Goodlow's Ghosts Read Free Page A

shoulder-length, strawberry blond hair entered the room.
    Sam pulled his head back in and stopped breathing.

RYERSON AT 35
     
    Ryerson Biergarten said to his two-year-old Boston bullterrier, Creosote, sniffing around a pair of Ryerson's argyle socks (its favorite chew toys, especially if Ryerson happened to be wearing them, as he was now), "It's passion you feel for my socks, isn't it?" He knew that this was true because, from time to time, he was able to read Creosote's mind—not in any directly translatable way (he wasn't able to carry on a conversation with the dog), but in a way that let him know the dog's moods and appetites. Ryerson understood that Creosote had a sock fetish. And it was not a fetish for just any kind of sock, only argyles. Dimly, Ryerson knew it was the patterns on argyle socks that got the dog worked up.
    Passion interested Ryerson today because he had just been thrown over by a woman he had fallen in love with—a woman who, he'd felt sure, had fallen in love with him. Her very last words to him were, "Yes, I do love you, Rye. But for reasons I'd rather not share, I am going to call us completed." Ryerson liked the phrase, but not the sentiment, and he certainly didn't like the emotion that had vaulted from her head to his when she'd said it. It had told him very clearly that their six-week love affair was over, and that it was what she wanted ( had wanted for some time).
    He whispered, "Damn, I miss her."
    And so, his thoughts meandered, Creosote had a sock fetish, he—Ryerson—had a broken heart, and the world still turned 'round.
    Creosote got a good hold on Ryerson's left sock, planted his feet firmly in the carpet, and tugged hard, wheezing and growling obscenely at the same time.
    Ryerson admonished him, face to face, finger wagging, "You mustn't do that, Creosote. It's annoying, and it's destructive. I like my socks. I don't want them turned into dog drool." Creosote continued tugging on the sock. Ryerson grinned. He knew that Creosote was having a wonderful time.
    Ryerson forced the dog's jaw open, so Creosote released the sock. The dog looked momentarily put out, then, after another wheeze and gurgle, curled up at Ryerson's feet. Ryerson reached down and scratched the dog's neck. Creosote gurgled, snorted, and sneezed.

TWO
     
    Jenny Goodlow glanced sadly about her brother's empty office and sighed. "Sam," she whispered, "you were a world-class slob."
    Yes , she heard, I'm aware of it! She thought for one chilling moment that Sam had actually said it. But then she realized that it had not been Sam's voice but her memory of his voice, her memory of the thousand times she had told him he was a slob, and the thousand times that he had come back with "Yes, I'm aware of it!"
    She said, "I miss you, Sam."
    I miss you, too .
    "You were so much more than just a brother."
      No, I was just a brother .
    She had come to the office to collect Sam's important papers, his personal items, and to close the office up. His lease was done. He had to clear out, anyway, she told herself.
    She sighed. "Oh, Sam, where did you go?" she whispered.
    She got no answer.
    The task of cleaning the office out had fallen to her because she knew that Sam would want no one else to do it, although he had had plenty of male friends—charming slobs usually did, Jenny thought—a half-dozen girlfriends, and a brother (he lived on the west coast and neither Jenny nor Sam had seen him in years). She and Sam were as close as a brother and sister can be (even though she was only his stepsister), and Jenny knew that he would have wanted no one else to do this.
    Where do I begin? she wondered. "Right where you're standing," she answered herself.
    She bent over to pick up a coffee-stained T-shirt. It had a photograph of one of the Three Stooges on it with the words "Just say" above, and "Moe" beneath. She smiled. She'd gotten Sam the shirt on his forty-first birthday, just a month earlier.
    She stopped smiling abruptly.
    The