Raveling by Peter Moore Smith

you about four in those days. And that would make me about forty-four back then.” He laughed drunkenly. “So
     how about it, Pilot? An ice-cold one?”
    I said I would, but by the time I reached the kitchen, I had experienced so much additional confusion I couldn’t bear the
     idea of making my way back out.
    Plus, I didn’t like the way he kept repeating my name.
    And our father was standing in the kitchen doorway. “How’re ya holdin’ up there, my boy?” he said.
    I nodded, saying, “I’m fine.” He only said
my boy
when he’d been drinking.
    Our father put a hand directly on top of my head. He cupped his ear to someone at the party. “Ice?”
    “Ice!” someone shouted back. “Yes! More ice!”
    He turned to look at me. “Shit,” he said. “I’m not sure if we have any more ice.”
    “There’s ice,” I said. I saw it in the sink behind him. “There’s plenty of ice.”
    He was drunk. And probably for the first time in my life, I understood what that meant. I didn’t know where it would lead.
     I only knew that he wasn’t himself right now, that my real father wouldn’t return until the morning.
    He had placed torches all around the pool, and now, the night having completely taken over the yard, they illuminated the
     faces of our party guests like actors in stage lights. Their smiles lit up strangely, surrealistically, and there was so much
     talking I could no longer distinguish one individual voice from the next, except that every now and then I thought I heard
     my name being mentioned somewhere in the vast conversation. I began to feel they were talking about me secretly, knowing they
     could speak freely about me because I couldn’t hear them above the din. I stood at the kitchen doorway like that for a long
     time, my father looming above me, just listening to the number of times my name was mentioned. Were they pointing, too? Were
     they laughing? People moved in and out of the kitchen door, moving past me like I wasn’t even there. I caught glimpses of
     Fiona every now and then, flirting with the blond man with the mustache. Sometimes he would pick her up, and she would put
     her arms around him, and whisper into his ear. Was it about me? She still wore her red bathing suit and red sneakers. What
     was she saying?

    The view from the woods was of the yellow torches flashing gold light off the surface of the water in the pool. It was of
     the faces of the people at this party rising up in flashes of light, too, frozen as if in a strobe. It was of glittering drinks
     with shining ice cubes rattling inside the shimmering glasses. The view from the woods was of women in stylish, shining dresses,
     men in dark shorts and Hawaiian shirts. It was of blue jeans on the younger people and summer suits on the older ones. It
     was of a crowd of people surrounding a small backyard pool, a party on flagstones, a surfeit of lawn chairs. It was of two
     children, one nine, one seven, squirmingthrough this crowd of adults, the adults leaning toward them from time to time, hands on their knees, pretending, with great
     hilarity and laughter, that these children—this little boy and girl—were the hosts.
    I moved closer, imperceptible to the people in the backyard, creeping fern by fern, millimeter by millimeter, toward the house.
     I was the earth rolling beneath the lawn, unfurling like a blanket.
    The party continued, and I advanced silently, one-billionth of an inch at a time, closer and closer.
    Someone had put “Light My Fire” on the stereo.
    “—so anyway, Hannah,” I heard someone saying to my mother, “I was just coming off Sky Highway, turning my steering wheel when
     I felt this terrible pain, this shooting pain in my hand, and I was wondering, wondering just what—”
    “It could be arthritis.”
    “She certainly isn’t old enough for—”
    “—ain’t seen nothing yet, Dave. Let me tell you—”
    “—been trapping animals out there, and he caught the family cat by