The Hook and the Haymaker by Jared Yates Sexton

You set your sights on something else, she said and paused. You’re a sweetheart most times, and I think you’ve got a good heart but you get lost. While he thought out what she’d said he ran the tip of the pen across a random page and the page ripped open like a zipper. He rolled that around in his head and took a drink of his beer and picked the pen off the pad of paper and opened the soggy phonebook. He even said Hello, you still there? and she said she was an was thinking of a way to say something.Ĭhappy, she said, finally, slowly, I think you’re a fine person, a good one sometimes, but you can act like a real sonuvabitch. The line went so silent he thought maybe she’d hung up. If maybe I just didn’t realize it.Ĭhristine didn’t answer at first. Well, I got a letter to write, he said, and I need to know if maybe I’m some kind of sonuvabitch. It’s not a letter to me, is it? Cause I can’t handle that either. I’m writing a letter, he said, and I want to get it right.Ī letter? Christine said. They were sitting on the kitchen table next to a phonebook he’d left out in the rain. I don’t know, he said, looking at the pen and paper he’d planned on using to write the letter. He looked in the refrigerator and opened a drawer and then shut it. He said, You know me pretty good, Christine.Ĭhappy, she said, I told you I couldn’t handle one of these phone calls. Do you think I’m some kind of terrible sonuvabitch?

Okay meaning that’s what you called for, or okay, you understand? We didn’t work out and that’s the end of it. If this is one of those calls, she said, I can’t handle it right now. Well Christine, he said, I was just sitting down to write a letter and I needed to ask somebody a question. There’s a mighty fine reason for that, he said. Christine was one of the last few who would put up with him and so that was who he called.Ĭhappy, she said like she wasn’t sure she knew a Chappy. Some got angry and told him never to call again. He looked at the ragged piece of paper on the counter with all the numbers.īy this point most of his ex-girlfriends had learned to just let the phone ring. He had to carry all his empty cans in and that led to getting another beer and that led him to the kitchen where the phone was screwed into the wall. When he went in though he got sidetracked. Luckily he’d replaced the bulb in the porch light the week before and all it would take to get some light would be to walk inside and flip the switch. It was already dark outside at that point. He had a letter to write that evening though and so he sat down on the porch to write it before retiring to the phone. WHEN HE GOT good and drunk and the night wore on he liked to get on the phone and call up ex-girlfriends.

The Hook and the Haymaker by Jared Yates Sexton