Redhead by the Side of the Road - Anne Tyler Page 0,8

Micah headed west on Northern Parkway. He turned left on York—signaling first, of course, even though he was in the left-turn-only lane. At the back of his mind, he felt a prickly little burr of unease. It seemed to him that Cass had acted less affectionate than usual. Since when had she cared if it was his night to set the garbage bins out? But she wasn’t the type to go into those mysterious sulks the way some women did, so he shook the feeling off. He started whistling “Moonlight in Vermont,” which was the last tune her kitchen radio had been playing.

Farther down York Road the little stores and cafés grew more familiar. Most of the stores were closed by now, their neon signs unlighted and barely visible in the dusk. He took a left onto Roscoe Street and then a right just before the used-clothing store, heading toward the parking lot.

When he got out of the car he retrieved his carryall from the passenger seat and plucked his TECH HERMIT sign off the roof and set them both at the top of his steps. Then he started wheeling the garbage bins to the alley. 2B’s bin—Mr. Lane’s—had a long cardboard mailing tube slanting out from under the lid. Recycling, on a garbage day! “Ooh-la-la, monsieur,” he said reproachfully. “You are un pee-saw,” which was how he thought the French might pronounce “pissant.” And he shook his head as he parked the bin next to 2A’s.

Some people; they just didn’t have a clue.

2

EARLY THE FOLLOWING MORNING, when he was just approaching the edge of waking up, Micah dreamed he found a baby in a supermarket aisle. He rounded a corner and there it was, sitting erect on the floor in front of the breakfast cereals and wearing nothing but a diaper.

He stopped short and stared at it. The baby stared back, cheerfully—a round-faced, pink-cheeked, generic sort of baby with a skimming of short blond hair. There wasn’t a sign of another grown-up around.

Micah rose to consciousness slowly, as if his sleep had layers to it. He opened his eyes and blinked at the ceiling. He was still trying to figure out what to do about the baby. Take it to Lost and Found, he supposed, but this meant picking it up, and he worried it would start crying. Then its parents would rush to the rescue, and they might very possibly leap to the wrong conclusion—accuse him of kidnapping, even. How to convince them he’d meant no harm? He knew it didn’t look good.

He turned off his alarm before the radio could click on and he struggled out of bed, but the baby stayed in his mind. He couldn’t understand why it had seemed so unperturbed. So expectant, even, as if it had been certain that Micah would show up. And once he was out on his run, taking gulps of the nippy air, he had the incongruous thought that he would startle the baby to bits right now if he were to wrap his cold hands around its naked torso.

He grimaced and picked up speed, shaking off the dream’s last traces.

At this hour, he pretty much had the sidewalks to himself. Later the dog owners would be out in full force, and the mothers taking their children to school. His route was a long oval leading first north and then west, and there were schools galore to the west.

When Micah went on his runs he never wore his glasses. He hated to feel them bobbing up and down on his nose, was why. He hated how they grew steamy when he sweated. This was unfortunate, because in the past few years his distance vision had noticeably worsened. Not that he was going blind or anything; it was just that he was getting old, as his optometrist so tactlessly put it. At night the lane markings on the streets were all but invisible, and just last week he had whacked a black spider that turned out to be a tangle of sewing thread. On the homeward stretch this morning, he made his usual mistake of imagining for a second that a certain fire hydrant, faded to the pinkish color of an aged clay flowerpot, was a child or a very short