In the Skin

Начало книги

The timing is unfortunate.

Just two weeks after we move into the new house I am called away on business. New York. The Big Apple. Across The Pond. Adi is aghast when I agree to go; she fails to see why a succession of dull business meetings is more urgent than helping to settle my family into the new place. I appreciate her opinion, but the way she goes about communicating it seems pointlessly selfish.

Adi fails to see a lot of things, and can never quite grasp the importance of my job in the grand scheme of life. Sometimes I’m sure she believes I pull money out of the air, like dead leaves falling from an autumn tree.

I watch her as she crosses the small living room and stands by the open window. Pale light scars her face with dull yellow abrasions, making her features look sharper than they actually are. She winces as the sunlight catches her in the eyes, screwing up her face like a child demonstrating distaste. I swallow hard, counting to ten. Adi is… fragile. The pills she’s been prescribed are messing with her head, making her seem vague and disconnected and slightly less than real. I don’t think she has been real for a long time, and my own reality shifts constantly, like a series of slides overlaid on a picture board, each one depicting a slightly different version of the same scene.

Читать дальше →