Milosz Read Online Free PDF Page B

returned, and he couldn’t wait to get back on stage to spew all over Martha again.
    He invited Gus to the opening night of Waiting for Godot , even though he knew his father would be bored out of his mind. The next day, when Milo showed the old man the good reviews, Gus shrugged and ate another sausage.
    While waiting for the receptionist to notice him, Milo pretends to text on the busted cell. She takes five hundred more calls before looking at him. ‘Are you waiting for someone?’ she inquires. She must be in her forties but has a mouth full of braces.
    â€˜Christopher Wedderspoon, please.’
    â€˜Is he expecting you?’
    â€˜Actually, no, I’m just passing through. My plane was delayed and I thought I’d take the opportunity to go over a portfolio with him.’ Milo holds up the briefcase he uses for corporate-type auditions.
    â€˜Your name, please?’
    â€˜Milo Krupi.’
    She presses buttons and speaks into her headset. ‘Milo Crappy’s here to go over a portfolio. He doesn’t have an appointment.’ She pauses, squinting at Milo, then repeats, ‘Milo Crappy.’
    â€˜Krupi,’ Milo interjects. ‘We used to be neighbours.’
    â€˜He says you used to be neighbours.’ Because she’s staring at him while speaking into the headset Milo assumes she’s addressing him.
    â€˜That’s right,’ he says, ‘we were neighbours. Actually, I still live beside his wife.’
    â€˜Mr. Wedderspoon will be with you shortly. Have a seat.’
    â€˜Thank you.’ Does this mean he will he be forced to ‘have it out’ with Christopher right here, amidst the teal furnishings of the waiting room? Sitting on a stuffed chair, he can’t help but notice the receptionist looking at his shoes. They’re Gus’s shoes, a little small and in need of polish. Gus took great pride in polishing his shoes. They are the wrong colour for the suit. He pretends to text again while rehearsing in his head the heart-rending speech that will convince Christopher to return home.



    hristopher slumps on a stool at the Quick Fixins counter with his head in his hands. It would have been preferable to have this heart-to-heart in a private office with a window overlooking the city. Milo could have paced as he explained the gravity of his mission, gazing sorrowfully out the window as he searched for the right words. But Christopher appears to have come down in the world and has only a cubicle. Milo isn’t sure what his job is. Christopher used to manage other people’s money, or lose it, which may be why he is now in a cubicle.
    â€˜I will always support them,’ he says.
    â€˜No one doubts that.’
    â€˜You swear she doesn’t know you’re here?’
    â€˜Scout’s honour.’ Christopher was a scout leader so Milo feels this oath is appropriate. Scouts had been an escape for Christopher as a kid and he’d hoped it would be the same for Robertson. But Robertson never moved with the crowd, instead lingered over anything that caught his interest.
    â€˜She thinks he can be normal,’ Christopher says. ‘I know he can’t.’
    â€˜Don’t you think normal is overrated? I mean, who wants to be normal? Robertson has a concentration, an intensity of thought, a single-mindedness, a ... ’ The words Milo so carefully chose to describe the wonder of Robertson escape him. He is drying , as they say in the theatre, and there is no prompter to feed him his line. ‘What I mean is,’ he stammers, ‘he has a tenacity, a … a directness. He can’t lie. How many people do you know who can’t lie? He’s incapable of dissembling.’ Dissembling is a word he’d thought would impress, but Christopher remains inert. ‘Robertson is unique,’ Milo sums up. ‘No one thinks like he does. I think he’s quite noble.’
    â€˜He can’t control