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Show Motherlunge a novel 135 which her large breasts joggled, suggesting colonial unrest-then and only then Would He Be Permitted To Return. I was outside with Walter that day, and I had begun to grab up his underwear and socks with a vermin-like intensity, stuffing them as fast as I could into a black plastic garbage bag. I couldn't look up-it was 5:30 at night and neighbors were coming home from work, tapping their brakes as they drove past our house and peering at us indiscreetly, no doubt, as I would have done. So I didn't see Walter's face when Dorothy gave him her ultimatum. But I heard his reply. "Fine," he'd said, and the syllable was deep with fury and ringing with unalloyed joy. He had it at last, permission to leave. He turned to me then and held out his hand for the garbage bag. I'd tied a knot at the top of it and handed it over. He'd walked to the Jeep Eagle-our family had just bought it from Walter's boss Judith-and thrown the bag in the passenger's seat. "Thea. Call and tell your sister what's going on." Pavia was a sophomore at the university then, and lived in a sorority house downtown. "I'll meet you at her place in a couple of hours, and we'll figure out the car." He'd dug in his coat pocket for the car keys, then !given me a look of understanding, which was the worst part. What was he understanding? I turned back to look at Dorothy. She didn't understand either. She was haughty as a goddess, fashioning a smile on her mouth, and when I met her eyes I began to turn to stone. "Later, Thea," Walter said, and he got in the car and drove away. ^ |