Read The Guy Not Taken for Free Online

fingertip and slipping them into my mouth.
    “Not bad,” Jon acknowledged, leaning his tennis racket against the wall.
    We considered the conehead until it started to melt.
    “We should dump it in the garbage disposal,” I said.
    “Send it to the collection agencies,” said Jon.
    “Or maybe we could feed it to Milo,” I said.
    Nicki smiled as she handed out the spoons. “We can’t let good ice cream go to waste.” She filled her spoon with ice cream and sauce and raised it in a toast. “To us,” she said. Four spoons clinked together over the figure of my father in ice cream. Mom and Nicki and Jon each took a single ceremonial bite before drifting away—my mother back to the pool, Nicki back to the television set, Jon back onto his bike and out into the night. I stayed in the kitchen with my spoon in my hand and the dog hovering hopefully at my feet, and I ate, scooping up ice cream faster and faster as an icepick of pain descended between my eyebrows, spooning through the hair and the eyes and the nose and the mouth, eating until I felt sick, until every bite of it was gone.

 
    I stood in front of gate C-12 in the Newark airport, waiting for Nicki. I had taken the train from Princeton to Newark. My sister was soon to arrive from Boston, and, after an hour layover, which we’d planned to spend in the frequent-flier lounge, we’d be on our way off for a week in Fort Lauderdale with our grandmother and, eventually, our mother and our brother, Jon.
    From my vantage point at the floor-to-ceiling glass windows, I watched my sister’s plane lumber toward the gate. Passengers struggling with luggage or wrangling fussy babies piled out of the walkway. I shifted my backpack from one shoulder to the other and checked my watch. When I looked up, Nicki was stomping into the lounge, dragging her duffel bag, looking mightily displeased.
    At nineteen, Nicki could probably still pass for a twelve-year-old, in her ratty canvas sneakers, white overalls, and faded Run-DMC T-shirt, and with an oversize lime-green wind-breaker tied around her waist. Her purse, a little number in black silk and gold sequins, which I recognized as one of our mother’s ancient cast-offs, was slung across her chest, and dangling from a leather cord around her neck was a tiny plastic vase with fake flowers and blue plastic water. Her dark brown curlswere piled haphazardly on her head, and her little mouth was pursed in its customary frown.
    I bent down to hug her. “Hi, Nicki.”
    She sidestepped my embrace, air-kissed my cheek, and pushed her duffel bag into my arms.
    “I have a kidney infection,” she announced by way of hello. She pulled her backpack off her shoulders and shoved it on top of the duffel bag. “Take this, oaf,” she said, and headed off down the hall.
    The frequent-flier lounge, a study in tasteful beige carpet and gray couches, was filled with businessmen murmuring into the telephones or talking to one another. It had an open bar that I hastily steered my sister away from, and a number of snacks laid out buffet-style on a table in the center of the room. Nicki plopped down on a couch across from two businessmen in blue suits, while I fixed myself a plate.
    Nicki looked at it longingly. “Can I have your plum?” she wheedled.
    “Get your own,” I said, sitting down beside her and pointing to the fruit bowl. “Kidney infection!” Nicki said loudly enough to cause the businessmen to stop their conversation and stare at her. She gave them a cordial wave and stared meaningfully at my food. I handed it over. She accepted it with a brief inclination of her head, devoured the plum with noisy relish, then grabbed my hand and spit the pit into my open palm.
    “Oh, for God’s sake!” I said. The suits grabbed their briefcases and departed for a quieter couch. Nicki gave them another wave as I tossed the pit and scrubbed my hand with paper napkins. “Bring me some salted almonds, Josie,” she instructed. “I’m sick.”
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