LaRose Read Online Free PDF Page A

faithful to the memory of Emmaline’s father, Billy Peace. It was reverently said that she had tried tothrow herself into his grave. He had actually been cremated, but no one remembered. Billy Peace was also Nola’s father. Nobody really knew how many wives had married Billy, or what had gone on in that cultish compound of his decades ago. Billy’s children and now grandchildren kept turning up and were usually added to the tribal rolls.
    Mrs. Peace had been a sad-looking, pretty woman with long flossy brown hair. She had long flossy white hair now and was still pretty but looked happy. She didn’t cut and curl her hair like most of her friends, but wore it in a thin braid, sometimes a bun. Every day she wore a different pair of beaded earrings. She made up the patterns herself—today sky blue with orange centers. She had taken up this hobby, and the smoking of cigarillos, after she left off teaching and moved back to the reservation. She rarely smoked a cigarillo now. She said beading had helped her quit. Her stand-up magnifying glass was placed just so on the table, for her vision was poor. When she looked up at Landreaux, her thick eyeglasses gave her a bewildered otherworldliness, adding to her aura.
    Landreaux entered as she nodded him in, hugged him. They stood wordlessly in the embrace, then stepped back. Mrs. Peace held out her hands, palms up.
    He took his boots off by the door. She was boiling water for tea. Landreaux waved the stethoscope and blood pressure cuff at her, but she told him to put that stuff away. She felt fine. The lodge owned a carpet-shampooing machine, and half her apartment, covered deeply in an ash-blond fiber, needed Landreaux’s care. For the moment, he left the machine and jug of soap parked outside the door. Though she still had an occasional attack, LaRose’s enigmatic pain had nearly vanished after the death of Billy Peace. Neuralgia, full-body migraine, osteoporosis, spinal problems, lupus, sciatica, bone cancer, phantom limb syndrome though she had her limbs—these diagnoses had come and gone. Her medical file was a foot high. She knew, of course, why the pains had left her at that time, rarely returning. Billy had been cruel, self-loving, and clever. Hislove had been a burden no different from hate. Sometimes his ironies still sneaked at her from the spirit world. People thought she had been faithful to his memory because she had abjectly adored Billy Peace. She let them say what they wanted. Actually, he had taught her what she needed to know about men. She needed no further instruction.
    Landreaux, who as a man believed the tragic lovelorn-teacher story, was solicitous, convinced that she presented a brave face to the world. Today he saw with concern that her face was crashed out, blank, and she was trying to make herself comfortable in her reclining chair. Perhaps she was having an episode because of what he had done.
    Don’t even worry about me, she said. This will take a long time to work out, eh? You’re a good boy to come over here and help me at a time like this.
    I can’t just sit around, he said, and tried to coax her into an opiate or two.
    It makes me loopy.
    She peered at him through her bottle-glass-thick lenses, her eyes swimming.
    Are you looking forward to having your carpet shampooed? he asked, hearing what he said as ridiculous or maybe pathetic. But she made his awkwardness okay.
    It’s amazing what a kick I get out of that, she answered. You go ahead.
    He drank the tea and brought in the machine.
    Landreaux moved the reclining chair, magazine rack, television, and television stand off the carpet. He put water into the tank, mixed the soap into the water, and began. The machine made purring, bubbling sounds. He moved it back and forth. The sound was low and mesmerizing. Sure enough, Mrs. Peace closed her eyes, beatific, smiling. When he was done, her eyes flipped open and she got up to bustle around the edges of the wet carpet. He put the machine away and