She was killed instantly By then our daughter had...
She was killed instantly
By then our daughter had probably already been
dead for twenty minutesThat Mary medallion you
held for me
414
He fell silent, and the silence spun outI didn't
fill it; there's nothing to say to a story like
thatEventually he resumed
"Just another version of the PowerballFive
numbers, plus that all-important Bonus Number
Click, click, click, click, clickAnd then clack
for good measureDid I think such a thing could
happen to me? No, muchacho, never in my wildest,
and God punishes us for what we can't knock off chanel imagineMy
mother and dad begged me to go see a psychiatrist,
and for a little while - eight months after the
funerals - I did indeed goI was tired of
floating through the world like a balloon tethered
three feet over my own head
"I know the feeling," I saidWe checked into hell on different
shifts, you and meAnd out again, I suppose,
although my heels are still smokingHow about
yours?"
"Yeahnice man, but I couldn't talk
to himWith him I was inarticulateWith him I
found myself grinning a lotI kept expecting a
cute chick in a bathing suit to trot out my balenciaga bags in black big
415
cardboard checkThe audience would see it and
applaudAnd eventually a check did comeWhen we
married, I'd taken out a joint life insurance
policyWhen Ez came, I added to itSo I really
did win la loteríaEspecially when you add in the
compensation Julia received from the accident in
the supermarket parking lotWhich brings us to
this
He held up the slim gray folder
"The thought of suicide had been out there,
circling closer and closerThe primary attraction
was the idea that Julia and Esmeralda might also
still be out there, waiting for cartier santos demoiselle me to catch up
but they might not wait foreverI'm not a
conventionally religious man, but I think there's
at least a chance that there is life after death,
and that we survive as A wintry smile touched the sides of
his mouth"Mostly I was just depressedI had a
gun in my safeI bought it for home
protection after Esmeralda was bornOne night I
sat down with it at the dining room table, and
I believe you might know this part of the story,
muchacho
416
I raised one hand and seesawed it in a maybe sí,
maybe no gesture
"I sat down at the dining dior monogram bag room table in my empty
houseThere was a bowl of fruit there, courtesy
of the home shopper I employedI put the gun on
the table, and then I closed my eyesI spun the
bowl of fruit around two or three timesI told
myself if I picked an apple out of the bowl, I'd
put the gun to my temple and end my lifeIf it
was an orange, howeverthen I'd take my lottery
winnings and go to Disney World
"You could hear the refrigerator," I said
"That's right," he said without surprise"I could
hear the fridge - both the hum of the motor and
the clunk of the men's omega seamaster ice-make