Angels Burning Read Online Free PDF Page A

and, of course, the man who unfairly paid for it.
    I like to think the man she was married to at the time remembers, too, as he continues to float around Europe on a cloud of family money serving out his self-imposed exile. At the time I wanted Gil as far away from my siblings and me as possible, but now I think I could finally deal with him properly. I wouldn’t mind if he came home again.
    However, I realize I’m not ready to deal with Lucky. I may have seemed tough and detached when I talked to him, but my conscience was wringing its hands inside me. My actions against him seemed inarguably necessary at the time; now I’m not so sure.One of the worst aspects of growing older is the lengthening of hindsight. As it stretches, it becomes thinner and more transparent and we see things more clearly.
    I drive home around noon to change my clothes. I’m still shoeless, and the feel of the gas pedal beneath my bare foot conjures up memories of Lucky giving me driving lessons. It was summer. He’d come roaringup on his motorcycle on a Saturday morning relishing the disapproving scowls on the faces of Gil’s neighbors peering out from behind their fancy drapes the same way Mom watched their garbage. I’d grab Gil’s car keys and run out to meet Lucky, usually forgetting to slip on my Dr. Scholl’s.
    Lucky’s relationship with Mom had ended five years earlier. After they broke up, a parade of men came and went before she finally took the plunge with Gilbert Rankin. I had begun to think that Mom was not only too beautiful for housework but also for marriage. I could imagine Grandma’s reasoning: “It would be a crime for a girl that pretty to only be able to manipulate one man for the rest of her life.”
    Mom had entered her thirties not seeming the least bit interested in a commitment, but I think Gil’s money and availability had been too much to pass up.
    Gil came from one of Buchanan’s wealthiest families. All small towns have a few who no one knows exactly where their money originally came from, but in Pennsylvania it can almost always be traced back to something dark or invisible that’s been dug, blasted, or piped out of the ground. His father had given him a department store and two restaurants to keep him busy. He also appeared to have an active love life, but despite constant rumors about possible potential spouses, he had never married or had any children.
    One day I came home from school to find Lucky lolling on Gil’s avocado-green-and-sunflower-yellow paisley-swirled couch with his steel-toed biker’s boots propped on the Lucite coffee table that looked like a gigantic ice cube made from lemonade. He had a can of beer in one hand and the other hand on Mom, who was laughing at something he’d said. They didn’t try to cover up anything when I walked in. It occurred to me fleetingly that they might be doing something they shouldn’t, but I had learned a long time ago not to judge my mother’s actions, since nothing productive or satisfying ever came of it. Mom was as oblivious to moral censure as Gil’s constantly yapping terrier was to shouts of “Shut up!”
    Lucky happened to drop by one day while I was asking Mom to takeme driving. I was going to be able to get my permit soon, but I didn’t have anyone to teach me.
    Lucky volunteered. I don’t know if he did it thinking it might earn him points with Mom or if he wanted to be near my nice ass and already good-size rack, but I think the main reason was that before and after my lessons in the empty high school parking lot he got to drive Gil’s big, shiny, cranberry Buick Riviera, and he drove it way too fast.
    Learning to drive was one of those rare moments where I missed not having a dad. As far as I could tell, no one needed a dad. I didn’t feel this way because Cissy had been one of those impressive single moms who stepped up and admirably performed the