The Big Dream Read Online Free PDF Page A

lifted snarls of ginger curls around her shoulders. “He said it’s a trial separation. And that I shouldn’t ask about it.”
    â€œAnd how are you doing on that?”
    â€œYeah, Joe accidentally put the hydro bill into a recycling bin instead of a mailbox yesterday. I don’t obey him on principle. Am I getting dinner tonight?”
    Theo willed his ribcage to expand with air, then contract to press out all the frustration and tension and rage. He’d been doing Rae’s yoga DVDs after the kids were asleep, but by then he was so exhausted he might not quite have had it right.
    â€œThere’s, yeah, some scalloped turnips in the fridge, just microwave’em. And tofu steaks from the weekend, if you want. The kids will probably just want the turnips, but give them the tofu if they ask.”
    Colleen put her face on her knees. “The kids will want scalloped turnips ?”
    â€œIt’s a free meal, Colleen.”
    She raised her head, suddenly bright and interested. “Are we going to argue?”
    â€œWhat?”

    â€œYou sounded . . . exasperated. If I’m mean, will you be mean back?”
    â€œI wasn’t being mean, I just didn’t want you to – ”
    â€œYeah yeah yeah. Better than Joe, just sitting there like a lump of – ”
    â€œThat’s why you threw the shoe? Because your father is an insufficient debater?”
    â€œHe didn’t even make a sound when it hit him. That’s how I know it didn’t hurt.”
    â€œThat’s not a way to know. Especially with Joe.”
    â€œShe’s not coming , you know. This is a joke.”
    He sighed, and then tried to make the sigh into a yoga breath. “You can’t make me angry, and you can’t make me think Rae won’t come. People get held up at work. Buses get stuck. Those are reasonable explanations. And there are others.”
    â€œNot for why she wouldn’t have called and used two 3-cent cellphone minutes to tell you that.”
    â€œThere might be something wrong with the – ”
    â€œThere isn’t. Just for argument’s sake say there isn’t.”
    â€œFine. But how do you explain why she’d ask me to dinner and then not come?”
    â€œCruelty?”
    â€œSeparation doesn’t mean Rae hates me. Even divorce wouldn’t mean that.”
    â€œDoesn’t have to have hate involved. Might not even be about you, or anyone. Some people are just naturally cruel.”
    â€œRae is not cruel,” he said fast and involuntarily, words expelled like the whoosh of breath that would have come out had Colleen punched him in the stomach.
    â€œNo?”
    â€œMarley, sit down. It won’t work if you do that.”
    The children were at the backyard gate, almost behind the porch. Marley was flopped forward over her chair-bar, with Jake in front of her, a long stick in his right hand, drawn up
as if to stab. But of course he would not do that. Theo gathered himself to speak sharply, to take the stick away, to parent.
    Without turning her eyes from Marley and Jake, Colleen murmured, “Do you think I’m cruel?”
    Theo froze half-standing, in a kind of pre-modern hunch. “Cruel?”
    â€œBecause I threw a shoe at my father, who is basically a nice person that just doesn’t know what the hell is going on? Should I just have let him be, in his ignorance?”
    Theo felt his shoulders relax, let himself sink back onto the step. He suddenly knew what to say. “I do think you should have let him be. Because the punishment didn’t educate him, did it? There should only be punishment when it has the capacity to reform. Otherwise it’s just energy wasted, pain – cruelty. Joe learned nothing about your wish for privacy from that shoe, so nothing was gained. You were cruel.”
    Colleen seemed to slip backwards without actually moving, shrink into herself. But then she said, “So