Leaving: A Novel Read Online Free PDF Page A

yelled.
    “He said you make him sick. He said you’re unnatural as a tree growing into the ground!” Easton wiped his mouth and waited.
    Corbet stared at him. Easton’s nostrils flared and he clenched his fists. The cavernous space of the living room held Easton’s epithets like the chiming of a clock. Corbet shook his head, turned, and sat back down in his rocking chair.
    Ruby pulled Easton back by the shirt.
    “Why are you sayin all this?” Ruby begged. But Easton ignored her and went on.
    “So I took his face and I slammed it into my knee. He didn’t get up even by the time I was walking out the door.”
    “And you think that makes me happy?” Corbet said. “You think that makes me proud of you?”
    “I don’t care.”
    Corbet lowered his pipe and looked into its ashes.
    “Dat’s just de kind of foolishness dat’s gonna keep you from making somethin of yo’self,” Ruby yelled. “What do you think Ronal would have said to you ’bout acting like some street nigger with no brains in yo head. Ronal was never suspended for fighting even once.”
    “And look where that got him: six feet under.”
    Ruby slapped him and looked as if she might slap him again, but Corbet stood and came between them.
    “Come on. Come on. That’s just the lesson he’s got to unlearn. Why don’t you go on in the kitchen. Let’s have some dinner.”
    Ruby didn’t move, but Corbet stared her down. She gave Easton one last hard look, turned, and went into the kitchen.
    Easton and Corbert stood side by side and watched her go, mostly to avoid looking at each other. When the door closed behind her, Easton went back to the couch and Corbet went back to his chair. They sat and listened as pans crashed onto the stove.
    “She’s just trying to look out for you,” Corbet said.
    Easton nodded. They could picture Ruby’s movements by the sounds she made, the opening of the refrigerator, the washing of the vegetables, the swish of the trash bag.
    “Is it true?” Easton asked, looking down.
    Corbet rocked back and forth. “What’s that?”
    Easton didn’t reply. From the kitchen came the sound of fat sizzling in the hot frying pan.
    “Oh,” Corbet said. “You mean am I a faggot.”
    Easton looked at him and then away.
    “I can’t answer that, not in the way they mean it,” Corbet said.
    “Never mind.” Easton shook his head and stood to go.
    “No, I mind. Sit down.” Corbert reloaded his pipe and lit it. “Does it bother you if I am?”
    Easton shrugged.
    “It’s okay if it does. It still bothers me sometimes. That kind of talk gets into your blood. If people tell you that you’re bad long enough, for whatever reason, you start to believing it. It takes a lot of strength to like yourself.”
    Easton did not look at him. In some ways he would have preferred a beating to this talk. At least in a beating there wasn’t anything expected of him; it happened and it was over. But with this … Corbet seemed to be waiting for something. Easton stood again and brushed his palms against his slacks.
    “I’m going to help her with supper,” he said.
    “Okay.” Corbet watched him walk into the kitchen and disappear. He listened carefully, listened for what they might say about him, but they didn’t speak. He turned to his phonograph, put the needle down, and sat back in his chair.

CHAPTER 2B
    SEPTEMBER 1975   •   LIDA 16
    IN HIGH SCHOOL, Lida and Marcus often hung out in the back of his father’s health food store. This night Lida scooted between the boxes and waited for him, her naked ankles showing between her tapered red pant legs and red pumps. Marcus tiptoed back into the storage room. He had a purple cloth band tied around his hair, which was fully grown out into a Hendrix Afro. He held a joint in one hand and sang into a jar of honey: “‘Have you ever been experienced?’”
    Lida bent forward laughing, and Marcus sat down next to her. He pulled off the headband and wrapped it around her.
    “It