"You're a stupid mother*fucker*!" David said, and squirmed off of Alan's
lap.
The vice principal's lips tightened. "Alan," he said quietly, "take your
brother into the hallway. I am going to write a note that your mother
will have to sign before David comes back to school, after his two-week
suspension."
David glared at them each in turn. "I'm not coming back to this
mother*fucker* place!" he said.
He didn't.
#
The rain let up by afternoon, leaving a crystalline, fresh-mown air
hanging over the Market.
Andrew sat in his office by his laptop and watched the sun come out. He
needed to find Ed, needed to find Frank, needed to find Grant, but he
was out of practice when it came to the ways of the mountain and its
sons. Whenever he tried to imagine a thing to do next, his mind spun and
the worldless howling thing inside him stirred. The more he tried to
remember what it was like to be a son of the mountain, the more he felt
something he'd worked very hard for, his delicate normalcy, slipping
away.
So he put his soaked clothes in the dryer, clamped his laptop under his
arm, and went out. He moped around the park and the fountain, but the
stroller moms whose tots were splashing in the wading pool gave him
sufficient dirty looks that he walked up to the Greek's, took a table on
the patio, and ordered a murderously strong cup of coffee.
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