Out of Shadows by Jason Wallace Page B

moment. It seemed so long since he’d invited me to his farm and I wished more than anything he’d ask me again.
    Then I thought about Simpson-Prior’s expression thatnight we’d made him wet his bed. I found another stone and hurled it, pretending the bottle was the memory, but on this occasion I’d tried too hard because although I waited for the noise, the only sound of chinking glass came from up at the house.
    My mother was up.
    Our garden was huge and circled with a boundary of jacaranda and avocado trees and tall pines that felt like prison bars sometimes. Our bungalow sat in the middle, with its plain white walls and a gray asbestos roof that hung over a veranda the family hardly ever used.
    The grass hadn’t seen rain for months and made noises under my toes.
    â€œHerro, Mastah Bobby,” Matilda greeted me, bent double over the washing board yet still managing the biggest smile.
    I waved back and went into the cool.
    As expected, my mother’s door was closed, though I knew she’d been out because a glass by the drinks table had been used, empty before the ice had even begun to melt. He said he hadn’t but I knew my father had moved into the spare room because Matilda made the bed in there each morning.
    Daylight was banished in my mother’s room and merely glowed around the edge of the curtains while she lay in the gloom, pale and propped up against pillows. I scarcely recognized her anymore.
    Her eyelids fluttered.
    â€œDarling. Goodness me, what are you doing here?” She raised an arm, another glass at the end of it I hadn’t noticed until now, sloshing clear liquid. “It’s so early.”
    â€œIt’s nearly the afternoon,” I replied.
    â€œReally? Golly, and here’s me still in bed. I’m sorry, darling, I haven’t been feeling too well recently. You know howit is.” Her cold and damp fingers found my face. It was the touch of a stranger and it made me uncomfortable. “Look how my little baby’s growing up. That school of yours must be feeding you well. What time is it?”
    â€œAlmost twelve. Mum—”
    â€œAlmost lunch, then. That’s good,” she said. Guilty eyes peered over the top of her glass. “Don’t worry, it’s only water. Promise. Have the rains come yet?”
    â€œNo, Mum, it’s only September.”
    â€œI do miss the rain so. Cold, gray, English rain . . .”
    A vacant cloud drifted over her. I’d noticed that same cloud almost straightaway on my first day home and it hadn’t gone away.
    â€œMum, have you heard from Granny recently?” I asked.
    She stayed silent for a while.
    â€œYour grandmother is,” she began. “Has . . . Is . . . Oh, it’s all too late.”
    Too late?
    â€œFor what?”
    She reached weakly for the bedside table and her bones made shapes under her skin. In her hand she held a tattered envelope with a British stamp on it.
    â€œHere.” She sighed. “This explains everything.”
    As I went to take it, I saw it was a handwriting I didn’t recognize. The word
URGENT
had been written on it in big capitals and I hesitated. It was enough time for her to change her mind and she took it back.
    â€œYour grandmother has gone away,” she told me in an unfamiliar tone because she was speaking into her glass. She tipped it to take a final swig of whatever it was only to find she’d already finished.
    â€œWhere?”
    â€œDoes that really matter?” She noticed my reaction to her tone and softened her voice. “Moved. An old people’s home.Yes, that’s it. A sort of hospital. She couldn’t cope on her own anymore, the poor thing. So old, so suddenly. It happens.”
    â€œBut . . .” Only at that precise moment I didn’t know how to articulate my thoughts. “But she didn’t tell me.”
    â€œShe couldn’t.