Read The Wonders of the Invisible World for Free Online

“Goodnight and sleep tight.”
    Deke lets his head sink into the pillow and looks up at the ceiling. “Good night and sleep tight. Did you know Mommy has Old Maid in her room?”
    “No kidding. You know, I’d forgotten about Old Maid. We used to play all the time.”
    “Can we play?”
    “Sure. How about tomorrow?”
    “Tomorrow
morning.
”
    “Tomorrow morning. Surest thing you know. That’s what my—what your grandfather used to say. ‘Surest thing y’know.’ He was an epistemologist.”
    Deke looks at him. “Mommy said he was a teacher.”
    “That was his day job, sure.”
    “But what’s a pistemologist?”
    “
You
know.” Billy’s sorry he started this. “Somebody that mows the lawn and stuff. Reads the paper. Shovels snow in the winter.”
    “Like you?” Deke’s frowning. He clearly knows there’s something he’s not getting.
    “
Exactement.
” Billy gives him his best imitation of a guileless smile. “Sweet dreams.” Kisses his fingertips, presses them to Deke’s forehead, then hits PLAY on the boom box.
    He puts away the dishes, then goes down to the basement and sticks a load of clothes in the washer. He pours himself a finger of Macallan—
dernier cru
Scotch, Mark called it—and settles in with the
Times.
Down the hall, Horowitz tinkles away. Deke pipes up for a glass of water; Billy brings him half a glass, holding his breath when he bends close. As if a seven-year-old would detect the smell. Though this one might.
    When he finishes what little he reads of the
Times
anymore, he gets up and vacuums the living room; to keep from feeling like a drudge, he does just one room a day. Then he goes back down and puts the clothes in the dryer, pours another finger of Macallan, brings it into the bedroom and shuts the door. After his father died, his mother had an extension phone put in. Billy’s with his father on this: it’s an indulgence, like a box of bonbons. But he’s gotten to like it, and once in a while, usually after a drink, he’ll lie back on the bed and call somebody he used to know. There’s not much to say abouthis life anymore except for specialized anecdotes of tech support, so he draws out their stories with questions and quasi-alert reactions.
Really. Mm-hm
. A
No kidding
where it seems right.
    He takes off his shoes, stacks the two pillows and stretches out on top of the covers with his chin jammed into his breast-bone. Solid comfort. He looks up Dennis’s office number just to make sure, punches it in and gets the voicemail, then waits for the tone and tells Dennis he’s probably surprised to hear from him but he just has a question. Then, thinking how
that
must sound, says, “Nothing heavy.” If Dennis calls back, he’ll think up a question. Mark’s name for Dennis was “Miss Monica,” because of his dark hair and smooth cheeks and what he pretended to imagine were Dennis’s preferences. Mark’s snottiness about him was part of the attraction. But so was Dennis’s sheer good looks. Mark wasn’t exactly the Adonis of the Western world. Neither is Billy.
    He creeps in, in stocking feet, to check on Deke. Sound asleep. When he hits STOP in the middle of the Waltz in A minor, he can hear the dryer humming in the basement. He hits REWIND, to get set for tomorrow night. Back in his bedroom, he locks the door and pulls out the magazine he keeps under the mattress and resorts to a couple of nights a week. He finishes off, cleans up, knocks back the Macallan, then goes down and gets the clothes out of the dryer. He’s folding Deke’s narrow blue jeans when it strikes him that he’s insane to run such a risk.
If I should die before I wake.
Well, not so much that. But if one of these days Deke, who’s into everything, should be exploring around and find
Fuckbuddies
—or, worse yet, if Deke and his friend should find it on their playdate. No, thank you. He could sneak it out of the house in the morning, folded in the
Times.
But what if he
should
die before he