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Show Woodworth/95 But Michael never wrote back that time, either. "No. No boyfriend." "BejrH you 'have a brother to bring home interesting men?" She looks at him blankly. "I had a brother." "Had one?" "Yeah. He died. Or committed suicide. I don't really know which it was." "Oh." He turns to face her, touches her hair. "I'm sorry." "It's ok." She turns from him, pulling her head away. "It was a long time ago. Over eight years." Gary puts his arm around her. She feels his breath on her cheek, and smells the sun in his clothes. He pulls her towards him, and wraps his other arm around her. She feels the bones in his chest, a thin chest, like a little boy's, and smells the warm, male odors of his body. "Eight years?" he says. Eight years, or no time has passed as she sits by a window with leaded glass, watching the crowds of boys tromp through the aging snow on their way to classes. It got warmer during the day, and the air is heavy with moisture. "Marty," her mother says. "Come figure out which of these records belongs to Jake." She turns. The room where she and Rachael had been less than a month before, sneaking illegally ap^the up the stairs to eat liver pate and roast beef sandwiches and drink cheap champagne. They sat on that bed and Jake told her stories about his professors, the ones that ridiculed him in class, the ones that made him play football even though he was twenty pounds lighter than the other guys on the team. "Moral fiber," he had said, and they had laughed while trying to figure out anatomically where moral fiber might be located. The |