82 Desire

golf.”
    “Yes. Or the four of us do—Russell and I go with Douglas and Beau. Maybe we’ve known each other so long we just don’t have much to say anymore.”
    She sensed something that might be hostility, or might be hurt feelings. She said, “There’s been a change in your relationship.”
    “We used to be…pals.” He spoke the last word contemptuously. “Still own a boat together, matter of fact.” He paused, bringing himself back to the present. “There’s been a change in Russell. Ever since that sailing accident.”
    “I think Bebe mentioned it. As I recall, it was a few days before he was rescued.”
    “He spent five days alone in a capsized boat. The guy’s a hero.”
    “How did it change him?”
    He opened his hands in the wit’s-end gesture. “I don’t know; it just did.”
    She was silent, hoping he’d blather on to fill the void.
    “He just got kind of … serious.”
    “Withdrawn?” Skip asked, and was instantly sorry—she was probably feeding him false information.
    “I guess so. I don’t know, maybe it broke his spirit. He just hasn’t been the old Russell lately.”
    “What do you think has happened to him?”
    “How would I know?” He sounded openly hostile.
    “He must leave a big hole in the company.”
    Favret nodded, evidently trying to close the subject.
    “You know, you just don’t seem worried about him.”
    What had been smoldering hostility flashed into anger. “What do you know about whether I’m worried about him? You don’t see me pacing at night, grabbing Tylenol PMs with one hand and Rolaids with the other—nobody sees that but my wife. You want to talk to her? Sure, I’m worried about him. We’re all worried about him.”
    Skip smiled. “Tell me something—that boat in its slip?”
    “Is that a serious question?”
    “You bet it is.”
    “Of course it’s there—my wife and I went sailing over the weekend.”
    “You made Russell sound kind of depressed. I wonder if he might have committed suicide.”
    “Suicide?” His eyebrows went up. He repeated the question. “Suicide?” He shook his head. “I kind of don’t think so.”
    “But you did consider it. Do you know of anything that’s been bothering him?”
    “No. Nothing.” His chin jerked slightly, and Skip wondered if this was a nervous tic, something he did when he lied.

Eleven
    TALBA THOUGHT, I need to write a poem about this . Whole books have been written about being Jewish and getting a doctor in the family. People like us work for people like them. Does anybody realize exactly how large a pain in the ass it is for one sibling in an African-American family if another goes to medical school?
    She was setting the table with a white tablecloth and her mother’s Chantilly pattern silver that someone she worked for had been about to discard and had given to her instead—a woman from Texas, who had also given Miz Clara a worn-out fur coat.
    Special ceremony and ritual were required because Talba’s brother and his wife were coming to dinner. Never mind that the wife, Michelle, was like one of those Uptown parakeets—such a pretty little tiny thing no one would dream of asking her to work for a living. A kind of woman Miz Clara had absolutely zip use for in either its white or its black form, though, truth to tell, you didn’t see it in black form that much, which should have made Miz Clara just that much more contemptuous of her.
    But Dr. Corey Wallis, Talba’s big brother, could commit infanticide in front of City Hall and his mama wouldn’t notice he’d fucked up. Because Corey could not do a damn thing wrong in Miz Clara’s eyes, no matter how hard he tried.
    Becoming a doctor was what Miz Clara did send her children to college for, or at least that was one of the top three options. The others were becoming president or Speaker of the House.
    Talba could have killed him for doing it, but she was so damn proud of Corey she couldn’t really hold it against him. On the other hand, he did have an attitude, for which his butt needed beating, but Talba satisfied that urge by mouthing off at him.
    Lamar had said Noooo-thank-you to this little family party, so it was just going to be the four of them eating Miz Clara’s fried chicken, which she insisted on making despite the fact that she now had a doctor in the family and knew better.
    Michelle came in, smelling entirely too much like slightly crushed petals—probably some hip new perfume. If you shopped a lot, you were