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whether Matty's violent resistance to a medical checkup stemmed from his fear of detection. |
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"The water's pretty bad still," he said. |
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"I know. It's probably all the rain." For some reason, every time they got heavy rains, the water turned color. It had been doing that ever since they had moved in ten years ago. Town officials said it had something to do with the water tables not being able to absorb excessive downpours. She wished she had asked the DPW guys about it when they were around. It seemed to be getting worse. This morning it looked like tea. |
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"Kind of smells funny, too." |
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She hadn't noticed. But, then, Matty had an acute sense of smell. In fact, he was an habitual sniffer, investigating the world nose-firstthe cereal, his baseball glove, magazines, shoes, his clothes. Everything had to meet olfactory approval. What raked her mind was the thought of cocaine. Wasn't sniffing a sign of usage? |
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"You know that woman who came yesterday?" |
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"Well, she made an offer to buy our house." |
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The change in him was immediate. He slammed down his glass. "I don't want to move. I told you that." The rage was back. "I'm not going to go to some stupid town in New York." |
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"But Dad got a great job . . ." |
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"I don't give a damn," he said, pushing up from the table. He made a step to leave when the phone rang. |
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"Would you please answer it?" |
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He gave her a defiant look. "No." |
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"Damn it, Matty, do as I say." |
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For a long moment he glowered at her through menacing eyes. Fuck you eyes. He muttered something under his breath, then picked up the phone. |
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She could tell by the sudden change in his voice that it was Dr. Tojian. As arranged. Before bed last night, she had called to explain the situation and Tojian had agreed to call Matty before he left for school and ask him to come to the office later that day for a replace- |
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