Death Of A Hollow Man Read Online Free PDF Page B

sudden smile seemed almost shocking in its sweetness. Avery thought he was like a figure in a Caravaggio painting. Or perhaps (his profile at the moment looked alarmingly austere) a medieval monk. Nicholas had said he thought that Tim, although emotionally lean, was spiritually opulent. This was not what Avery wanted to hear. He didn’t give a fig for spiritual opulence. Give him, he had replied, a nice filet mignon and a fond caress any old day of the week.
    Avery knew he cut a ridiculous figure when compared to Tim. He was tubby, and his features, like his personality, were sloppy and spread all over the place. His lips were squashy and overfull, his eyes a washed-out blue and slightly protuberant, with almost colorless lashes, and his nose, just to be different, was neat and small and seemed quite lost in the pale pink expanse of his face. His head was very round, with a fringe of curls, butter yellow and softly fluffy like duckling down. He had always been agonizingly conscious of his baldness, and until he met Tim, had worn a wig. The morning after their first night together he had found it in the wastebasket. It had never been mentioned between them again, and Avery bravely continued to live without it, treating himself and his scalp to a weekly going-over with a sun lamp instead.
    Then there was the difference in their dispositions. Tim was nearly always calm, while Avery veered excitedly between elation and despair, touching all the psychological stations of the cross on the way. And he reacted so dramatically to things. This had always seemed to amuse Tim, but once or twice lately Avery had noticed a twitch or two of impatience, a spot of lip-tightening. Now, draining his glass of Bordeaux, he framed in his mind the latest of many small vows. He would learn to take things more calmly. He would think before speaking. Take several deep breaths. Perhaps even count to ten. He turned his attention back to the Le Creuset. All the tissues had sunk without trace. Avery let out a scream that could have been heard halfway down the street.
    “Bloody hell!” Tim banged his glass down on the countertop. “What’s the matter now?”
    “The Kleenex have sunk to the bottom.”
    “Is that all? I thought at the very least you were being castrated.”
    “I meant them to soak up all the bits,” sobbed Avery. “Well, now you’ve discovered that they won’t. Knowledge is never wasted. We’ll just give it to Nicholas.”
    “You can’t do that—it’s full of tissue.”
    “Riley, then.” Riley was the CADS feline mascot. “Riley! There’s half a bottle of Beaune in there.”
    “So he’ll think it’s Christmas.”
    “Anyway, Riley’s a fish man, not a meat man. What are you doing?”
    “Toast.” Tim was slicing bread on the marble pastry slab. Now, he reached across Avery and switched on the grill. Then he refilled both their glasses. “Drink up, sweetheart. And stop flowing all over the furniture.”
    “Sorry …” Avery sniffled and snuffled and drank up. “You’re … you’re not angry with me, are you, Tim?”
    “No, Avery, I’m not angry with you. I’m just bloody starving to death.”
    “Yes. So-”
    “Don’t keep saying you’re sorry. Get off your backside and give me a hand. There’s some duck pate left over. And we could finish the mango ice cream.”
    “All right.” Still mopping and mowing, Avery crossed to the fridge. “I don’t know why you put up with me.”
    “Stop being ingratiating. It doesn’t suit you.”
    “Sor—”
    “And if I didn’t, who else would?”
    This question, so casually posed, seemed to Avery no more than the simple truth. Awash with sorrow, he hung his head and pondered, looking down at his round tummy and chubby little feet. Then he looked up and met Tim’s sudden brilliant smile. O frabjous day! thought Avery, beaming widely in his turn. And then, to make things absolutely perfect and he and Tim equal in carelessness, the toast caught fire.
    “We can