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file:///E|/Funny%20&%20Weird%20Shit/75%20-%20Stephen%20King%20Books/Stephen%20King%20-%20Pet%20Sematary.htmJud stood up with alacrity. “Hot damn! I’ll go for that, Louis. Quick, before she changes her mind.”The first snow came a week before Thanksgiving. They got another four inches on the twenty-second ofNovember, but the day before the holiday itself was clear and blue and cold. Louis took his family toBangor International Airport and saw them off on the first leg of their trip back to Chicago for a visitwith Rachel’s parents.“It’s not right,” Rachel said for perhaps the twentieth time since discussions on this matter hadcommenced in earnest a month ago. “I don’t like thinking of you rattling around the house alone onThanksgiving Day. That’s supposed to be a family holiday, Louis.”Louis shifted Gage, who looked gigantic and wide-eyed in his first big-boy parka, to his other arm. Elliewas at one of the big windows, watching an Air Force helicopter take off.“I’m not exactly going to be crying in my beer,” Louis said. “Jud and Norma are going to have me overfor turkey and all the trimmings. Hell, I’m the one who feels guilty. I’ve never liked these big holidaygroup gropes anyway. I start drinking in front of some football game at three in the afternoon and fallasleep at seven, and the next day it feels like the Dallas Cowgirls are dancing around and yelling boolaboolainside my head. I just don’t like sending you off with the two kids.”“I’ll be fine,” she said. “Flying first class, I feel like a princess. And Gage will sleep on the flight fromLogan to O’Hare.”“You hope,” he said, and they both laughed.The flight was called, and Ellie scampered over. “That’s us, Mommy. Come on-come on-come on.They’ll leave without us.”“No they won’t,” Rachel said. She was clutching her three pink boarding cards in one hand. She waswearing her fur coat, some fake stuff that was a luxuriant brown . . . probably it was supposed to looklike muskrat, Louis thought. Whatever it was supposed to look like, it made her look absolutely lovely.Perhaps something of what he felt showed in his eyes because she hugged him impulsively,semicrushing Gage between them. Gage looked surprised but not terribly upset.“Louis Creed, I love you,” she said.“Mom-eee,” Ellie said, now in a fever of impatience. “some on-come on—c— “Oh, all right,” she said.“Be good, LOUIS.”“Tell you what,” he said, grinning, “I’ll be careful. Say hello to your folks, Rachel.”file:///E|/Funny%20&%20Weird%20Shit/75%20-%20Ste...%20Books/Stephen%20King%20-%20Pet%20Sematary.htm (87 of 333)7/28/2005 9:21:49 PM