Gypsy Davey by Chris Lynch Page A

were crusted in a quarter inch of spiny white frost. That wouldn’t matter, though, after the boiling. Lois always boiled sausages before browning them, to reduce the fat.
    Lois had just nodded off at the table when the childrencrept stiffly into the kitchen. They didn’t sit down at first, stood there mesmerized at the mess of cooking stuff all over, and at the actual early-morning presence of their mother. Joanne raised her nose in the air and whiffed the sausages that were warming in the oven. Davey stuck his finger in the dripping bowl that sat on the table, tasted it, then pulled back like he’d seen something wiggling in there.
    Lois’s eyes opened slowly, followed a few seconds later by full awareness. She was embarrassed. “Come on, sit down,” she said, jumping up and making herself busy. She slapped plates and silverware down, dropped one dollop, then four into the sizzling skillet, and in a few minutes served pancakes, sausages, and sectioned fresh oranges to her gape-mouthed baby birds. Joanne and Davey ate quickly, ravenously, not out of a great hunger, exactly, but out of a desire for this food right here. Between bites they would tip glances up at Lois, who was smiling as she watched, smiling satisfied, but smiling tired.
    The meal finished, the kids sat back pregnant with round bellies and with feelings they didn’t know, things they couldn’t get out. Lois disappeared briefly into the bathroom and returned with a comb to attack the mop that was always on Davey’s head. The comb got impossibly stuck an inch above his forehead, and she pulled it out with a laugh. Joanne gave her mother a weak smile and tapped Davey onthe shoulder, and they got up. “Thanks, Mum,” Davey said as Jo led him out to school. “Thanks, Mum.”
    â€œYou want me to take care of that, Davey?” Joanne said hurriedly, pointing at his tattoo. “I’m sure I could take that right out in no time. With cold cream.”
    â€œNo thanks,” he said, walking away with his hands clasped behind his back. He’d already touched up both tattoos to keep them alive a little longer, working with either hand, with a pen.
    When they were gone, Lois looked around at the kind of domestic mess she hadn’t witnessed in years. Dirty dishes, heavy batter solidifying on the table, the floor, the stove. Every container she’d opened sitting open. Eggshells and orange peels sitting in the sink. The entire room seeming to be powdered in flour.
    She stood up to work on it. The smile left her, the flutter of joy in her belly gone with it. The tiredness returned in its place. Lifelessly she picked up the batter bowl and trucked it toward the sink. The bowl slipped out of her buttery hand and exploded like a smashed windshield on the floor. Lois stared down at it, stood on it, and quietly began to cry again. She couldn’t do this. Not really, not for real, not for long, not even for one more meal, she already knew. She couldn’t do this. She couldn’t do this .
    Joanne came back through the kitchen door, makingDavey wait outside for her. She could do it, she thought after she’d left. She could tell her mother thank you. But Joanne was stunned all over again to find the abandoned kitchen, the untouched mess, to crush under her feet the smashed pieces of glass. She walked to her mother’s bedroom and found her lying under the blankets, coiled on her side, staring at her music box, which was open and tinkling “Nadia’s Theme.” As it would play for Lois all day long.
    Joanne crept back out of the room. She cleaned the kitchen so thoroughly it was hard to remember the breakfast scene. Then she went out and collected Davey, who still waited, forty minutes and late for school, on the step.

THEY
    They want to take Jo’s baby away. I don’t know who they are but they are making a mistake because they can’t have him. Because I don’t care I really