Silence. The television laughed at something.
"Your mother would be ashamed of the way you spoke to me," Earl said.
"Mom kept Audrey's papers in a bin because she was proud of them," Marcus said. "She would have taped that card before she took her shoes off. You don't get to use her tonight."
Another silence, longer. When Earl spoke again, the warmth was gone and the injury was plain, and the injury did not make him kind.
"You keep that boy confused and that girl enthroned, and you will call me a villain for the rest of my life so you don't have to be a man who needed help. Fine. Skip Sunday. See if righteousness covers the electric. I'm not coming where I'm treated like a criminal for handing my grandson a bill and telling my granddaughter the truth."
"You told her nothing true," Marcus said. "You told her she was a problem for being proud of work she did. That's the whole of it. I'm not doing a longer fight on the phone. She can hear walls."
"Then hang up."
Marcus did. His hand shook afterward, which he despised and allowed. Denise, at the table, had heard his half. She did not clap. She rubbed her eyes with the heels of her hands.
"The weekday talk will be ugly," she said.
"Yes."
"And one canceled Sunday is not a personality transplant."
"No."
"And I am still angry at you."
"Yes."