Anne Tyler - The Accidental Tourist

He knew all this and yet, finding a folded sheet of paper on the counter, he opened it and devoured her lurching scrawl as if she were a stranger. Pretzels. Pantyhose. Dentist , he read. Pick up Mrs. Arnold’s laundry.

No, not that. Not that.

Then it was three o’clock and Alexander was home from school, letting himself in with a key that he wore on a shoelace around his neck. “Macon?” he’d call tentatively. “Is that you out there?” He was scared of burglars. Macon said, “It’s me.” Edward leapt up and went running for his ball. “How was your day?” Macon always asked.

“Oh, okay.”

But Macon had the feeling that school never went very well for Alexander. He came out of it with his face more pinched than ever, his glasses thick with fingerprints. He reminded Macon of a home-work paper that had been erased and rewritten too many times. His clothes, on the other hand, were as neat as when he’d left in the morning. Oh, those clothes! Spotless polo shirts with a restrained brown pinstripe, matching brown trousers gathered bulkily around his waist with a heavy leather belt. Shiny brown shoes. Blinding white socks. Didn’t he ever play? Didn’t kids have recess anymore?

Macon gave him a snack: milk and cookies. (Alexander drank milk in the afternoons without complaint.) Then he helped him with his schoolwork. It was the simplest sort — arithmetic sums and reading questions. “Why did Joe need the dime? Where was Joe’s daddy?”

“Umm…” Alexander said. Blue veins pulsed in his temples.

He was not a stupid child but he was limited, Macon felt. Limited. Even his walk was constricted. Even his smile never dared to venture beyond two invisible boundaries in the center of his face. Not that he was smiling now. He was wrinkling his forehead, raising his eyes fearfully to Macon.

“Take your time,” Macon told him. “There’s no hurry.”

“But I can’t! I don’t know! I don’t know!”

“You remember Joe,” Macon said patiently.

“I don’t think I do!”

Sometimes Macon stuck with it, sometimes he simply dropped it. After all, Alexander had managed without him up till now, hadn’t he? There was a peculiar kind of luxury here: Alexander was not his own child. Macon felt linked to him in all sorts of complicated ways, but not in that inseparable, inevitable way that he’d been linked to Ethan. He could still draw back from Alexander; he could still give up on him. “Oh, well,” he could say, “talk it over with your teacher tomorrow.” And then his thoughts could wander off again.

The difference was, he realized, that he was not held responsible here. It was a great relief to know that.

When Muriel came home she brought fresh air and bustle and excitement. “Is it ever cold! Is it ever windy! Radio says three below zero tonight. Edward, down, this minute. Who wants lemon pie for dessert? Here’s what happened: I had to go shopping for Mrs. Quick. First I had to buy linens for her daughter who’s getting married, then I had to take them back because they were all the wrong color, her daughter didn’t want pastel but white and told her mother plain as day, she said… and then I had to pick up pastries for the bridesmaids’ party and when Mrs. Quick sees the lemon pie she says, ‘Oh, no, not lemon! Not that tacky lemon that always tastes like Kool-Aid!’ I’m like, ‘Mrs. Quick, you don’t have any business telling me what is tacky. This is a fresh-baked, lemon meringue pie without a trace of artificial…’ So anyway, to make a long story short, she said to take it home to my little boy. ‘Well, for your information I’m certain he can’t eat it,’ I say. ‘Chances are he’s allergic.’ But I took it.”

She ranged around the kitchen putting together a supper — BLT’s, usually, and vegetables from a can. Sometimes things were not where she expected (Macon’s doing — he couldn’t resist reorganizing), but she adapted cheerfully. While the bacon sputtered in the skillet she usually phoned her mother and went over all she’d just told Macon and Alexander. “But the daughter wanted white and… ‘oh, not that tacky lemon pie!’ she says…”

If Mrs. Dugan couldn’t come to the phone (which was often the case), Muriel talked to Claire instead. Evidently Claire was having troubles at home. “Tell them!” Muriel counseled her. “Just tell them! Tell them you won’t stand for it.” Cradling the receiver against her shoulder, she opened a drawer and took out knives and forks. “Why should they have to know every little thing you do? It doesn’t matter that you’re not up to anything, Claire. Tell them, ‘I’m seventeen years old and it’s none of your affair anymore if I’m up to anything or not. I’m just about a grown woman,’ tell them.”

But later, if Mrs. Dugan finally came to the phone, Muriel herself sounded like a child. “Ma? What kept you? You can’t say a couple of words to your daughter just because your favorite song is playing on the radio? ‘Lara’s Theme’ is more important than flesh and blood?”

Even after Muriel hung up, she seldom really focused on dinner. Her girlfriend might drop by and stay to watch them eat — a fat young woman named Bernice who worked for the Gas and Electric Company. Or neighbors would knock on the kitchen door and walk right in. “Muriel, do you happen to have a coupon for support hose? Young and slim as you are, I know you wouldn’t need it yourself.” “Muriel, Saturday morning I got to go to the clinic for my teeth, any chance of you giving me a lift?” Muriel was an oddity on this street — a woman with a car of her own — and they knew by heart her elaborate arrangement with the boy who did her repairs. Sundays, when Dominick had the car all day, nobody troubled her; but as soon as Monday rolled around they’d be lining up with their requests. “Doctor wants me to come in and show him my…” “I promised I’d take my kids to the…”

If Muriel couldn’t do it, they never thought to ask Macon instead. Macon was still an outsider; they shot him quick glances but pretended not to notice he was listening. Even Bernice was bashful with him, and she avoided using his name.

By the time the lottery number was announced on TV, everyone would have left. That was what mattered here, Macon had discovered: the television schedule. The news could be missed but the lottery drawing could not; nor could “Evening Magazine” or any of the action shows that followed. Alexander watched these shows but Muriel didn’t, although she claimed to. She sat on the couch in front of the set and talked, or painted her nails, or read some article or other. “Look here! ‘How to Increase Your Bustline.’ ”

“You don’t want to increase your bustline,” Macon told her.

“ ‘Thicker, More Luxurious Eyelashes in Just Sixty Days.’ ”

“You don’t want thicker eyelashes.”

He felt content with everything exactly the way it was. He seemed to be suspended, his life on hold.

And later, taking Edward for his final outing, he liked the feeling of the neighborhood at night. This far downtown the sky was too pale for stars; it was pearly and opaque. The buildings were muffled dark shapes. Faint sounds threaded out of them — music, rifle shots, the whinnying of horses. Macon looked up at Alexander’s window and saw Muriel unfolding a blanket, as delicate and distinct as a silhouette cut from black paper.

One Wednesday there was a heavy snowstorm, starting in the morning and continuing through the day. Snow fell in clumps like white woolen mittens. It wiped out the dirty tatters of snow from earlier storms; it softened the street’s harsh angles and hid the trash cans under cottony domes. Even the women who swept their stoops hourly could not keep pace with it, and toward evening they gave up and went inside. All night the city glowed lilac. It was absolutely silent.