Kent Haruf - Our Souls at Night

What do you think? she said.

It’s a bigger house than I thought. More rooms.

It’s been ae=text/css" re

I think I’ll just use the bathroom, she said.

While she was out of the room he looked at the pictures on her dresser and the ones hanging on the walls. Family pictures with Carl on their wedding day, on the church steps somewhere. The two of them in the mountains beside a creek. A little black and white dog. He knew Carl a little bit, a decent man, pretty calm, he sold crop insurance and other kinds of insurance to people all over Holt County twenty years ago, had beZ17Ks.en elected mayor of the town for two terms. Louis never knew him well. He was glad now that he hadn’t. There were pictures of their son. Gene didn’t look like either of them. A tall thin boy, very serious. And two pictures of their daughter as a young girl.

When she came back he said, I think I’ll use the bathroom too. He went in and used the toilet and washed his hands scrupulously and squeezed out a little dollop of her toothpaste and brushed his teeth and then took off his shoes and clothes and got into his pajamas. He folded his clothes over his shoes and left them in the corner behind the door and went back to the bedroom. She had gotten into a nightgown and was in bed now, the bedside lamp alight on her side and the ceiling light switched off and the window open a few inches. There was a cool soft breeze. He stood beside the bed. She folded back the sheet and blanket.

Aren’t you getting in?

I’m considering it.

He got into bed, staying on his side, and pulled the blanket up and lay back. He didn’t say anything yet.

What are you thinking? she said. You’re awfully quiet.

How strange this is. How new it is to be here. How uncertain I feel, and sort of nervous. I don’t know what I’m thinking. A mess of things.

It is new, isn’t it, she said. It’s a good kind of new, I’d say. Would you?

I would.

What do you do before you sleep?

Oh, I watch the ten o’clock news and come to bed and read till I’m asleep. But I don’t know if I’ll be able to sleep tonight. I’m too keyed up.

I’m going to shut off the light, she said. We can still talk. She turned in the bed and he looked at her bare smooth shoulders and her bright hair under the light.

Then it was dark with just the light from the street showing faintly in the room. They talked about trivial matters, getting acquainted a little, the minor routine events of town, the health of the old lady Ruth who lived in between their houses, the paving of Birch Street. Then they were quiet.

After a while he said, Are you still awake?

Yes.

You asked what I was thinking. One thing I was thinking: I’m glad I didn’t know Carl very well.

Why?

I wouldn’t feel as good as I do being here, if I did.

But I knew Diane pretty well.

An hour later she was asleep and breathing quietly. He was still awake. He had been watching her. He could see her face in the dim light. They hadn’t touched once. At three in the morning he got up and went to the bathroom and came back and shut the window. A wind had come up.

At daybreak he rose and got dressed in the bathroom and looked again at Addie Moore in bed. She was awake now. I’ll see you, he said.

Will you?

Yes.

He went out and walked home on the sidewalk past the neighboring houses and we" text/css"/> <

When he woke that afternoon he realized he was sick. He got up and drank some water and felt hot. He thought for a while and then decided to call her. On the phone he said, I just got up from a nap and I don’t feel good, a pain in my stomach of some kind and also in my back. I’m sorry. I won’t be coming over tonight.

I see, she said, and hung up.

He called his doctor’s office and made an appointment for the next morning. He went to bed early and was sweaty in the night and couldn’t sleep and in the morning he didn’t feel like eating and at ten he went to see the doctor and was sent to the hospital for blood and urine tests. He waited there in the lobby until the lab had the results and then they admitted him with a urinary tract infection.

They gave him antibiotics and he slept most of the afternoon and again was awake much of the night. In the morning he felt better and they told him he’d probably be released the next day. He ate breakfast and lunch and took a short nap and when he woke up around three she was sitting in the chair beside his bed. He looked at her.

You weren’t kidding, she said.

Did you think I was?

I thought you were just saying you were sick. That you decided you didn’t want to be with me at night.

I was afraid you were thinking that.

I thought it wasn’t going to happen, she said.

I’ve been thinking of you all yesterday and last night and all day today, he said.

What were you thinking?

How you’d misinterpret my call. And how I could explain that I still want to come at night and be together. How I was feeling more interested in this than I’d felt about anything for a long time.

Why didn’t you call me then? To tell me?

I thought it might even be worse, that it would sound all the more like I was making this up.

I wish you’d tried.

I should have. How did you find out I was in the hospital?

I was talking to Ruth next door this morning and she said, Did you hear about Louis? I said, What about him? He’s in the hospital. What’s wrong with him? They say he’s got some kind of infection. Then I knew, she said.

I’m not going to lie to you, he said.

All right. Neither of us will. So will you come again? at him, waiting.

As soon as I feel well and am sure I’m over this. It’s good to see you, he said.

Thank you. You look pretty ragged right now.

I haven’t had time to put on my face yet.

She laughed. I don’t care, she said. That’s not what I mean. I was just making a comment, an observation.

Well, you look pretty good to me, he said.

Did you call your daughter?

I told her not to worry. That I’d be out in a day and this was nothing to be concerned about. She won’t have to take off work. I don’t need her to come see me now. She lives in Colorado Springs.

I know.

She’s a teacher like I was. Then he stopped talking. Do you want something to drink? I could call the nurse.

No. I’m going home now.

I’ll call you after I’m home again and feeling all right.

Good, she said. I already bought some beer.

She left and he watched her walk out of the href="kindle:

The next day he worked in the yard in the morning and mowed the lawn and ate lunch and took a short nap and then went down to the bakery and drank coffee with a group of men he met with every other week. One of them a man he didn’t particularly like. The man said, I wish I had your energy.

How’s that?

To stay out all night and then still have enough left over to function the day after.

Louis looked at him for a while.

You know, he said, one of the things I always hear is how any story is safe with you. It goes right in your ears and out your mouth. I wouldn’t want to get the name of a liar and a prevaricator in a little town the size of this one. A reputation like that would just about follow you everywhere.

The man stared at Louis. He looked around at the other men sitting at the table. They were looking anywhere but at him. He stood and walked out of the bakery onto Main Street.

I don’t believe he paid for his coffee, one of the men said.

I’ll take care of it, Louis said. I’ll see you boys later. He we//www.w3.org/1