The Paris Review - Fall 2016

“Take out the casserole. I’ll be right there,” she said.
“You two will whisper for another half hour if I leave.”
“You’re caught in the middle,” Little Edgar said to Mandy.
“I guess I am,” she said, after some consideration. “Let’s talk about this
tomorrow.”
“No granola,” Little Edgar said. The year before, it had been all he’d
eat—dry, without milk. Preferably with raisins, but only golden raisins, not
brown. Now they were going through a lot of peanut butter, which at least
Mandy bought at the health-food store so it wouldn’t be full of sugar. “I don’t
want to give her any present,” he said. “I want to give her a home.”
“Jesus,” Mandy said. She looked searchingly at Dick, but could see only
his back disappearing. What would he have done if she hadn’t moved in?
But he’d been good for her, too. Before he leveled with her about his money
problems, he’d bankrolled the part of the scholarship she had to repay,
up front, so she wouldn’t accrue any interest. Accrue basically meant to build
up debt.
“Mmmmmm,” Dick called from the kitchen. “This macaroni and cheese
with ham smells delicious. I’m going to be eating it all by myself, though.”
Mandy patted Little Edgar’s leg under the sheet. “We’ll talk tomorrow
morning. But Edgar—I mean, Little Edgar—you don’t really have a headache,
do you?”
“If I did, I would get Tylenol.”
“You would. But do you?”
“No,” he said. “I just don’t want to be awake any longer.”
“My God,” she said. “Okay. Well. Sweet dreams.”
“We have to save her,” he said.
The futon was on the floor. There was a futon frame, but Little Edgar
was totally flipped out about falling off at night, even though it was about six
inches off the floor, so his father had taken it away. It was being used to dry
clothes. Both dryers in the laundry room were broken, and had been since
before Thanksgiving.
Dinner was more or less ruined by Giacomo ( Jake) del Tredici, practicing
his clarinet next door. If you didn’t sit down to eat before six, you were
inevitably serenaded until Jake’s mother—a pole dancer at Night Delite—
started screaming. He never got any better. At least he didn’t have a drum
set, though who knew what Santa might bring. If Santa brought Dick and
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