A Private State: Stories Read Online Free PDF Page A

it look like one of the nursery's fanciest tulips. She held it close to Hannah's desk and looked at photos. Hannah on a pinto, holding the pommel with a casual hand. Hannah linking arms

 

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with women gleeful at their conquest of a bald peak. Not a single picture of her sister in any phase but Arizonan. Waxy drops rolled to the desk. The door swung wide and Julia turned to see Stephen. "Having fun?"
Julia looked at him and said, "Oh yes. Tons."
He closed the door and stretched out on the sofa, rumpled with Julia's sheets, and said, "What did you think of the canyon?"
"Impressive." She gestured vaguely, hoping she'd lit on the right word.
He wandered over to the wine and poured himself some more. "You never get used to it," he said. "You just feel sort of small out here all the time." It was the only thing he'd said yet that made her like him.
"But Hannah loves it," Julia said and sat down at the desk.
Stephen sat nearby and said nothing, which felt fine, not awkward. The whole-grain breakfasts had accustomed them to pauses. The floor rang with music. "Hold on," he said, and went to the living room. He came back with chips and guacamole. "I like this stuff."
"Me, too," said Julia. She thought avocados were beautiful, their flesh sliding quietly from green to white at the pit. Even more, she liked mashing them for Henry, whose wife thought they were too fattening to have in the house. She had realized instantly, as the fork met the soft slices, that this was competition. "Henry likes it, too."
"Is he your boyfriend?"
"I think so," she said.
"New?"
"Married."
"Complicated," said Stephen tranquilly.
So Julia started to talk to Stephen, and it tumbled from her like gardener's twine unraveling from a badly wound ball. But listening to the story out loud for the first time, she was sad to hear how common it seemed, and she stopped. Partly it was how brittle

 

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Henry's name sounded in the dry air. But mostly, it was realizing she was telling the wrong story. What she really wanted to say was that she was having dreams about her mother so real she woke up sometimes thinking she could smell her skin. Stephen poured more wine and said, ''You ever cut your hair?"
Julia shook her head no. The three longhaired women. My Rapunzels, her father called them.
"Can I do it?" he asked. "Short?"
"OK," she heard herself say.
Stephen wet a comb in the bathroom, shifted his chair closer to hers, and wrapped a towel around her neck. Then he eased out the scissors on his Swiss Army knife. "You're going to use those?" Julia asked.
"Don't worry. I got the best haircut of my life with them." He turned on a small lamp. The comb slid across her scalp. He went straight to the base of her skull and a skein of hair fell to the ground.
"Stop!" Julia said, clutching her head. "Just a minute." She remembered how Henry loved to braid her hair. She remembered even better her mother brushing it smooth for school. But these were things that couldn't be allowed to make a difference anymore. He might as well go on. "OK," she said. He snipped slowly, his breath steady. A damp mass of brown slid into her lap. They were quiet for a minute. The candle guttered out. Julia asked him, "Do you love Hannah?" She'd given him permission to cut her hair and felt entitled to some large, abrupt questions.
Stephen stopped. "Love. Wow. Big word." The scissors started again. "Do you?"
"Of course," Julia protested.
"Just because she's your sister, you don't have to."
"Everyone's so groovy out here," Julia heard herself saying. "If you don't feel like being nice, that's OK, you're just in a bad space. What's bad space, anyway," Julia said, a little louder. "Some cave where you put the meat eaters?"

 

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"Sit still," said Stephen. "I'm going to mess up the line."
"How come losing your temper out here is a federal crime?" Julia said, sitting up straight. "How come Hannah makes me feel like a serial killer when I tell her how to get rid of slugs? She's murdered