Dad, I reject your narrative.
The gist of the letter was forgiveness. GJ forgave him; GJ rejected Greg’s version of the story. What story?
We’re both addicts.
Greg had held the letter under the dripping faucet, watching it grow soggy, willing the words to fade. When it finally fell away from his hand and landed in the sink, he turned the water on, and then he pushed the letter down the garbage disposal with the handle of a wooden spoon. He did not mention the letter to Deb, or Marie, and after a few days he’d decided it had never happened, was just a fantasy he had manufactured in his desperate urge to connect with his son.
“Maybe I’ll go tonight,” he said. “Live a little.”
“I love it,” Deb said. It was clear it’d shaken her, his bringing up Pastor Lawrence. She smiled too big, pushed her voice too hard. One of the dining chairs was askew; had she and the pastor done it under the table?
In the car on the way down the mountain, the afternoon light felt sharp, too bright, every leaf and pebble forcing itself into Greg’s view. He took the curves slowly, squinting, every now and again waving his hand in front of his face as if he could shoo away the brightness. Would he really go to the meeting? No, probably not. “Maybe we can have barbecue tonight,” Deb had said. “You could stop at Piggy’s on the way back.” He probably wouldn’t do that, either. Where was he going? Nowhere. When he was a boy, his dog had disappeared one day and never come back. He went off to find a place to die, his father had told him, as if it was something Greg should have known. That’s what old dogs do. It had hurt him back then, imagining the dog dying alone. Now that kind of solitude felt like just the thing. Two more turns and he’d reach the bottom of the mountain, could drive faster, escape the light whipping into his eyes around every turn.
If he was honest with himself, there was a part of him that felt proud of GJ for the letter. Glad. Like he’d been a glue trap holding GJ in place, as his son, as a problem, as something predefined and predictable and forever doomed. GJ had freed himself. Greg had driven off and boomeranged right back to where he started. GJ was the unknown now, Greg the known. But really, weren’t they all? Marie, Deb, GJ. Impossible to know them with any finality. Impossible to hold them. He felt a sharpness in his eye—the salt of a tear? Or maybe it was just that it hurt to look now. It hurt to see. Good for him, he was thinking. Good for him.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This book was made possible by the generosity of:
My mother-in-law, Sue Brockett, who has supported my writing career in every sense of the word from the day I mentioned I might like to go study writing, like, for real.
NogginLabs, Inc., which is so much more than a day job and is run by the amazing humans Traci and Brian Knudson, who push their employees to creative excellence both in and outside the office. All four of my books were written while I was employed there, and I don’t think that’s a coincidence.
My brilliant and crazy editor, Emily Bell, who has championed my work and spoiled me rotten.
My agent, Jim Rutman, whose thoughtful reading and patient phone calls buoyed and challenged me.
Jac Jemc and Kyle Beachy, who read early drafts of this book and offered invaluable insight and excitement.
My son Parker, who got shipped off to the sitter many, many days so I could write. I live to make you and your baby brother proud of me.
My husband, Ben, who watches me tear my hair out and eat bags of candy bars and slouch around in despair, and knows that this is my process and makes room for it and loves me anyway.
Thank you, thank you to all of the above. I am the luckiest.
ALSO BY LINDSAY HUNTER
Ugly Girls
Don’t Kiss Me
Daddy’s
A Note About the Author
Lindsay Hunter cofounded and cohosted the groundbreaking Quickies! reading series, a monthly event that focused on flash fiction. Her first book, Daddy’s, a collection of flash fiction, was published in 2010 by Featherproof Books, a boutique press in Chicago. Her second collection, Don’t Kiss Me, was published by FSG Originals in 2013 and was named one of Amazon’s 10 Best Short Story Collections of the Year. Her first novel, Ugly Girls, was published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in 2014. The Huffington Post called it “a story that hits a note that’s been missing from the chorus of existing feminist literature.” She lives in Chicago with her beloved husband, sons, and dogs. You can sign up for email updates here.
CONTENTS
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Epigraph
Begin Reading
Acknowledgments
Also by Lindsay Hunter
A Note About the Author
Copyright
Farrar, Straus and Giroux
18 West 18th Street, New York 10011
Copyright © 2017 by Lindsay Hunter
All rights reserved
First edition, 2017
Heartfelt thanks are given to the band Typhoon for permission to reprint their lyrics.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Hunter, Lindsay, 1980– author.
Title: Eat only when you’re hungry / Lindsay Hunter.
Description: First edition.|New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2017.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016053074|ISBN 9780374146153 (hardback)|ISBN 9780374715991 (e-book)
Subjects: BISAC: FICTION / Literary.|FICTION / Psychological.
Classification: LCC PS3608.U5943 E28 2017|DDC 813/.6—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016053074
Our e-books may be purchased in bulk for promotional, educational, or business use. Please contact the Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at 1-800-221-7945, extension 5442, or by e-mail at [email protected].
www.fsgbooks.com
www.twitter.com/fsgbooks • www.facebook.com/fsgbooks
Eat Only When You're Hungry Page 19