The Gospel According to Larry Read Free Page A

that Todd has to have the basement cleaned by the weekend or he can’t play. I’m trying to have some school spirit for once. Plus, he knows I’m really good at organizing things … .”
    I wanted to tell her those skills might be put to better use than placing football and basketball trophies in chronological order, but I held my tongue. Instead I told her I had lots to do, tons to do, was way too busy to deal with this paltry exchange. I shuffled away as nonchalantly as someone in deep despair could shuffle. My anxiety around Beth could be traced to one thing—I was never included in the endlessly rotating list of guys she had crushes on. Sam, Daniel, Andy, Speedy McDermott, Jack, now Todd. But never, ever me. If the choice were a two-week exciting vacation in Europe with me or helping Todd clean his basement, I knew, sadly, what Beth’s choice would be.
    Next stop in my fun-filled day: guidance with Ms. Phillips. I tried to rally myself for
the occasion by doing some standing push-ups against my locker.
    I hadn’t even sat down when Ms. Phillips got to the point. “Have you thought about your major, Josh?”
    Ms. Phillips had the terrible habit of pushing her glasses up her nose with her middle finger. She did it so often, everyone in school called her Flip-Off Phillips.
    I played with the zipper of my bookbag, then realized I was not giving her my full attention—Larry’s Sermon # 22. I looked her in the eyes. “I was thinking about philosophy. You know, the meaning of life—that sort of thing.”
    â€œFrom the point of view of someone who likes to read, likes to think, like you do, it’s a good choice,” she said. “But you realize the job prospects are pretty slim.”
    â€œI’m thinking after the Depression, after the Apocalypse, there’ll be lots of positions for people with depth and vision.”
    She crinkled up her nose, her glasses fell, and she flipped me the bird again. “Josh, I’m not sure it makes sense to plan a career based on an apocalypse. What if there isn’t one?”
    â€œThen I guess I’m screwed.” I flashed her a big smile so she couldn’t yell at me for the language.

    â€œI suppose I’m being too materialistic,” she said. “Studying philosophy at Princeton is a fine and worthy choice.”
    I wasn’t sure Ms. Phillips’s revelation came less from my sales pitch than it did from the fact that it was ten to eleven and she was dying for a cigarette before her next appointment. I decided to let her off the nicotine hook; I gathered up my things and headed for the door.
    I’ve had a soft spot in my heart for Ms. Phillips since last year, when I spotted her e-mail address in her office and started up a chatty Internet conversation with her as a forty-year-old bachelor from Portland. 8 After months of quiet online flirtation, I invited her to meet me at the Borders coffee shop, only to watch her from the cookbook section. She waited more than two hours and three cappuccinos before she went home. ( That I felt bad about. Ms. Phillips was usually tough as nails; I never thought she’d fall that hard.)
    I decided to skip the rest of the day; the recurring vision of Beth dressed up like Snow
White singing as she swept Todd Terrific’s basement was more than I could endure. I grabbed my camera from my locker and opted to check in with my mother instead.
    When my stepfather visited Mom, he headed for the cemetery. I—who knew her much better than he did—headed for somewhere that captured her spirit more than a pasture full of granite headstones.
    The makeup counter at Bloomingdale’s.
    I slogged through the slush, then grabbed the bus to Chestnut Hill. Ever since we lived in the Boston area, my mother had dragged me here once a month.
    The waft of perfumes hit me like a surge of memories. I plopped down in the tall seat at the Chanel counter. I think