Complication Read Free Page A

I’d received the letter, I wondered if Paul and this Vera person had been romantically involved, but seeing her now, there was no question. She was exactly his type, only more so. Thinner, darker. From the looks of it, more troubled.
I’d bet anything she had some weird tattoo hidden somewhere, some Goth leftover from a youth that was further away than she maybe wanted to admit.
    â€œPaul was my brother,” I prompted.
    She blinked. “He never mentioned he had a brother.”
    This didn’t surprise me. Paul liked to act like he had no family at all. A lone wolf.
    â€œI’m sorry,” Vera said. “This is strange for me. You look just like him.”
    People said this often enough that I’d stopped pointing out that my brother was at least three inches taller and forty pounds heavier. When last I’d seen him, he’d sported a bald head and a goatee. His nose bent to the left where it had been broken by a girl in a punk rock bar on North Avenue when he was twenty-four. He had a tattoo on his left forearm of Elmer Fudd, which he didn’t like to explain but had to do with the way he laughed—a stuttering, gravelly monotone that surfaced and disappeared often for no apparent reason.
    She motioned me to sit. A thin silver bracelet orbited her wrist, and a bottle of Matoni sparkling water sat half empty next to a glass on the table. She extended her hand and I moved to take it before realizing she wasn’t offering a handshake but had merely paused in an upsweeping motion aimed at getting the waiter’s attention.
    â€œYour father sent you?” she asked.
    â€œNot exactly. My father is, well, he’s dead.”
    She placed a hand over her mouth.
    â€œHeart attack,” I said. “Mowing the lawn.”
    â€œ Ježíš Maria . That’s terrible.”
    â€œA lot of people die mowing the lawn. More than you might think. Not that you probably have any thoughts about lawn mower fatalities. Happened just Saturday.”

    Some part of me wondered why the other was talking about lawnmowers.
    â€œThat’s awful. I’m so sorry.”
    My throat suddenly felt constricted, my face hot. Bad time to get choked up, but when is a good time? “Thanks,” I managed. “He was a good guy. A people person.”
    Christ, I thought, next I’d be telling her he’d died with his boots on. I wondered whether my dad might have met Vera when he had flown out when Paul’s personal effects were recovered. He’d returned without saying a word about his trip. Nothing about what he’d eaten, where he’d stayed, how much paperwork he had to fill out, whether he’d been treated with kindness or indifference. He came back carrying only the same suitcase he’d left with, and if he’d had Paul’s possessions shipped back, I never saw them. Are you going to be okay? That was all he’d said in the car as we rode back from O’Hare. Worrying about how I was taking the news was I guess his way of trying to keep his own emotions at bay, to hold himself together. Not knowing what else to do, I’d reached out to squeeze his shoulder. He started crying and stopped in the same breath, like the sound a dog makes when you step on its tail. But thinking back to Vera’s letter, I knew they hadn’t met before. It was clearly a letter written to a stranger.
    We sat in silence while she rummaged through a handbag and produced an unopened pack of cigarettes. “Do you smoke?” she asked. I’d hardly noticed up to now that she had an accent, slight though it was.
    I shook my head.
    â€œI also don’t smoke.” She tore the cellophane wrapper and tapped the pack against the inside of her wrist. “I stopped long ago. But I told myself if your father came, I would make an exception. For you, I will also make an exception. Finally a waiter. Do
you like beer? Czech beer is very good. Your brother, he very