red moon over west virginia - 18. gerald and pixie

by jeremy witherington

part 18 of 36

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when gerald got back to his tiny room on the top floor (a room which had formerly been part of the servants quarters) the first thing he did was call pixie, the little floozie who was leading him inexorably to his doom. she did not pick up, so he just left a message, call me. he lay back on his bed and stared up at the ceiling. the ceiling sloped downward so sharply that it had taken him a long time to master maneuvering around in the little room without constantly banging his head. gerald wondered if he should bother to text pixie. he knew from experience that she almost never read the texts - just noted that he had sent them - so whatever he had written he had to repeat when she called or texted him back. he decided not to text her but to wallow in his misery, and recount to himself, for the thousandth time, the circumstances which had brought him to his present unhappy situation. besides, what could pixie do for him? what would she do for him, if she knew or thought he was broke? so maybe he should not say anything to her about being cut off by aunt agrippina. maybe it was best if she did not know or suspect anything. on the other hand…. pixie was the only “streetwise” person he knew, the only one who might help him navigate his way at all, if he really did find himself “out on the street”… it was a conundrum. and it was something he had to think about too, and gerald did not like to have to think. how unfair it was all was! and it was all terence’s fault ! it was terence, his miserable older brother, and not himself, gerald, or any of the other harcourt siblings or cousins, who had brought the estate so low that aunt agrippina would even think of throwing any of them out in the street. but what did terence care? the “golden boy”, the “twinkly-eyed rascal” that everybody “loved”, was safe and warm in the harcourt family mausoleum, without a care in the world. gerald’s phone vibrated. it was pixie. you called me? yes. about what? um - i was just lonely. lonely? you called me because you were bleeping lonely? i’m sorry. sorry? i will tell you what you can do with your sorry. pixie launched into a stream of vicious vituperative abuse, of the kind that was expected of her, and that gerald loved so much. next