PI On A Hot Tin Roof

sorry.”
    “I’m okay. What’s that you hit me with?”
    The girl held up the object proudly. “Camcorder. I got it for my birthday.”
    Actually, Talba already knew that—it was in the blog. She also knew it was Lucy’s most prized possession.
    Lucy looked sheepish. “Listen, I’m sorry you had to hear that.”
    “What? I didn’t hear anything.” Talba winked and continued down the stairs.
    “Turn around,” Lucy said, and when Talba did, she saw that she was being taped. “Say something brilliant.”
    Here goes nothing , Talba thought, and declaimed, “‘Call the roller of big cigars, the muscular one, and bid him whip in kitchen cups concupiscent curds.’”
    The budding filmmaker stared admiringly. “Awesome.”
    “Translation: Want some ice cream?”
    “That was Wallace Stevens.”
    “Never heard of him,” Talba deadpanned.
    “Give me a break. How
do you
know Wallace Stevens?”
    “They let black girls go to school. Last I heard, anyhow.”
    Lucy turned off the camera and followed her downstairs. “Nobody else in the asylum knows any poetry.”
    Talba was drunk with power. Enough time invading people’s privacy, and you could conquer the world. “Asylum?” she asked.
    “You mean you haven’t noticed? Even Daddy calls it that. You don’t think it’s weird that we all have to live together like this?”
    “I thought maybe you liked it that way.”
    “Mommo does, I think—so she can keep an eye on me. But Daddy says he’s looking after my interests. ’Cause I’m a minor.”
    “Too deep for me, kid.”
    “Well, my grandfather died when I was little, but he wanted Mama to inherit the house—see, it was always in his family, and he and Mommo didn’t really own it together. So his will said she could live in it till Mama got it—‘right of habitation,’ it’s called. But then Mama got killed.” Talba searched the girl’s face for sadness, and saw it settle there. “And her will left it to Daddy, and we moved in so he could ‘look after my interests.’ ’Cause Royce and I are supposed to get it eventually, and I’m a minor. I think there’s some kind of fight about it, though—or would be, except that everybody wants Mommo to take care of me. Except maybe me.”
    “Lucy, you know your grandmother loves you.”
    The girl sighed. “She’s old-fashioned, that’s all.”
    Not liking the shadow of sadness that still sat on Lucy’s face, Talba said, “Come on—there really is ice cream.”
    “Maybe a Coke float. With Diet Coke, of course.” The kid giggled.
    Talba led her into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator, but Lucy pushed her aside. “You don’t have to make it. My best friend’s African-American. I hate it when, uh…”
    “Uh-huh, I get it. That would be Danielle, I presume?”
    “Yeah, these assholes won’t even let her come to the Bacchus party.”
    “Language, young lady.”
    “You too, Brutus?” the girl said.
    “Oh, boy, a closet intellectual. You hide it pretty well, baby.”
    “It’s a lonely job,” Lucy said, taking a bite of vanilla ice cream.
    Talba finished the sentence. “Yeah, yeah. But somebody’s gotta do it.” An ancient line to her, but Lucy seemed to want to hear it, and Talba figured it wouldn’t hurt her to oblige. She was right—evidently the kid hadn’t yet heard it enough to make her wince. Instead she smiled, clearly delighted to find an adult who’d kid around with her. But then her eyes filled up and she turned back to her food preparation.
    “What?” Talba asked. “What is it?”
    “Oh, nothing. I just wish…”
    “What?”
    “I wish they’d let me have a pet or something.”
    “Hmmm.” Talba’s mind raced to figure out what she was getting at, and failed. “I give up. Can you spell ‘non sequitur’?”
    “Awesome,” the kid said again. “You are way smart.”
    “Not smart enough to get that pet thing.”
    “Oh.” Lucy looked forlorn. “I thought of it because I said lonely, I guess. I don’t have a boyfriend—I mean, look at me—I’m not the boyfriend type. And my best friend’s black and half the time that gets weird. And, like, I live in an asylum. I need, like…”
    “Something to love?”
    Lucy looked embarrassed.
    “Well, why can’t you have a pet?”
    “Suzanne’s allergic. Or says she is. She’s a bitch.” She put a hand to her forehead. “Ooh. I ate that too fast.”
    “I heard that, young lady,” Adele said, stepping into the room.
    “What? That I ate my