Sideways Read Online Free PDF

the Pacific glittered like crumpled tin foil under a waxing pale yellow moon. Approaching the eastern end of Santa Barbara, I directed Jack to an offramp that took us up into the hills of Montecito, an affluent bedroom community. In the commercial district, Jack searched around for a florist, grousing that it wasn’t right to show up for my mother’s birthday without flowers. He finally found a small corner shop, its entrance overflowing with flowers, parked the car in a loading zone, and marched in without me. Inside the brightly lit shop I watched Jack asking advice of a middle-aged man with a bushy moustache. My thoughts drifted desultorily to mostly unpleasant topics.
    A moment later, Jack returned carrying a dozen long-stemmed yellow roses swaddled in green wax paper. He thrust them at me. “Here,” he said. “Tell her you love her.” He started up the car and slipped it into drive. “After all, she gave birth to you.”
    “I’m supposed to thank her for that?” I deadpanned. Jack merged back into traffic. “You’re dyed-in-the-wool, brother. If you met Mr. Happiness he’d fold his tent and pack it in.”
    “Mr. Happiness is an illusion created by pharmaceutical companies.”
    Jack laughed, nearly losing it on a hairpin turn.
    My mother lived a comfortable life in a small two-bedroom house on a terraced street that commanded a panoramic view of the ocean. The beautiful vista didn’t much matter to her anymore: after my father died of a stroke she hardly ventured outside at all. She no longer drove and I suspected that some weeks her only human
    I was clutching the dozen roses and Jack had a bottle each of the Veuve and the Byron bubblies when my mother answered the door dressed in a nightie. She had once been a beautiful woman, vaguely reminiscent of Ingrid Bergman, but age and drink and loneliness had conspired to make her appearance a little frightening with her Bride of Frankenstein hairdo, pallid complexion, and rheumy eyes that didn’t move in tandem. It was only 7:30 when we showed up at her doorstep, but she was already a little sloppy, tottering in her nightgown and furry mules, and it took her a couple of seconds to recognize her only son.
    “Mom. Happy Birthday!” I handed over the roses.
    The flowers were almost too cumbersome for her and she pressed them clumsily to her chest. “Oh, they’re so beautiful, Miles,” she sang in a lilting voice. “Thank you.” She looked over and focused on Jack. “And champagne.”
    “Veuve Clicquot,” I said. “Your favorite.”
    “Oh, this is such a nice surprise. I didn’t think you were going to come.”
    “I told you I was, Mom.”
    “And I can’t remember you ever giving me flowers before.”
    Jack sneaked one of his disapproving looks at me and shook his head in a tight motion. The excitement of new voices—any voices—startled my mother’s Yorkie into a yapping frenzy.
    “Snapper, you be quiet,” my mother scolded her rambunctious
    “Mom, this is Jack. He’s the one I told you was getting married.”
    “How do you do, Mrs. Raymond?” Jack came forward and greeted her. “And Happy Birthday.” He gave her a peck on the cheek.
    “Oh, call me Phyllis, please, you make me sound so darn old.” She pushed the door open and stepped aside. “Come on in.” Snapper tilted his head up and barked once. She looked down and shook a finger at him. “Now, you be quiet. Go get your
comida
.” Snapper scampered away, barking up a storm.
    We followed my mother inside. She moved dreamily as if she were a somnambulist, gliding along on her slippered feet. I hadn’t been to visit in a while, but her house had remained unchanged. The living room was sparsely furnished and impeccably neat. Her hardwood floors were so heavily waxed that her dog slid five feet every time he tried to apply the brakes. Along the darkened hallway leading into the kitchen I found the same pictures and mementos, representing a kind of loose chronology of the Raymond