CivilWarLand in Bad Decline by George Saunders

Halfway through his shift he’d call home and she’d jerk the phone to the floor by the cord and make a certain sound that meant she was fine. So before leaving for work he’d put Boneless on the floor with a water bottle and her lunch and a picture book. But without the purifier money he couldn’t afford the masseuse who eased Boneless’s bad pain and couldn’t afford to have Mrs. Inside was a sponge and an electric motor connected to nothing. Split Lip said the blacks didn’t care what kind of poison they put in their bodies. When the neighborhood changed, the purifier business went belly-up. Split Lip’s main job was cop but on the side he sold water purifiers.

Caspian’s while Split Lip held Boneless against him in the last pew, shushing her whenever the music overcame her and she started making horrible moaning noises trying to sing along. She found another man and together they made a little blond beauty they dressed in red velvet and paraded up and down the aisle at St. Split Lip was long gone, unable to bear the work Boneless required. She was scared of the tub, so to bathe her Split Lip covered the couch with a tarp and caught the runoff in a bucket. Mrs. Leo and I stood outside the window on cinder blocks, watching. She looked like a newborn colt, appendages folded in as she lay on the velour couch protected by guardrails. We were young, ignorant of mercy, and called her Boneless or Balled-Up Gumby for the way her limbs were twisted and useless. The first great act of love I ever witnessed was Split Lip bathing his handicapped daughter. Online Feature: “Isabelle” by George Saunders

CivilWarLand in Bad Decline by George Saunders