Adam's Peak Read Online Free PDF Page A

something from the bank, and a single letter, from his brother. He turned it over, looking for Aunty’s name. Adam’s letters were always to the two of them. “To Aunty Mary and Rudy,” the envelopes always said, and inside would be short, chatty updates on his job at the campus bookstore, his swimming, his motorcycle, family goings-on, and other things of that sort. But this letter was addressed simply to “Rudy Vantwest.” Frowning, Rudy folded the envelope in half and stuffed it in his trouser pocket.
    In the kitchen, Aunty Mary was dusting Easter cookies with sugar. A kitten with matted orange fur had stationed itself at her feet, while a mob of tiny flies hovered over a jack fruit on the counter. Rudy deposited the bananas next to the jack fruit and kissed his aunt’s cheek. She smoothed her cotton dress and patted the thick twist of silver-black hair at the back of her head.
    â€œYou’re home late, son.”
    â€œYeah. The bus was slow.” He reached above her head for a glass.
    â€œWant tea?”
    â€œNo, thanks. Water is fine.”
    â€œAh, yes. My doctor is telling me I should drink more water. Very good for the health, isn’t it. You’d like chicken for dinner?”

    â€œSure.”
    â€œI’ll just finish this. It shouldn’t be long.”
    â€œNo hurry,” he said distractedly. “I’ll get started on my marking.”
    He filled his glass from a pitcher in the fridge, drained it, then went out back to wash at the well. Bathing at the stone well in the pink-gold light of late afternoon was one of those entitlements, like eating rice with his fingers or shitting in the outdoor toilet under a leafy canopy, that Rudy indulged in simply because it was not—could never be—part of his Canadian life. With renewed determination to distance himself from that life, he drew a pail of cool water dotted with dead leaves, emptied it into the plastic washtub, and rolled up his sleeves. A pair of mosquitoes—enormous brutes with long, dangling legs and abdomens—danced threateningly over the tub. He clapped them both dead, pried a bar of soap from the rim of the well, and scrubbed his hands and face. Completing the ritual, he emptied the tub over the dirt and shook his hands.
    Adam’s letter weighed heavily in his pocket as he returned to the sitting room and installed himself at his grandfather’s desk. His knapsack was on the floor, Kanda’s essay inside. It was a queer twist of fate, being confronted with both on the same day—though the coincidence didn’t particularly surprise him. He reached down and unzipped his bag. He would start with the essay; the letter could wait.
    Skimming Kanda’s introduction, he put a check mark next to the thesis statement. (The boy had a thesis; two-thirds of the class would-n’t.) He made a few more check marks throughout the paper, circled some errors, then, turning to the back page, considered what comments to make. A further response had entered his mind, joining those he’d come up with earlier:
What if your sister got in the way of a Tiger attack, Kanda? What then?
But he couldn’t write that—or anything else he’d come up with, for that matter.
    He leaned back, and his gaze drifted up to the framed oil painting hanging above the desk. The painting, an awkward, immature work, apparently done by Uncle Ernie, had been in Aunty’s house for as long as Rudy could remember. Its subject was Adam’s Peak, the mountain his brother was named after, rendered as a dappled green oblong under a yellow sun. Despite the clumsiness of the brushstrokes, the light on the peak showed a certain sensitivity to nature, while the surrounding hills cast convincing shadows on the landscape. At the summit of the oblong was a red pavilion. The lopsided building was too large for the scale of the painting, and it seemed to Rudy that the picture would be more effective