Apple Brown Betty by Phillip Thomas Duck

told her as she ran her fingers over the soft upholstery of his sofa. “Ultrasuede…has the look and feel of suede.”
    â€œAll that,” Nora said, repeating the phrase over and over as he showed her through the rest of the house.
    â€œAnd you did this all by yourself?” she asked.
    â€œYes.”
    â€œYou should have insisted your parents see this, Desmond. They’d be so impressed. Why have you shut yourself off, become so withdrawn and secretive?”
    He didn’t answer. She didn’t press.
    Somehow they ended up in the bedroom last. Somehow clothes were shed. Somehow their warm tongues were shared. Desmond wanted Nora up until the moment he climaxed; then, like men often do, he didn’t want her anymore. She was expendable. A short-term fix. He needed a long-term answer that could outlast the longevity of even his parents’ union. The dim prospect of finding such an answer left him gun-shy in the commitment department.
    He moved to Nora now, sleeping so peacefully, and shook her shoulder. “Nora…Nora.”
    She opened her eyes, momentarily thrown by the strange surroundings. She yawned, stretched. “What?”
    â€œYou know what we agreed to. You have to go. I want you to call your friend to pick you up.”
    She blinked her eyes; the reality that her plan didn’t work hit her like a ton of bricks. She started to whimper. She reached out for him but he turned to retrieve her neatly folded clothes from the chair behind him. He brought them to her and placed them on her lap.
    â€œGo ahead and take your time,” he offered.
    She looked at him, her eyes moist.
    â€œIt’s me, Nora,” he said, shaking his head. “It’s me. I’m sorry. I couldn’t and can’t chance failing at another relationship. I’d rather not even try.” He thought about his mother, his father. Thirty years, after all, was a long and elusive ghost to chase.
    He turned and left the room.
    Â 
    â€œCydney, I been trying to reach you all day.”
    â€œI was at the library doing some research for a paper.” She could hear something in her brother’s voice. “Why? Something happen, Shammond?”
    â€œYou spoke with anyone from the county prosecutor’s office or Asbury Police Department yet?”
    She’d just walked in the door, had her heels in her hands. She dropped them to the floor, bypassing the stand in her living-room closet where she neatly kept her shoes. County prosecutor’s office? Asbury Park police? “Shammond, tell me what’s going on. Are you in trouble?” She could hear a tear in her brother’s voice, though she was oddly sure it was manufactured.
    â€œGeorge.”
    â€œPop G, what about him?” Her heart started to race. He was the one member of the family who actually accounted for something, worked hard, worked within the parameters of the law and didn’t have any damning vices.
    â€œYou sitting down?” Slay asked. “I know how you feel about George.”
    â€œOh, my God!”
    â€œThey found him down by the boardwalk. Shot dead.”
    â€œPop G?” The words hurt as they left her mouth.
    â€œYeah, couple gunshots.”
    â€œHow could something like this happen? When?”
    â€œThey found him the other night. A drug deal gone bad, they’re guessing.”
    â€œPop G wouldn’t…” She couldn’t continue, felt her head spinning, the ground leaving her. She dropped to the spot where she stood, leaned her back against the island separating her kitchen and living room.
    â€œWouldn’t what?” Slay asked.
    â€œDrugs,” she whispered.
    â€œYou don’t know?”
    â€œDon’t try and tell me—”
    â€œNot for himself…for Mama. Been copping her shit for a while now, since she got beat up that time.”
    â€œNo!”
    â€œYou sit up in your little pretend palace acting like the earth