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Show 70 "She is not, and anyway we don't need to go through all this." "Debra," she said. "A perfect choice. You have excellent taste, Lorin." Debra was a short girl with a bouncy ponytail, who thought everything was neat. When she wore her boyfriend's letterman sweater it hung to her knees and made her look as if she were standing in a hole. "I wish you'd quit being facetious," he said. "You just won't let me do anything, will you?" she said. "You really wouldn't mind if he knew it was you?" Lorin asked. "I think it should be Debra." He lay back in the grass and closed his eyes. There was no talking to her when she was like this. Besides, his stomach was starting to turn from the mucus that had drained into the back of his throat and had been swallowed. Until he felt better he would just lie there with his eyes closed, and see dark green leaves floating in a bath of hot milk. She could finish the conversation by herself. * * * They used the downstairs living room of a friend's farmhouse. The heavy furniture, including the piano, had been pushed against a wall where it was out of the way, the curtains had been drawn over the windows, the door from the hallway had been closed to keep foot traffic away. David had permitted them to drive a nail into the doorpost and another into the wall across the room, though he did not think his parents were going to like it. They had tied a rope to each of the two nails, and draped a blanket across it, cutting the room in half at eye level except where the rope sagged in the middle. Lorin sat in a kitchen chair beside the blanket |