Are You Loathsome Tonight? Read Online Free PDF Page A

foods, including a whole box of Cadbury Flake, an English chocolate bar unavailable in the States. He'd always bought them at the candy store in Manchester where he and Matty used to go after school. One of the clerks would sell them cigarettes, too, even though they were only fourteen...
    If Matty was dead, there was no one in the world who knew him . The thought shocked Cobb out of his satiated doze, and he sat up in bed. He'd been close with the other two, of course, and with a number of women. But the intimacy of total collaboration , the sense of minds melding, had never been there with anyone else.
    He went into the kitchen and got the bottle of vodka out of the freezer.
    Many shots later, he slept.

    In his dream, he was standing atop one of the distant hills. He could see the house and the little graveyard behind him, but they did not look fearsome now.
    With the smooth suddenness of dreams, Matty was beside him, resting one elbow on Cobb's shoulder as he'd had a habit of doing since they were school friends. A breeze ruffled Matty's dark hair, lifted it from his face. There were streaks of gray in that hair, but Matty's face in profile was as serenely handsome as ever, if a shade more careworn. Afraid to speak first, Cobb watched Matty out of the corner of his eye, and Matty smiled.
    â€œI really am dead, you know."
    â€œWell...” Cobb's voice was rusty, but he would not let it crack, would not. “You look damn good for a man who's taken a shot in the mouth."
    â€œOh, that .” Matty turned to face Cobb. “I don't have to look like that to convince you, do I?"
    â€œNo,” Cobb said hastily. “Look, do we have to stand out here?"
    â€œOf course not, nature boy,” said Matty, and at once they were back in the house, lying in bed. Cobb wasn't embarrassed, though he was naked and Matty appeared to be also; they had shared plenty of beds and bathrooms out of necessity.
    Matty propped himself up on one elbow and lit a half-joint Cobb had left in the tray. Before Cobb had time to wonder whether the joint would be smoked when he woke up, Matty said, “I didn't die in New York, though. I died here, in this bed."
    Then he passed the joint over, as if he knew Cobb would need it.
    â€œIt was cancer,” he went on. “Bet you never thought of that, did you? No one has. No one can imagine why happy old Matty Matthew would suddenly up and blow his brains out, not even you. Am I right?"
    â€œFucker, you know you are."
    Matty acknowledged this with a nod. “Well, no one knows happy old Matty had about three months to live, either. With a prognosis of drooling dementia followed by coma followed by death. I decided not to let them know. There's no dignity in it, you see. Better to go out as a tortured artist."
    â€œWhat about the autopsy?"
    Matty got one of his looks. Cobb hadn't seen that look for twenty years, but he remembered it perfectly. “The autopsy , Terry, consisted of a pathologist inking my fingertips and snapping a few Polaroids. How much d'you suppose those will fetch on the collector's market?"
    â€œHard to say. If the reports were right, they could be pictures of just anyone who'd blown his brains out."
    â€œThat's true.” Matty grimaced. “But I had to do it that way. That's where the cancer was."
    â€œIn your brain?"
    â€œRight in the center. Inoperable. I saw it on the X ray, as big as a plum, and I had to have my files stolen from the hospital, and the X-rays too—"
    Now he sounded as if he were bragging, and Cobb interrupted him. “What do you mean, you died in this bed?"
    Matty went right on. “The doctor may leak it to the press anyway, but there'll be no proof, and he'll look as if he's just trying to make a buck—"
    Cobb said it again, more loudly.
    â€œOh.” Matty blinked. “Well, so that I could be here when you came. I didn't know if it would work. Looks like it did."
    â€œHow did you know I'd come?”