Bark: Stories by Lorrie Moore Page A

directed at me. “I missed you a little at the hospital.” Her smile had become clearly tight and judging.
    “I am so sorry,” I said.
    “That’s OK, they’ll tell you,” she said, indicating Is and Pat. “It was a little nuts.”
    “It was totally nuts,” said Pat.
    “As a result?” whispered Robin. “No hugs. Everything’s a little precarious, between the postmortem and the tubes in and out all week. This scarf’s the only thing holding my head on.” Though she was pale, her posture was perfect, her dark red hair restored, her long thin arms folded across her chest. She was dressed as she always dressed: in black jeans and a blue sweater. She simply, newly, had the imperial standoffishness I realized only then that I had always associated with the dead. We pulled up chairs and then each of us sat.
    “Should we make some gin rickeys?” Isabel asked, motioning toward the bags of booze and lime juice blend.
    “We wanted to come here and each present you with something,” said Pat.
    “We did?” I said. I’d brought nothing. I had asked them what to bring and they had laughed it off.
    Robin looked at me. “Always a little out of the loop, eh?” She smiled stiffly.
    Pat was digging around in a hemp tote bag I hadn’t noticed before. “Here’s a little painting I made for you,” she said, handing a small unframed canvas gingerly to Robin. I couldn’t see what the painting was of. Robin stared at it for a very long time and then looked back up at Pat and said, “Thank you so much.” She momentarily laid the painting in her lap and I could see it was nothing but a plain white blank.
    I looked longingly at the paper sack of gin.
    “And I have a new dance for you!” whispered Isabel excitedly at Robin.
    “You do?” I said.
    Robin turned to me again. “Always the last to know, huh,” she said and then winced, as if speaking hurt. She clutched Pat’s painting to her stomach.
    Isabel stood and moved her chair out of the way. “This piece is dedicated to Robin Ross,” she announced. And then, after a moment’s stillness, she began to move, saying lines of poetry as she did. “ ‘Heap not on this mound / Roses that she loved so well; / Why bewilder her with roses / That she cannot see or smell?’ ” There was more, and as, reciting, she flew and turned and balanced on one leg, her single arm aloft, I thought,
What the hell kind of poem is this?
It seemed rude to speak of death to the dead, and I kept checking in with Robin’s face, to see how she was taking it, but Robin remained impassive. At the end, she placed the painting back in her lap and clapped. I was about to clap as well, when car headlights from the driveway suddenly arced across the room.
    “It’s the cops! Get down!” said Isabel, and we all hit the floor.
    “They’re patrolling the house,” whispered Robin, lying on her back on the rug. She was hugging Pat’s painting to her chest. “I guess there have been calls from a neighbor or something. Just lie here for a minute and they’ll leave.” The police car idled in the driveway for a minute, perhaps taking down the license number of Isabel’s car, and then pulled away.
    “It’s OK. We can get up now,” said Robin.
    “Whew. That was close,” said Pat.
    We all got back into our chairs and there was then a long silence, like a Quaker wedding, which I came to understand was being directed at me.
    “Well, I guess it’s my turn,” I said. “It’s been a terrible month. First the election, and now this. You.” I indicated Robin, and she nodded just slightly, then grabbed at her scarf and retied the knot. “And I don’t have my violin or my piano here,” I said. Isabel and Pat were staring at me hopelessly. “So—I guess I’ll just sing.” I stood up and cleared my throat. I knew that if you took “The Star-Spangled Banner” very slowly and mournfully, it altered not just the attitude of the song but the actual punctuation, turning it into a protest and a