"Mary Rickert - Don't ask" - читать интересную книгу автора (Rickert Mary)

who died while they were gone and find it disturbing that they nod, as if they
understand, but show no grief. We stock the refrigerator with soda, though
we know they should drink juice, and Gatorade, remembering how they
used to gulp it down in great noisy swallows (and we scolded them for
drinking right out of the bottle) after games of little league and soccer,
though now they are happy to sit, listlessly, in front of the computer for
hours, often wandering the house in the middle of the night. We ask them if
their beds are comfortable enough, are they warm enough, are they cool
enough, but we never ask them what happened because the therapists
have told us not to. When we explain this to the famous lost boy (though
why do we feel we have to explain ourselves to him? He canтАЩt even hold
down a job at McDonaldтАЩs) he says, тАЬYou donтАЩt ask, because you donтАЩt want
to know.тАЭ

We hate the famous lost boy, he sneers and ridicules and we do not
want our sons to turn out like him. He is not a nice man. We just want him to
go away, but he wonтАЩt. Notoriously reclusive for years, he is now, suddenly,
everywhere. Walking down Main Street. Hanging out at the coffee shops.
Standing on the street corner, smoking. We are sorry to see that our boys
seem to like him. Sometimes we find them, running together, like a wild
pack. We call them home and they come back to us panting, tongues
hanging out. They collapse on the couch or the floor and when they fall
asleep they twitch and moan, cry and bark. We donтАЩt know what they dream
about, though we think, often, they dream of running.

They run all the time now. In the morning they run down the stairs and
around the kitchen table. We tell them to sit, or calm down, but it doesnтАЩt
really work. Sometimes we open the door and they tear into the backyard.
We have erected fences but they try to dig out, leaving potholes where
tulips and tiger lilies and roses blossomed through all those years of our
grief. We stand at the window wondering at the amazing fact of their
tenacity in trying to escape us when (and this is public knowledge, much
discussed and debated by newscasters and talk show hosts in those first
heady weeks after they were found) they never tried to escape their beasts.

Sometimes we feel our neck hairs tingle and we find the lost boys
staring at us like animals in a cage, frightened and wary, then they smile,
and we smile in return, understanding that they will have these bad
memories, these moments of fear.

****

The famous lost boy sighs, and right there, in the high school
auditorium, lights a cigarette, which Hymral Waller, the school board
president, rushes to tell him must be extinguished. тАЬWhat?тАЭ the word
sounds angry in the bite of microphone. тАЬThis?тАЭ HymralтАЩs words drift from
the floor, hollow, balloon-like, тАЬfire,тАЭ and тАЬsorry.тАЭ The famous lost boy drops
the cigarette to the stage floor and stamps it out with the toe of his sneaker.
We gasp at his impertinence and he squints at us.