blood.
âI canât believe it!â
He asked if he could help her. Maybe she wanted to buy something, a relic of the dead man. The realtor had said that everything had to go. Take this house down to the bones.
So far, George was just picking at the skin. He was looking through his fatherâs takeout menus, skimming the manâs internet history. There were items of New Mexican pottery to destroy, shirts to try on.
Maybe heâd dress up
His most recent contact with his sister was an email [email protected], back when her rare visits home were brokered by her staff, who would wait for their boss in a black-ops Winnebago out on the street. Ten years ago now? His mother was dead already, or still alive? At the time George wondered if Pattern couldnât just send a mannequin to holiday meals in her place, its pockets stuffed with money. Maybe make it edible, the face carved from lamb meat, to deepen the catharsis when they gnashed it apart with their teeth. Anyway, wouldnât his sister like to know that there was now one less person who might make a grab for her money? She could soften security at the compound, wherever she lived. Dad was dead. Probably she already knew. When youâre that wealthy, changes in your biological signature, such as the sudden omission of a patriarch, show up instantly on your live update. You blink in the high-resolution mirror at your reflection, notice no change whatsoever, and then move on with your day. Maybe sheâd have her personal physicians test her for sadness later in the week, just to be sure.
The question now was how to fire off an email to his very important sister that would leapfrog her spam filter, which was probably a group of human people, arms linked, blocking unwanted communications to their elusive boss, who had possibly evolved into a smoke by now.
Simple was probably best. âDear Pat,â George wrote. âMom and Dad have gone out and they are not coming back. Itâs just you and me now. Finally we have this world to ourselves. P.S. Write back!â
George went to California to pack his fatherâs things, intending a full-force jettison into the dumpster. Heâd only just started surveying the watery, one-bedroom apartment, where he could not picture his father standing, sitting, sleeping, or eating, mostly because he had trouble picturing his father at all, when a neighbour woman, worrisomely tall, came to be standing uninvited in the living room. Heâd left the door open and cracked the windowsso the breeze could do its work. Let the elements scrub this place free of his father. He needed candles, wind, a shaman. And on the subject of need: after sudden travel into blistering sunshine, he needed salty food to blow off in his mouth. He needed sex, if only with himself. Oh, to be alone with his laptop so he could leak a little cream onto his belly. Now there was a trespasser in his fatherâs home, suited up in business wear. It was enormously difficult to picture such people as babies. And yet one provided the courtesy anyway. An effort to relate. Their full maturation was even harder to summon. He was apparently to believe that, over time, these creatures, just nude little seals at first, would elongate and gain words. A layer of fur would cover them, with moist parts, and teeth, and huge pockets for gathering money. Was there a website where the corporate Ichabods of the world showed off their waterworks, gave each other rubdowns and whispered pillow talk in an invented language? Perhaps a new category beckoned.
âOh my god. You canât be George,â the woman said.
George sort of shared her disbelief. He couldnât be. The metaphysics were troubling, if you let them get to you. But day after day, with crushing regularity, he failed to prove otherwise.
The woman approached, her nose high. Examine the specimen, she possibly thought. Maybe draw its blood.
âI canât believe it!â
He asked if he could help her. Maybe she wanted to buy something, a relic of the dead man. The realtor had said that everything had to go. Take this house down to the bones.
So far, George was just picking at the skin. He was looking through his fatherâs takeout menus, skimming the manâs internet history. There were items of New Mexican pottery to destroy, shirts to try on.
Maybe heâd dress up
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