All Families Are Psychotic Read Online Free PDF

phone book. Come on over.' 'Now? Sure. I guess.'
    'We're having Chinese tonigh t.' 'I'll be there in twenty minu tes.' 'Wade—'
    'Yeah, Dad?'
    'Nice to hear your voice again.' 'You, too, Dad.'
    Wade left for his father's house in a rental car. His driving was lazy and he had a mild hangover from earlier on. Sheets of rain kept dumping , intense at times, never stopping .
    Dad — oh, man. Still the hypocritical prick acting out some corny 1960s idea of manhood. Wade knew
    that his father had dropp ed his mother qui te cruelly and was now living the li fe of Mr. Salt-and-Pepper Chest Hair, with his shir ts wide open, his gol f clubs leaned just inside the fron t door, and a trophy wife somewhere in the near distance plopping a Gipsy Kings CD into a slot.
    Wade felt that at a certain poin t in their lives, most people passionlessly assess what they have and what they lack — and then go abou t making the best of it — like an actor who goes from playing leads to
    playing character roles; like a party girl who goes from being a zany kook to being a cautionary tale for
    the younger girl s. Wade believed that the adul t world is a world of Ted Drummond s, and Wade hoped his father would be proud that his son understood this.
    He arrived at the house, which was an event in itself — glass and steel and concrete blocks inset into a cli ff overlooking the Pacific. Wade half expected to find his father in an eye-patch overlooking a backli t map of the world, stroking a white Persian cat and planning ICBM attacks on New York. Instead Ted
    opened the door, shou ted 'Wade,' and hugged his son so hard Wade though t blood would squeeze out of his pores like juice. 'Come on in. Have a look around . Quite a place, eh? I got sick of that suburbi a crap.'
    Ted poured generous drink s for them. He'd obviously been to a gym and somebody hip was shopping for his wardrob e. And then Wade saw a flash in his father's eyes. The flash said, It 's all shit, Wade, just don' t say the words out loud, because then even the shit goes away and we're left with nothing.
    Drinks in hand they took a tour of the main floor, high ceiling ed and enclosed in glass, on which the rain continued to drum. The fact that Ted had yet to mention any other family member was leaving Wade feeling a touch disoriented. Who is this old guy? What am I doing in his James Bond living room?
    Wade asked, 'Where's, uh, your wife?'
    If Ted was awkward abou t Wade meeting her, he didn ' t let on. 'Nickie? She'll be downstairs in a second. She's just in from work.' 'She works, huh?'
    'You kno w these modern young ponies. Keep them in the corral and they get testy. They've just gotta have their jobs.'
    'Huh. You don ' t say.'
    An awkward silence draped them. Ted asked when Wade's fligh t had arrived.
    'Around noon. I'd have called sooner, but I got waylaid with a piece of action from the bar down at the Av.' This seemed to arouse his father's conversational energy, and Wade found himself needing to please his father, so he gave him a soft-core version of the events. Ted hit him on the should er with a that's-my-
    boy slap.
    From the ki tchen there came a tinkling sound. 'Nickie!' said Ted. 'Come on in and meet your son.'
    Nickie came in, carrying a tray of martinis, an ironi c smile on her face parodying the demure wifeliness of the 1950s that Janet had once believed in. Wade quickly saw that Nickie was the afternoon 's blond ; the
    insigh t was reciprocal. Their faces blanched; the martini tray lurched sideways, glasses toppling onto the polished slate floor. Ted and Wade stepped forward and awkwardly helped Nickie pick up glass shards, whereupon Ted saw Nickie's cell number penned onto Wade's hand.
    Wade walked straigh t to the fron t door, got into his car and drove off, heading for home — Janet's house. Janet was in the driveway removing groceries from her car in the rain. Mom -ditched by her
    ingrate family, mateless and brave. Wade's brain ri fled through a billion images,