Crows by Charles Dickinson

Olive and her father scream. Without a word Robert went to the back door. The rain was falling harder than ever, fresh lakes in the driveway’s low spots, a pounding fabric unrolling through the murky light on the garage.
    â€œStay here tonight,” Ben said to Robert. “You can’t walk home in this.”
    â€œWe could give him a ride,” Ethel offered.
    â€œI don’t want to drive in this.”
    â€œI will. Olive will.”
    â€œYou’ll catch cold running to the car,” Ben said. “We have an extra bed upstairs. He can stay there.”
    â€œI can walk,” Robert said. “It’s not far.”
    â€œNonsense. What were you telling me earlier?”
    â€œAbout what?” Robert asked.
    â€œIf what you say is true,” Ben replied, “you have no home.” Ben faced his wife before Robert could speak, and said, “He came to me after an argument with his own father. It was a fight over career paths. He has nowhere to turn.”
    Ethel blinked; her arms were folded. Robert felt some word was required of him to set himself apart from Ben’s loose charade. First a crow tale, now this fable. But he said nothing. He was amazed to see the woman believed Ben; Robert was certain his own dumbfounded face had given it away.
    â€œIf you want to put him up for the night, so be it,” Ethel said with a reluctance that chilled Robert.
    The room he was taken to by Olive was on the fourth floor. The climb tired him and she said, “You’ll need better wind to stay with the likes of me.”
    â€œWho said I was in a race with you?”
    â€œNobody.” She smiled. “But you want to keep in better shape. It’s just smart.”
    The room was tiny, with a window looking through the rain at a tall birch tree. There was a narrow bed in one corner, covered with a tufted pink spread.
    â€œBen and Ethel are in the room beneath you,” Olive said. “I’m the one below that.” She studied him for a moment, removing her cap and fluffing her packed hair. “Did you really have an argument with your parents?”
    â€œMy father is unhappy I am not more devastated by my lack of work,” Robert said. This was the truth; he was not allying himself with Ben’s fanciful inventions. He said, “I’ll leave in the morning.”
    â€œThe room’s empty,” Olive said, shrugging. “If you’ve been kicked out, Ben’ll let you stay. He doesn’t care, he’s never home.”
    â€œI can’t stay.”
    No one came to wish him good night. Clean sheets were under the pink blanket. He took off his shoes and went to bed in his clothes. For a long time he heard Ben and Ethel talking in the room beneath him, but rain and the thickness of the floor blunted the precision of their speech. He was glad of that; he feared Ben’s spinning even more intricate webs of untruth for his wife. He did not want to know; he would be gone in the morning.
    He slept for an hour, then awakened, feeling unsettled and frightened. He sat on the edge of the bed, put on his damp shoes, then walked back through the narrow halls and down the flights of stairs to the kitchen. He called his parents’ house. Evelyn answered; she might have been up reading, her true purpose being to wait, and he was insensitive enough to sleep until guilt woke him.
    â€œIt’s me, Mom.”
    â€œWhere are you?”
    â€œAt a teacher’s house. I walked over here and then the rain started.”
    â€œI can come and get you,” she said.
    â€œNo. It’s late. They’ve offered me a place to sleep for the night and I’ve accepted. I just wanted you to know, and not worry.”
    â€œIt’s three thirty in the morning, mister. I commenced worrying six hours ago.”
    â€œI’m sorry, Mom. I’m really sorry.”
    His mother was silent for several moments, but he could hear the thoughtful rhythm of