Read Circuit Of Heaven for Free Online Page B

STANDING AT the end of his parents’ front walk—a winding stone pathway through lush vegetation that might’ve been the yellow brick road, only it was slate. The house, set off by weeping willows and wisteria, was a Tudorbethan monstrosity, complete with window boxes and a thatch roof. His parents had ordered it out of a catalogue. It was called “The Shakespeare.” It had edged out “The Cleopatra” and, Dad’s favorite, “The Donna Reed.”
    “What, precisely, is ‘this’?” Lawrence asked, his hands on his hips.
    Nemo winced. He was up against the nanny.
    “You know damn well what I mean—‘precisely.’ I know what they’re going to say before they do.”
    “That’s what families are for, Nemo. Now, come along. Let’s not keep them waiting, shall we? If you don’t see them, they’ll only beseech us to persuade you to come at some future date, and frankly, we’re weary of being beseeched.” Lawrence and his parents still maintained the fiction that Lawrence was their employee, and Lawrence reported to them on their son’s progress from time to time.
    “Tell them to bugger off.”
    “A spirited suggestion, but rather your responsibility, don’t you think? Perhaps you can offer it to them over dinner.” He made a sweeping gesture like a maître d‘.
    “If they start nagging me to come into the Bin, I’ll walk.”
    “They have promised not to breathe a word on the subject.”
    THE DOOR WAS A MASSIVE , DEEPLY SCARRED AFFAIR , AS IF a batallion of crazed soldiers had flung themselves against it in full armor to lend an appropriately ancient ambiance. The doorway was wreathed with English ivy that never changed. The line Nemo had traced with a black marker seven years before around one of the tendrils was still visible as if he’d only just done it. His mom had explained that they could’ve ordered growing ivy, but that struck her as an unnecessary bother. She had her hands full, she said, with the yard and the garden. The door knocker was a roaring lion’s head, the tarnish worn away where countless visitors would grasp it to a shine—on the snout, the fangs, and the fringes of the mane—but dark everywhere else. Its eyes and mouth and ears were dull black pits. Nemo stuck his forefinger down the thing’s throat, lifted, and let it fall with an impressive clunk.
    Uncle Winston answered the door, drink in hand. He was tall, but not too tall, and good-looking in a statesmanlike way, with silver hair and broad shoulders and a posture like a pine tree. He smiled as if for a camera, holding it even as he spoke. “Newman!” he exclaimed, clapping his hand on Nemo’s shoulder. “Happy Birthday!”
    “Nemo,” Nemo said, shrugging off Winston’s hand. “Don’t call me Newman.”
    Uncle Winston looked vaguely hurt for a moment, but recovered himself after two beats, wagging his head with the exaggerated tolerance of a politician. “You young people have such notions. You should be proud of your name. You are named after a Great Man.”
    Nemo loathed it. Millions of boys were named after Newman Rogers, Inventor of the Bin. His picture was everywhere—a short dweeby guy with owllike eyes and ears that stuck out like stubby wings. “I’m proud of Nemo,” he said.
    “A crazed character in some old science fiction movie, your mother tells me. What sort of model is that for a young man?” He sighed, setting aside his superior wisdom. “But this is your party. I’ll call you whatever you wish.” He held up his glass. “Have a drink? Everyone’s out in the garden.” He gave his regular-guy, good-natured chuckle. “I’m afraid we’re a couple ahead of you.”
    “I’ll have scotch, and since you asked, Lawrence will have bourbon.”
    Winston gave Lawrence a thin smile. “Certainly. And how are you this evening, Lawrence?”
    “Very well, Senator, thank you. Nemo, by the way, was originally a character in a Jules Verne novel of the late nineteenth century. The film adaptation came