Shooting Stars 01 Cinnamon Read Online Free PDF Page A

at sad scenes in her favorite old movies. She has a lock on the television set in the family room, fixing it on her oldtime movie channel. She complains incessantly about today's movies, television, music and books, calling it all depraved and claiming the most degenerate minds are responsible.
Occasionally. I would sit and watch an old movie with her. Some of them are very good. like Rebecca. I especially liked the scene where the evil housekeeper, Mrs. Danvers, tries to talk the second Mrs. de Winter into jumping to her death. The first time I saw it. I thought she was going to do it. Mrs. Danvers made it sound so inviting. I felt like jumping.
After I saw the movie. I began to think of Grandmother Beverly as our own Mrs. Danvers trying to talk Mommy into jumping off a cliff or at least helping drive her off the cliff of sanity into the bag of madness, where she now resided.
"That's not funny. Cinnamon," Daddy said. "Some people have less tolerance for unpleasant things."
"Grandmother Beverly? Weaker than other women? Please. Daddy," I said.
He blinked and nibbled on his Danish, quickly falling back to his relaxed demeanor. Daddy has a quiet elegance and charm. He is truly a handsome man with rich dark brown hair and the most striking hazel eyes I have seen on any man. He has those long eyelashes, too, and a perfect nose and firm mouth. He's almost square-jawed with high cheek bones and a forehead that's just wide enough to make him look very intelligent. He's an impeccable dresser and never goes any longer than three weeks without having his hair trimmed.
I understood why Mommy once told me he was the most attractive man who had ever looked at her twice. When she did speak about the early romantic days between them, she emphasized his solid, eventempered sensibility and how she had come to rely on him to keep her from going too far in one direction or another. Whatever happened to that? I wondered. It was almost as if he had abandoned ship.
"Your mother could be here a while," he said. "Or, she could be moved to a more comfortable place, a place that specializes in her problems."
"You mean a nut house?"
"No, a clinic," he corrected sharply.
I looked away. Tears didn't come into my eyes often, but when they did. I held them over my pupils tightly, battling to keep them locked behind my lids. I took deep breaths.
"We've got to be strong," Daddy said. "For her."
I looked at him. He was checking the time and looking toward the doorway.
"I haven't even learned about today's market results. I hopped on the train as quickly as I could," he muttered.
"Where were you. Daddy? Why weren't you in your office? I thought you have to be there to call your clients while the market is open."
"Sometimes. I go to visit a big account," he explained. "Ifs good politics. I have an assistant who does a good job covering for me."
"How come you didn't leave a telephone number where you could be reached?"
"I just forgot." he said. "I left too quickly."
Lying is an art form. I thought. Good lying, that is. It requires almost the same techniques, skills and energy that good acting requires. When you tell lies, you step out of yourself for a while. You become another version of yourself and yet, you have to do it so that the listener believes it's still you talking because he or she has come to trust you, have faith in you. I like making up stories, exaggerating, changing the truth a little-- or maybe a little more than a little- sometimes just to see how much I can get away with. It's all in how you hold your head, keep your eyes fixed on the listener and how much sincerity you can squeeze into the small places around the lie.
Maybe Daddy was a bad liar in person because he did mast of his lying over the phone. He didn't have to be face-to-face with his customers. He could quote statistics, talk in generalities, blame his mistakes on other people, other businesses or agencies than his own. It's much easier to sound convincing when you talk to an ear