Robbie Forester and the Outlaws of Sherwood Street Read Free Page B

the middle of having all those tattoos removed, called over, “Hi, Robbie. Hot chocolate?”
    I glanced over at my dad; he nodded.
    “Yeah, thanks,” I said.
    “And an espresso for me,” Dad said.
    Hugh brought over the espresso and a mug of hot chocolate, much darker than the hot chocolate you usually see and without the whipped cream swirl on top; whipped cream swirls weren’t the style at Monsieur Señor’s. I took a sip—steaming, not too sweet, delicious. I didn’t have a sweet tooth, took after my mom that way. Over the rim of my mug I watched Dad stirring sugar into his cup. I had a very young-looking dad; his face pretty much unlined, his hair without a touch of gray, always sort of scruffy, like a college kid who’d just gotten out of bed. He was turning forty next fall.
    “He’s not such a bad guy,” Dad said.
    “Who?”
    “Van Slyke. Disney’s looking to turn one of his books into a movie.”
    “
Too Many Pies
?” I couldn’t see how you’d make a movie out of that.
    Dad shook his head. “A new one—it’s not out yet.” He sipped his espresso. “His agent’s one of the best.”
    “Oh,” I said. My dad was between agents right now, exactly how and why not too clear in my head. But I knew agents were important from conversations I’d overheard my dad having with other writers. They talked about agents a lot, way more than the stories they were dreaming up. “How’s the novella going?” I said.
    “It’s actually more of a memoir, but with a fictional interface, clearly distinguishable, of course.”
    I failed, one hundred percent, to understand. My dad was a brilliant writer, had already published two books. The first one,
All But the Shouting,
had come out the year I was in kindergarten, and… what was the expression? Made a splash? So books that failed made no splash, just sank to the bottom? And books that succeeded made a splash and then sank to the bottom? My dad’s second book, published last year, was
On/Off,
a huge novel, over a thousand pages, that I’d heard him calling “kind of an experiment, in retrospect” on the phone not too long ago.
    Memoir was about memories, right? “Memories of what, Dad?” I said.
    He smiled. My dad had a very nice smile, except lately there’d been some question about tooth grinding in his sleep, and now he needed some implants. And wasn’t he supposed to go easy on those late-afternoon espressos?
    “That’s what I’m working on now,” he said.
    I was confused. “You’re working on the plot, Dad?”
    “
Plot,
” said Dad, making air quotes around the word, “is problematic. I’m talking about what and who the memories will be attached to. In other words, I’m starting with pure memory and working back.”
    I had trouble following that, but at the same time, it reminded me of scenes in
Alice in Wonderland
and
Through the Looking-Glass,
so it couldn’t be all bad: those books had sold in the billions! At that moment, Dad’s eyes shifted, a look I was long familiar with; it meant he was getting an idea. He turned to the laptop.
    “Finished your hot chocolate?” he said, fingers gliding toward the keyboard.
    “Just about. I saw this homeless woman lying on the sidewalk today.”
    “Oh?”
    “They took her away in an ambulance.”
    “Probably just dehydration,” Dad said, his fingers now on the keys. “Pendleton could use a walk.”
    I drank up, rose. “Are you coming?”
    “After I make a note or two.”
    I knew that those notes, even one or two, could take time. “See you.”
    Dad nodded.
    I walked home. Home was only a block and a half farther down the hill, an apartment that took up the toptwo floors of an old brownstone. There were two heavy wooden doors at ground level. The one on the left led to Mitch’s apartment; he was the landlord, worked on Wall Street. The door on the right was ours. I unlocked it, climbed the steep staircase to the inner door, unlocked that, too. I could hear Pendleton whining—or