Larry Goes To Space by Alan Black Page A

while, or at least keep him in the house a bit. I’ll have Gary and Marcy bring him back when they come over tonight.”
    “Tonight?” Larry thought quickly. “Um, tonight might not be good, Dad. Can they stay there until after I leave in the morning?”
    “Son, I’m not going to let a pregnant woman sleep on the fold out couch. You have an extra bedroom they can use.” It wasn’t a question, nor did his father phrase it that way.
    “Pregnant? You got Mom pregnant again!”
    “I should hope to hell not. Marcy is pregnant.”
    “Okay, Dad. Send ‘em along. I’ll make do somehow. I gotta go, Dad. I love you and give my love to Mom and Grandma.”
    “Grandpa too?”
    “Goes without saying, Dad.”
    Larry hung up the phone and wondered what to do about Gary and Marcy. No one could see the spacecraft from the house, but a person could probably see the spacecraft if they climbed into the hayloft in the barn and stretched their neck. Not like Bud Wilkins stretched his neck when he hung himself in his barn last winter, but more like a crane or just standing on tippy-toes.
    Anyone looking was sure going to see them take off for outer space tomorrow morning. Maybe he would just have to figure something out. Once he was gone, it wouldn’t really matter since any fuss raised would be exactly like buying insurance after the barn burned down, or using a condom after she got pregnant, or for that matter telling the FBI you were going to rob a bank after you got away clean and hid the loot. Done deal and nothing no one could do about it!
    He decided not to fix his steak until he knew whether Gary and Marcy had eaten. There was no sense in cooking two meals, although he doubted Mom or Grandma would let anyone out of their house without being so stuffed they had to waddle to their car. He went about straightening up as fast as he could. Not that hurrying made the job any less perfectly done. He wouldn’t have done a better job of vacuuming even if he’d been going slow. He wouldn’t have dusted the corners any more precisely even if he’d been creeping along. He wouldn’t have sorted the rest of his laundry with any more regard to fabric or color than if he had all day to do it.
    He was just putting the vacuum away in the hall closet when he heard a car door slam. He looked at his watch and wondered what had taken them so long in coming from his parent’s place. Grandma had probably insisted they stay for another piece of pie. He hoped Grandma had insisted they bring a piece along for him.
    “Hello?” a hesitant female voice called through the screen door. Marcy was a short, dark haired young girl barely out of her teens and heavy around the hips like a bowling pin or rather exactly like seventy-five percent of all women over nineteen in farm country. Being pregnant enough to show, just balanced her belly to her hips, giving her a wonderful rounded look, ripe like a peach.
    “Hello yourself, Marcy. Come on, girl. Get in the house.” They hugged tentatively like most people recently related by marriage: shoulders in, hips back, with quick pats on the back. Larry commented on how nice she looked; being all pregnant and everything. He mentioned how good it was to see her; how long has it been, not since the wedding, we shouldn’t wait that long, how were her parents, when is she due, blah, blah blah. It was everything that Larry was expected to say, but nothing he wanted to talk about.
    He finally said. “Where’s Gary?”
    Marcy nodded at her husband’s name. She looked around as if surprised he wasn’t right behind her. “Um, Gary, well he said he was going to bring in our luggage, but he wanted to try and tie up your dog for the night.”
    “Oh, hell,” Larry said. “Ol’ Bucky will be running circles round him in the dark.” He walked to the screen door, kicked it open, and called for Ol’ Bucky. The dog loped out of the dark, past Larry and flopped down under the kitchen table. “Let me go help