Subscription

It struck Pearl as peculiar, how purposefully the boy seemed to have come to a stop in front of her home. How, without so much as a glance in her direction he had dismounted his bicycle, leaned it mindfully against the pickets, opened the gate and let himself into her yard.

A blonde boy, he carried over his shoulder a large canvas bag, ink grayed, with the word TIMES printed where it bellied, bold enough that Pearl did not need her eyeglasses to read.

    Coming up the walk, the boy removed from the bag what looked by the heft of its roll to be a Sunday newspaper, which he offered to Pearl at the foot of the stair.

     His eyes were the bursting blue of cornflowers and Pearl leaned forward in her rocker as much to better see them as to make out what the boy was saying.

It’s free, was what she thought she had heard and so asked the boy, ‘Free?’

‘Yes, maim,’ he replied, and one, two, three, up the stairs he came, placing the rolled newspaper into Pearl’s outstretched and unsteady hands.

‘Just this once,’ the boy said. ‘You see if you like it. And if you do, then you can subscribe.’

Pearl looked away from the boy’s cornflower eyes. She studied the newspaper. Felt its heft. ‘I didn’t think ...’ she began.

Hadn’t her daughter told her that newspapers were a thing of the past. That everything was online now and if she wanted to read the News, she would need to get a computer.

But Pearl didn't want a computer. She didn’t want to read the news either. Any part of the paper for that matter. That was Harold’s joy, and Harold was gone. Pearl only wanted to hear the regular morning thump of it on the porch, to witness on occasion the backhanded toss from the street, the paper’s slow arch and spin, the nearness of it to the doormat.

She smelled the ink now, the warmed canvas of the boy’s carrying bag. She wanted to subscribe. ‘Let me get my coin purse,’ she said, and made to rise.

The boy offered his hand, ‘Don't worry about that now, ’ he said, helping her to her feet. 

Peculiar, she thought, how strong he is, and looking over his shoulder, Pearl could no longer see the bicycle, propped beside the gate.