Bud
Copyright© 2015 by Bill Offutt
Chapter 29
Bud's earliest memory, and he was not sure whether it was a real recollection or just one that had been implanted by numerous tellings, was of his behavior when he was still a toddler and liked to crawl rather than walk on the soft living room rug. He thought he recalled looking up at the fringed lampshade under which his father habitually read the newspaper.
He could still see it in his mind with its three glowing light bulbs and dangling brass chains. The shade was a dark orange and the fringe was sort of gold, a greenish gold. He sat up with his back to his father's shinbone, his hand on his slippered foot and looked around the living room.
Opposite his father, who was smoking a pipe, sat his mother, still wearing her flowered apron, and she was reading a magazine with a picture of a skater in front of a large red ball on the cover, which he guessed, was supposed to be the sun but did not really look like it. He liked the way his mother flicked through the pages with her thumbs.
Philip, who was sharing the light of his father's lamp, had his nose buried in a schoolbook of some sort, a thick one with a light blue cover, and Janie was looking at a movie magazine with a pretty woman with very red lips on the cover. Her foot was rocking to and fro in front of her crossed legs. Dinner had been over for a half hour and that evening's favorite radio shows were yet to begin. The house was very quiet.
"Read," Bud said. And when no one looked up, he again said, "Read," just a bit louder and looked from person to person. His mother smiled at him and flicked another page.
"Eh?" said his father, setting aside his pipe and moving his feet.
"Read, Dada," Bud said, or at least he had been told he said that and it sure sounded right when he thought about it.
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