The Matter With Morris Read Online Free PDF Page A

strong and she’ll survive.”
    Morris was astonished. “You talked to Libby about this before talking to me?”
    “We’ve discussed this, Morris. For half a year we’ve talked about it. This should not be a surprise.”
    “It is a surprise. I’m flabbergasted. You’re so rigid. You are a miser, a collector. You give just enough to make sure that you get something more in return. Libby said that she wants to live with you?”
    Lucille nodded. “She’s not rejecting you, Morris.” She reached out to hold his hand but he pulled away. “It’s a trial,” she said. “There’s nothing permanent in this.”
    “I’ve heard that before. Exactly what your best friend Margo said to her husband Timothy and now she’s happily ensconced in a condo by the river, entertaining young men with big dicks.”
    “Morris, this isn’t about sex.”
    “I’ll go,” he said. “You can take care of this place.” He waved a hand at the house, aware of the falling-down soffits, the peeling paint, the many unfinished projects that he’d been meaning to get to. What had been a novelty so many years ago, a house that needed a new kitchen, had now become a burden. The year before, a squirrel had made a nest in the eaves; it could be heard scampering along the gutters, storing up nuts and leaves and acorns for the winter. Morris had set a live trap, gently placing peanuts on the tripwire, and when he caught the poor thing, he drove it over to Omand’s Creek and released it into the wild. Only to have it return. Morris swore that the squirrel made it back to the house before he did. And so he reset the trap and caught the same squirrel, stupid animal. He phoned Poulin’s Pest Control and was told that a squirrel had a homing instinct of up to three miles. “Take it across the river,” the woman told him. And so he did, dumping the squirrel into the unsuspecting laps of the folkson the other side of the Red River. And it worked. A house was a haven for crows and mice and ants and chipmunks. Come one, come all, thought Morris. He’d often suggested to Lucille that they should move into a condominium, where there was no need to shovel snow, to repair plaster, to redo the roof, or to make immigrants of squirrels. “We can just sit back and drink and talk and make love,” he’d announced. But she’d balked at the idea of small closets and no garden. Where would she put her perennials? And so they had stayed on, and the house had continued to collapse around them.
    “You’re angry,” Lucille said. “You know that I’m afraid of your anger.”
    “You, of all people, should be willing to work at this.”
    “Me, of all people. I’m not perfect, Morris, I don’t have the answers.”
    He was on the verge of begging, and he hated it. He looked up quickly. “Is there someone else?”
    “No. God, no. No one.”
    “Who’s going to buy your clothes?”
    She reached for his hand again and this time he allowed her to hold it. “We’re not dead, Morris. If you want to buy me a skirt or a sweater, I’d love it.”
    “Who’s going to watch you put it on and take it off? That’s my dominion.”
    She smiled sadly and squeezed his hand.
    And then, too quickly, within several months, she found someone else. Maybe she’d been searching on the Internet, slyly beckoning lovers to join her. And she ended up with the heart surgeon who, Lucille said, held her safely in his arms.If there was any comfort to be found, it came from Morris’s perception that he himself was stronger, more resilient than Lucille, that he was capable of grieving alone.
    Morris had left the letter from Ursula lying on the kitchen table, opened and face up, a few days later. He had never intended to leave it there, though Lucille would have found something premeditated in the act, as if he had wanted to hurt her. The letter was meandering, a detailed description of calving a cow and then a brief account of a shopping trip to Minneapolis, dinner out with Cal, the