 
THE COMPLETELY UNNECESSARY

DEATH OF BILLY NAKAJIMA

A Novel

by

Christopher Long

Copyright 2016 Christopher L.Long

Published by Christopher L. Long at Smashwords

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ONE

THE FIRST THING you have to know about me is that I am an unreliable narrator. You can't believe half of what I say. I mean, I lived it, and even I don't believe most of it. But then, as my late father-in-law used to say, "Believe only half of what you see, and none of what you hear." I was never quite sure whether I was supposed to believe him or not. I mean, when you think about it, that nugget of wisdom pretty much contradicts itself.

Anyway, I'm not going to sit here and claim that everything I say is the God's honest truth. I figured out a long time ago there is no such thing. Shades of gray, my friend, nothing but shades of gray. So it's up to you whether you want to come along for the ride. I can't promise you'll believe every last word of it, or even a single word of it. But I can promise you this: you won't be bored.

THE NAME'S CORMAN McGirth, named after my mother's favorite comedian, Harvey Korman, from my mother's favorite comedy variety show, The Carol Burnett Show (thank God she didn't name me Conway) and my tale begins as these things always do: fishing.

The river is unusually cold, take-your-breath-away cold, and I cannot suppress a shiver as I contemplate it from my foldout camping chair on the riverbank in the sun, enswaddled as I am in the downiest jacket available at REI. It is early in the morning, too early to be sitting on a riverbank holding a fishing pole and a steaming cup of crap instant coffee. The coffee steam's pretty, anyway. But the so-called coffee is only marginally drinkable. Guess that's part of the allure. Roughing it. No lattes out here, my friend. Just nature in all her bountiful glorious bounty. And I'm quoting now. My erstwhile friend and coworker Billy Nakajima. You'll hear more about him later. But for now I want to say that the river is as sickeningly picturesque as is humanly possible, with the dappled shadows and the sparkling water and the silvery flash of fish in the deepgreen pools of the creek, and so on and so forth. And I haven't caught fish one.

Screw it. Billy Nakajima said fishing would be the balm for what ails me, the peace my soul is craving, the putty for the cracks becoming quite evident on the surface of my already compromised personality. And I'm quoting again. I'm not quite sure what Billy was talking about, since all I did was mention the headache I had been nursing so long that I was considering naming it. And then all this shit about fishing.

So I give it a try. Why not? God knows I need a change. But God also knows this ain't the change I need. And if He doesn't, I sure do. So after snapping it sort of in half over my knee I throw the fifty dollar hybrid graphite reinforced pole with the stainless steel hardware and tangleproof spinner as far as I can into the river. Okay, it's not a prizewinning hurl, but I have to admit that the splash is quite satisfying. Not as pleasing, however, is the red and white bobber suddenly bobbing and disappearing and the reflection of my fifty dollar pole bounding over the riverbed stones. That had to be a big fish.

I can't throw the folding chair half as far as the fishing pole but the splash is even more gratifying, and it is going to take a freaking shark to take off with that thing. I keep the jacket. Hey, it's a nice jacket.

"SO, HOW WAS it?"

Billy Nakajima fills up the doorway of my cubicle. He is a good-sized man. That's okay by me. It's his fu manchu mustache that rubs me the wrong way. And I don't mean because we're lovers, either. Because we're not. And that's not because I have something against Asians. I've been with plenty of Asians. All girls. His mustache rubs me the wrong way because Billy Nakajima is Japanese, and a self-respecting Japanese should not wear a fu manchu mustache. It's just not right.

"It was crap, Billy." I don't bother to turn around. I can see Billy's bulk and that disgraceful fu manchu in the reflection of my terminal. "I must have sat in that aluminum frame camouflage camp chair, which, by the way, is not ergonomically designed by any stretch of the imagination, for at least forty-five minutes and not a nibble. Not one."

I hear him snort. A derisive snort, in fact. "Forty-five minutes? That's it? You quit after forty-five minutes?"

I spin the chair, hard, to face him. Too hard, as it turns out. Some of the dramatic effect is lost when I overshoot and bang my knees loudly into the filing cabinet and have to flail awkwardly to reorient and square up. I make up for it by gripping the rubber armrests so hard my knuckles pop. Billy leans away, hands and eyebrows raised in mock fear.

"You said it would soothe my nerves, Billy. You said, and I quote, 'Fishing is as old as man and is the best way known to man to find the peace so lacking in our current age of something or other.'"

"I didn't say, 'Something or other.'"

"Well not literally."

"Well you said you were quoting me."

"Look, don't change the subject! The fact is, sitting in the mud with a tin cup of the worst excuse for coffee I've ever choked down and holding a fifty dollar stick—"

"You paid fifty bucks for a fishing pole?" He's laughing now.

"Forty or fifty."

"What an idiot."

"Hey! I just wanted to do it right!" I don't much care for some Japanese wannabe Chinese folk villain calling me an idiot within hearing of my esteemed coworkers. But I hold myself back from what I really want to do. Tear into Billy Nakajima tooth and nail and shred the flesh from his bones. Verbally, I mean. Instead I just spit a gob of phlegm into his fat face. Mentally, I mean. Then I spin back (perfectly, this time) and begin typing furiously.

"All I know is this," he continues. Damn that Billy Nakajima just won't shut up. "You need to figure out some way to destress, Corman. Fishing works for me, but it's obviously not for everybody. But man, you need to do something. You're wound tighter than a tightly wound string of some kind."

"Piano," I assist.

"Right, piano string. And I'm not talking double low F, you know, those big fat loose strings. I'm talking triple high B flat. Those ones way up there that will slice right through your jugular if they ever break, assuming, of course that your piano is an upright grand and you have the front cover removed and you're sitting in exactly the right—"

"Yeah, I get the picture," I growl, still typing demonically to seem busy. Although, I suppose if I really was as busy as I'm trying to look, I wouldn't be responding so fluently to Billy Nakajima's wandering discourse.

"Whatever it takes, buddy. Meditation, yoga, a little herb now and again. Or every day, for that matter."

"Thank you, Billy. You'll have to leave me the name and number of your dealer. That would be really great." I hope he detects the heavy sarcasm. I judge by his laugh that he does.

"Just trying to help, Corman. Just trying to help." I feel his big warm and surprisingly hard hands on my shoulders. His fingers squeeze, just briefly, then he lumbers out chuckling, and despite myself I feel my throat tighten and a tear come into my left eye. Billy is a good guy. I don't care what anyone says. And they say a lot.

After clearing my throat and blinking rapidly I look at my computer screen. Hopefully when Billy was giving my shoulders that totally heterosexual squeeze he didn't see all the random garbage I had typed. It looks something like this:

Jd eksjo k gkowo dkkwoeijfls,m vnvownl dl;s gnwpoine s;;snm ekdiopsen glwnenodifnwlwne giwngowowngodk ekeknowlx.z/x[wjg m,oihgvpwicf onv;lw kd gwp dkl do w;jvp[ehjw9 dkeiels d,s;l wqp

The whole email page is filled with this gibberish. Yeah, he saw it. He's probably telling Connie and Melanie right now. Do I hear them giggling a few cubicles away? Who cares. I need a smoke break, so I log out and grab my cigarettes and lighter and head for the hallway, making sure to pass by Connie's cubicle at a casual stroll. I glance in. Sure enough, Melanie's in there with Connie. They're looking at pictures on the computer of naked men with huge erections. They both turn, hearing me, but don't even attempt to cover the screen. Why is it my face that's turning red, my ears that are suddenly burning? I pick up the pace after leaving the doorway of the cubicle behind and leave behind also the two girls' increasing laughter.

IT'S COLD OUTSIDE and I stand smoking with my left fist jammed into my pocket feeling stupid for leaving my jacket inside. The smoke from my cigarette whips away in the wind and by now I know my hair is a mess. I squint my eyes and try to look unconcerned, athough I'm not sure why I bother since I'm out here alone behind the building. The sky is overcast and troubled and ready to rain. I can feel it. I take a few last hard puffs on the half-burned cigarette and throw it down onto the blacktop without bothering to step on it and trot back up the three stairs to the metal door, the green-painted railing icy cold in my hand.

The door is locked. Of course. I neglected to jam into the doorway the broken piece of brick left on the landing for just that purpose. Stupid rookie move. I must be more bugged by those two girls than I thought. Or maybe Billy Nakajima is right. Maybe I'm just stressed out. Well, that's not news. I've been on edge for seven months, ever since Janine left me for that personal trainer. Well, why wouldn't she? He looks like Brad Pitt's much better looking younger brother and I look like something you forgot in the back of the refrigerator.

But she didn't have to tell me how much better a lover the guy is. That was just plain mean. Especially after all we'd been through. After Paris. After the hostage situation, which is how we met. Not the first hostage situation. The second one. Well, to be clear, my first one, her second one. After all the ups and downs, the highs and lows, the promises, laughter, tears. Even after all that, she said it was a mistake, that it was just physical, a knee-jerk reaction. To what, I was never clear. But I was the one who was the jerk, she said, just before kneeing me in the nuts. So much for knee-jerk reactions. But I guess, in the end, we were too different. It was asking too much for it to last. But I'll always remember my time with Janine as the best three weeks of my life. So far, anyway.

Looking back with the clarity that only comes with time, I realize that she was just as much to blame as me. I mean, she was seeing that personal trainer, Scott or Devin or something, before we even met. And I think she was seeing him the whole time we were together, too. That would account for the nights she never came home. She was always so noncommittal about those nights, calling my questions silly and irrelevant. It bothered me, I admit, but then she would make me pancakes and coffee and jump in the shower with me and I'd forget all about the blank spots in our relationship.

Until she didn't come back two nights in a row. Which turned into three, and then four, and then ten, and then I'd had enough. I tracked her down and found her spending every night with him. Scott or Devin or whatever. Every day, too. She just never came back. That's when I knew it was over.

But it still hurt. There is still a hole in my heart, all these months later. I guess part of me believes she'll come back. I don't know why I believe that. It's certainly not based on hard or even circumstantial evidence of any kind. It's just a feeling. Call it a gut instinct. Or desperate grasping at straws. Could be either one.

I'M NOT GOING to be pulling this damn door off its hinges anytime soon no matter how hard I try, and no one seems to hear my palm pounding on it. Just have to walk all the way around the building like the last time this happened. Humiliating. I just have to play it off, like I was actually in front of the building the whole time. No problem. Except for all the floor-to-ceiling windows on either side of the building.

As I'm trying to figure out a solution to that seemingly insurmountable obstacle I feel the first spits of rain, big fat cold drops. The first hits the back of my neck and immediately drips into my shirt between my shoulderblades, and the second hits me square on top of the head and feels like a small water balloon. I make the mistake of looking up, as though I'm not sure where these globules of water are coming from, and am immediately punished with a direct hit in the eye.

"Shit!" I wipe my eye and duck my head and start to run toward the end of the building. It's starting to really come down now.

"Hey, Carmen! What are you doing running around in the rain?"

I look up at the familiar voice and see a broadshouldered figure silhouetted in the bright light of a loading dock, blazing teeth visible in the shadowed face beneath golden curls.

"Hey, Sean!" I vector toward the welcome dryness of the Receiving room.

I pass by Sean and duck under his outstretched arm, the hand of which is poised over the red button that closes the huge partitioned rollup metal door. His hand ricochets off my back and he says in a jovial voice, "Get in here, you big kid, playing in the rain."

"Thanks, man." I run my hand through my wet hair. It's amazing how quickly you can get soaked when it's really coming down. Seconds.

"How you been, Carmen?" I can barely hear him over the clacking of the door coming down, and I wait and watch the rain coming inside until the door thumps closed on its rubber cushion. I've known Sean for a long time and I like him. I trained him for this position in Computer Shipping and Receiving when they pulled me over to Purchasing. He's young and foolish, but relatively harmless. His thinks his nicknames are hilarious and maybe endearing, but he's alone in this opinion. I don't mind so much being called Carmen, but some of his other inventions aren't so benign.

"I'm all right, Sean. How are things going here?"

"Right as rain." He laughs, a genuine laugh. I can't help but laugh myself. "And how is it up there with all the important people?" I know where this is going. And Sean doesn't disappoint. "How's your buddy, old Birry Jock-Anemia?" Sean says this with squinty eyes and a forced overbite and a ludicrous accent straight out of a Three Stooges WW2-era short. He barely gets it out before busting up. His face turns red and his curls bounce.

"Come on, now." But goddammit I'm laughing, too. Sean can always do that to me.

"I'm just kidding. I like Billy. He always takes a minute to shoot the shit when he stops by. He's all right."

"Yeah. Except for that damn mustache."

"The evil biker stache? Yeah, it is a bit seventies Hell's Angels. How's Melanie? Still wearing those tight dresses, sticking her titties in everybody's face?"

"Like you mind?"

"Not me, man. She just don't come down here enough."

"Probably afraid of you."

"Little ol' me?" He lets out a jet of air. "I'm harmless. You know my girlfriend would castrate me if I messed around."

"Really?"

"Yes. Literally castrate me. Sans anesthetic."

"Now that's a woman."

"You know it."

I'm angling for a parting line before leaving when I see that he's looking me over like some kind of inspection.

"What about you, Carmen?" he finally says.

"Me?"

"Yeah. You a playboy, right? I mean, you got no one to answer to."

"Nope, sure don't." No one waiting for me at home at all.

"There you go, then. Why don't you hit that shit?"

"What, Melanie?"

"No, Carmen, Birry Jock-Anemia. Yes, Melanie."

"Uh, no thanks. Not really my type." I think of Melanie giggling over the hardbodies with the saberlike phalluses. Phalli?

"Not your type? What type is that? Flat chested no ass librarian? Come on, Cor-man, go for it! She's exactly your type—hot, horny, and single."

"I'll look into it."

He laughs. "You do that. Look real hard. Melanie is all about the lookin', that's for sure. But don't just look. If not for you, do it for me. Please!"

I laugh, but it's forced. I have to get out of there. Halfway down the hallway I hear Sean call after me.

"Go get that pussy, Carmen!"

I look around quickly. Doesn't he care who hears him?

I'M SITTING ON the roof of the building after work. The rain stopped a while ago and the clouds while still black are broken, leaving patches of sky showing through, and I think in a few minutes I could be in for a real show. I often come up here after work to smoke and watch the sun set. And I'm not alone. Next to me is Charlene. She's been joining me for the last month or so. She doesn't always come up, but I always wait for her, and am always glad when she shows up. I glance over at Charlene and am amazed once again at how beautiful she is. Especially her eyes, the impossible green of them. She looks over at me looking at her and I smile. She blinks, her expression as inscrutable as always, then looks back at the sky.

Unlike me, she doesn't sit on the edge, but stays back a few feet. I like to let my feet dangle. Makes me feel, I don't know, brave. Because, I mean, it's four stories to the ground. I don't think many people would sit right on the edge like this, casually smoking and looking off into the distance like they're sitting on a park bench. Okay, a tall park bench, where your legs dangle without touching the ground, but still you know the ground is only a few inches away. Where here, I know it's over forty feet away. Big difference.

"Isn't it nice up here, Charlene?"

She looks at me with those huge eyes and I just want to reach out and touch her. But I don't. She's very shy. I knew that the first time she came up here. She keeps her distance. But that's okay. We have nothing but time. No rush. And she's here. That's what matters.

But it is kind of depressing that I can't even get a damn cat to come to me. Even with food. Charlene will eat if I have something she likes—chicken, or tuna. But I have to throw it to her. She won't take it from my hand. In fact, I don't even know for sure if she's a she. Charlene could be Charlie. She just looks like a she, pure white with those perfect green eyes and that little black spot on her nose. If she's a guy, well, I don't want to know it.

The sun is just beginning to set and it looks like it's going to be a prizewinner when I notice Charlene stand up and walk to the edge, which she's never done before. She looks down and I follow her gaze and see someone right below us on the ground picking through the shattered fruit that I threw down there earlier. (What's the point of sitting on the edge of a four-story building if you're not going to throw fruit over?)

Who is that down there? And what the hell is he doing? It's too dark, especially with the trees that border this side of the building, to tell who it is. He has black hair, I can see that much. And he's poking around in the fruit mush with his foot. I lean forward a bit, trying to make out who it is and what he's up to. Then, inexplicably, I'm falling.

My stomach lurches up into my chest and I don't even cry out as the floor-to-ceiling windows reflect my shocked expression and I look up just before I hit and see Charlene looking down at me and was that her paws I felt on my back just before I went over the edge?

Why, Charlene, why?

A SINGLE STAR, growing into a sun, and then I'm looking up at the light on the side of the building. That's funny, I think, staring at it as it moves in and out of focus. Was that light always on? No, I think it just came on. If it was always on, I would have been able to see whoever it was down there.

Then I wonder why I'm not dead. I'm not dead, am I? I'm seeing what looks like my office building, the mirrored glass and dull fleshcolored stucco bands, and I see the branches of trees and leaves and the sky with patchy black clouds. Yes, I'm alive. I fell four stories, but somehow I'm alive. Am I paralyzed? I lift my head a few inches. I almost black out as pain hammers the inside of my skull trying apparently to force its way out. I feel cold dirt under me. I move my feet, then my hands. I lift my hands and look at them, make fists.

Eventually, incrementally, eyes squeezed shut, I roll onto my side. My head throbs. It's agony. But it subsides. I open my eyes. I'm looking along the ground now, and it's quite bright under the light. There is a piece of red pulp directly in front of my nose. Ha ha. Watermelon. I look past it and there is a large white bulk. I can't make it out. I blink and try to make sense of it. White and black and...flesh?

I roll further, onto my stomach. I hurt all over, like I'm one big bruise. Maybe I am. Slowly I push myself up onto my hands and knees. My tailbone feels broken. If you break your tailbone, hard, like in a forty-plus foot fall, where does it go? I mean, really, where the hell does it go? I feel somewhat panicky now. Does your tailbone go inside you? Up into your guts? Driven like an extremely unsharp blade through your intestinal walls or bladder or some other soft internal structure? (My knowledge of internal anatomy is embarrasingly inadequate as you can tell.) Am I right now bleeding to death on the inside? What do they call that? Hemorrhaging?

I need to get to a hospital. But first I need to get up. I sit back on my heels before I remember that my tailbone is destroyed, but it's okay. It only hurts a little. Maybe I'm not as damaged as I thought. I roll my head around and my neck cracks like twigs breaking and my head feels much improved. I look to my right and now I can see that it's a body next to me. Not only that, it's Billy Nakajima's body.

Billy Nakajima stares at me and his eyes are dull and flat and see nothing. Oh, Billy, it was you down there. Down here. What were you doing down here among the sticky detritus? What were you looking for? A sob escapes my lips.

You saved my life, Billy. And I took yours. Oh my God.

I killed Billy Nakajima.

In a frozen state, like a cold automoton, I rise and turn and feel no pain, feel nothing at all as I walk through broken fruit chunks, walk calmly and quietly away from the broken body of my friend Billy Nakajima. I walk out of the pool of light and cannot stop myself from turning and looking back.

He's still there. Unmoving. Never again to move, never again to taunt me with that ridiculous fu manchu, never again to darken my cubicle doorway with his massive frame. Never again to ask me if I can handle a few of his requisitions 'cause he has to get home early to take his kid to a ballgame.

Oh, Billy. I never knew a human back could bend like that.

TWO

I KNOW IT was an accident, but somehow I can't turn myself in. I'm scared, I admit it. Of course I am. Terrified out of my mind. But, curiously, virtually unhurt. I don't bother to go to the hospital. I go to a bar instead. That is the medicine I require. To calm my nerves.

It doesn't work. I sit and drink and smoke and drink some more, but somehow I can't stop shaking. What am I supposed to do now? I can't go back to work. Somebody must have seen me through one of those windows. They must have. It was only eight thirty or so when it happened. There were bound to be lots of people still working. I sit and think. Now what departments did I pass on the way to the ground? On the way down to Billy. I gulp my drink, spilling most of it onto the table. Luckily peope stopped staring at me a while ago. Except the bartender, Mike. I think he's about to throw me out.

I stare into the quarter inch of Jack Daniels in my glass and try to mentally walk through the office building, turning down this hallway and then that one, but it's no use. I can't figure out which departments are on that side of the building. The problem is, Shipping/Receiving and Purchasing are the only departments I've ever been in. No reason to to go anywhere else. But someone was bound to notice what happened, especially after the outside lights turned on.

That must be why I saw all the police cars and the ambulance flying up the street on my way here to the bar. I didn't really pay much attention to where they went, but it must have been to the office. So somebody definitely saw me. And who knows what conclusion they drew? For all I know they could be telling the cops that I intentionally jumped off the roof onto Billy. Wait, that sounds pretty crazy. Why would I do that? Why would anyone? If I wanted to kill Billy, and it's true that I often considered it, I wouldn't jump onto him from the top of a building. I'd run him down with my car, or push him in front of a train, assuming I could get him near some train tracks. Or maybe poison his lunch. But I wouldn't risk my own life by leaping onto him from four stories up. I mean, suppose I missed. Suppose Billy, whom I had implausibly lured to that spot with the promise of something irresistable hidden there among the fruit compote, walked a few steps to one side or the other right as I jumped. I would have missed him completely and been pulverized, just like the fruit.

So clearly that would have been an ill-conceived plan. Laughable. Totally ridiculous. But who's to say what some office drone, bleary-eyed after ten hours staring at PowerPoint presentations and chain emails and God knows what else (naked engorged men?), would conclude upon looking out the window and seeing my plummeting form pound Billy's wandering bulk into the pavement? And then watching in horror or revulsion or some similarly strong emotion as I open my eyes and roll over and get up and look at Billy bent at an impossible angle and then just turn and stagger away. I'm pretty sure I staggered. You don't saunter away from something like that.

This would surely amount to the most exciting and unbelievable single event this fantasy role-playing scifi-reading comic-collecting near virgin tech geek had ever seen and there is no way in hell he or she would conclude it was exactly what it actually was, an accident of monumental proportions. Wouldn't happen. As far as Applied Macro Solutions Inc. and the police are concerned, Corman McGirth is a stone cold killer.

I'M HOLDING THE glass now with both hands trying to get some of the precious firewater into my gullet but my hands just won't stop shaking and the door bangs open and I recognize the voices as they come in from the wet night even before I see the people they belong to. Not here! Why here?

I realize immediately that it was a mistake to choose a bar so close to the office, the only bar, in fact, anywhere in the vicinity. It's the bar, come to think of it, that everyone at the office goes to after work. What was I thinking? I wasn't thinking. My head was all turned around. I justed wanted a drink or two or ten, quick.

Now I'm trapped. Back in the corner at a table by myself with no way out except to pass right by them: Connie, Melanie, and some friend of theirs I barely recognize, Danny or Donny or something. I think he's their gay friend from Customer Service. I've seen the three of them in here before. In fact, it was only a few weeks ago, and this Danny/Donny was definitely coming onto me, touching my hand and grabbing my arm every time I said anything funny. But what really was funny was that I was actually enjoying the attention because nobody had paid that much attention to me for a long long time, and none of that was lost on Connie and Melanie. They wouldn't let me hear the end of it for days, and every time I passed Danny/Donny in the hallway he'd say, "Hello, Corman," in a singsongy voice, like it was two separate words: Cor Man, and I would get this strange feeling after he passed, like his eyes were roaming all over me, and one time I actually looked back and sure enough he was looking at my ass, I know he was, and when he saw me looking back he just put his hand to his mouth and smiled and rolled his eyes and turned and sashayed down the hall (there's no other way to describe it) and why am I even going into all this now? I have to figure out how to get out of here....

Too late. They've spotted me. Well, Danny/Donny did. It's like he has some kind of tracking device in his head. He scanned the room as soon as they hit the bar and within seconds his eyes had locked on mine and a big "Oh my God look who's here" expression erupted on his face. I duck my head but it's too late. He's banging a rapid slapping stacatto on Connie's shoulder. She looks at him then follows his pointing finger and sees me.

I'm dead.

I look around in desperation like a cornered animal, which is pretty much what I am, but there's nowhere to run. Even the bathroom is on the other side of the bar down a dark hallway by the front door. I look back at them and now Melanie is looking over at me. She waves. I wave.

I resign myself to my fate. The criminal has been spotted, all means of escape have been cut off, and in short order the authorities will be en route. Any moment now one of the three will grab their cell phone and turn away hoping I won't notice and make that call. Or go outside and call from there. Any moment now. Any moment.

But they don't. They get their drinks and make a beeline for my table. Surely they haven't already called. How could they know I was in here? Then it hits me: the bartender, Mike. Just before they get to my table I shoot a look at Mike. He's leaning on the bar watching the ballgame on the flatscreen in the corner. At least that's what he wants me to think he's doing.

Wait a second. Something doesn't add up. How would Mike know what happened? I come in here all the time. Nothing unusual about that. And if he did know something, he would call the police himself. He wouldn't call Connie or Melanie. And he certainly wouldn't call Danny/Donny, who I know for a fact Mike despises, being the unashamed homophobe that he is. And that's if Mike would have called at all. Which I doubt. Mike's one of those benefit of the doubt types, and I'm sure he'd want to hear my side of the story before passing judgement. God bless him. If only more people were like Mike.

But he didn' t say anything when I came in. Okay, he may have raised an eyebrow at the fruit stains on my clothes, but that's about it. I'm sure he's seen a lot working here. A guy with a few (okay, a lot of) fruit stains on his clothing is bound to draw little more from a jaded guy like Mike than a raised eyebrow. Maybe a grunt or something along the lines of, "Looks like you could use a drink." Which is exactly what he said. A very keen observation. Forget about the fact that Mike always says that when I come in. Or when anyone comes in. That's just what he says. And he's right on the mark, every time. But with the subtle addition of the eyebrow, "Looks like you could use a drink" takes on a whole extra layer of meaning. Which is why I responded, "Your eyes do not deceive, Mike," in what I'm sure was a worldweary tone. And his, "You got it, partner," was particularly apt. Concise, biting. I appreciated it a great deal. And I said so when he handed me the glass. "Thanks, Mike. I appreciate it." I'm sure the fiver I left expressed my appreciation better than words ever could. (Which, by the way, is why I put cash in birthday cards and don't write anything. Haven't had any complaints so far.)

Somebody is calling my name. A familiar voice. Someone I know well. It is Connie. She is standing right in front of me. I'm staring, I suddenly realize, directly at her crotch.

"Corman! What is wrong with you?"

"What?" I look up slowly. She looks perplexed, irritated.

"Aren't you going to invite us to sit down?" says Melanie. I look at her, trying to think of a response, when Danny/Donny pulls out the chair next to me and plops down.

"Of course he is," says Danny/Donny, crossing his legs and poking his toe into my shin as he sucks his straw while grinning and looking at me with half-closed eyes.

Connie and Melanie sit down.

"You remember Dennis, don't you?" says Connie.

Danny/Donny/actually Dennis sticks a hand out for me to shake. I don't move. He grabs my limp hand and shakes it and says, "So nice to see you again, Corman." He won't let go of my hand. I have to pull it away. He laughs coyly.

Melanie looks at my clothes. "What happened to you?"

I look at the arms of my coat as though surprised to see I'm wearing a coat. There are wet spots and seeds and pulp everywhere. I guess I threw a lot more produce over the edge tonight than usual.

"It's nothing. Just fruit."

"Fruit?" says Connie. Melanie, who is clearly not interested in me or my clothing issues looks impatiently about the bar for somebody more interesting. That shouldn't be difficult I think, momentarily transfixed by her perfect profile and full breasts, most of which, it seems, are visible. I feel a finger on my chest. Dennis carefully scoops up some sticky detritus from my shirt, somehow managing to drag his fingernail across my nipple. I jump slightly, and he giggles at his masterful provocation. Then without breaking eye contact he languorously puts his finger into his mouth and makes a big production out of sucking it clean.

"Mmm. Citrus. My favorite fruit." His toe scrapes up the inside of my calf.

Before I can crack the little fairy across his perfectly square jaw, Melanie looks at me, bored, and says, "Where's your other half?"

"My what?"

"She means Billy," explains Connie, taking a cigarette out of the pack I left on the table. She says around the cigarette as she picks up my lighter, "He's usually in here with you, isn't he?" The lighterflame makes her face glow for a few moments.

"I don't know," I say as noncommitally as possible. "Haven't seen him much today. Other than at work, you know, of course. I saw him at work. Inside the building, that is. Not outside."

They're all looking at me like a worm just crawled out of my nostril and I shut up. No one moves for a few moments. Connie's cigarette smoke curls its way up to join the rest of the smoke clouding the arclights in the ceiling and gayDennis holds his drink, his lips poised in a partial pucker just above the end of the straw, and Melanie gets up and whispers into Connie's ear then heads across the floor, perfect ass swinging overlymuch in her skintight dress, to a few people who just came in and are leaning on the bar.

"Are you okay, Corman?" Connie looks at me carefully in the dim lighting.

"Just a long day, Connie. A really long day."

"Tell me about it," squeals Dennis, and rips into a long and dramatic tale about his unbelievable day, which even Connie isn't paying any attention to. Not that Dennis notices or particularly cares.

Finally I can stand it no longer. I grab a cigarette and light it as quickly as I can so they won't see my still-shaking hands and after taking a deep drag and blowing it out at an angle that happens to be directly into Dennis's face I look across the room and say, "Did you guys come here right from the office?"

"No, we left a little early and had dinner over at Gino's," says Connie. "We would have invited you but we couldn't find you."

"Corman, you missed out," says Dennis. "I did too, don't you know." Dramatic pause. He puts his hand on my arm. "Because you weren't there."

"Give it a rest, Dennis," says Connie, rolling her eyes. He sticks his tongue out at her.

"Oh, Corman knows I'm just teasing. Don't you, Corman? You know I'm just a big tease."

"Sure."

"And you know you love it."

Of course I'll never admit it, especially not to Dennis, but he's not totally wrong. Instead I say, "About as much as a poke in the stick with a sharp eye." I don't intend for it to come out that way, but I'm slightly flustered and Dennis thinks it's absolutely hilarious. He slaps me on the shoulder.

"I think I'll buy you a drink for that one, big guy." He jumps up and heads to the bar, swinging his ass at least as much as Melanie did.

"Don't mind him, Corman. He just does it to get a rise out of you."

"The last thing that little fruit is going to get out of me is a rise."

She laughs. "Now that's the Corman I know."

I relax a bit. They don't know what happened. They weren't even at the office. They didn't hear the sirens. Not from Gino's, which is a good three miles away. Besides, there are sirens zooming around these streets all the time, being so close to some of the worst areas of Berkeley.

"What you need is a girlfriend," she says, dropping her cigarette stub into what's left of Dennis's drink. She stirs the stub and ashes around with the straw.

"A girlfriend? Any suggestions?"

She studies me over her glass. She drinks slowly.

"No one springs to mind. Sorry."

I shrug, unsurprised. I'm sure it's not something that occupies a lot of Connie's time.

"You're a nice enough guy, Corman. Good looking in your own way. Kind of a gruff Kris Kristofferson type."

I'm not sure how to take that. Do I really look grizzled? At thirty-eight years old?

"You know, if you put on some bootcut jeans and a nice heavy linen shirt you'd almost make a passable cowboy."

"Really?"

"I think it could work for you."

"I'll consider it."

"Don't forget the boots and the hat."

"Of course not."

I reconsider my opinion of Connie. She's more caring than I thought. I realize that I've never talked to her one-on-one before. Maybe we could actually be friends. I'm feeling some affection toward her as she smokes and drinks and turns a few times to look at Melanie laughing at the bar and leaning a lot on the best-looking guy in the small group there and it seems she would rather be over there. Just as I'm about to release her from any feeling of obligation to keep me company Dennis is back. He puts a drink in front of me and another down next to it and scoots his chair way too close and sits down pressing his leg fully against mine.

I lean away as he leans toward me and says, "I just took a wild stab at what you drink, Corman. I hope you like it." He holds up his glass clearly eliciting some kind of toast, some fraternal acknowledgment from me. What the hell. I clink glassbottoms with him and he's clearly tickled. I take a sip and almost spit the godawful concoction across the table. Dennis is watching me carefully and my obvious disgust engenders a near spit on his part and he breaks out laughing.

"What the fuck is this?"

"It's called a hardon. It's my own recipe. Do you like it?"

I shouldn't say it but I do: "It leaves me limp."

Dennis puts his drink down and claps his approval then gives my thigh a squeeze. I don't mind. I've decided he's pretty harmless. Plus, I'm sure I could snap his neck like a dry branch if I wanted to.

Connie suddenly puts her drink down and fishes in her purse, coming up with her phone. I never even heard it ring. Dennis is saying something but I don't hear him as I watch Connie's face. She turns slightly to listen, then looks surprised, then looks at me.

Shit. She's talking to someone from work. It has to be.

"Really? You're kidding. Really? No way. Are you sure it's him? Omigod! Corman? No, he's here. Here, at The Green Spoon. Yeah. Really? We're just sitting here having a few drinks..."

I don't hear any more because I'm heading toward the door. It was an accident, goddammit, but I'm not taking any chances. I can't stay around to find out who saw what and let our joke of a justice system decide my fate. No way. I've already been down that road. Never again.

I'm almost to the door. I hear Connie behind me yelling my name. But I don't stop. Except when I get to where Melanie is at the bar between two young guys, probably from the office, though I don't recognize them. They look kind of generic, actually, like Tall Wellbuilt Studs with Perfect Features and Casually Sculptured Hair sent over from central casting to bookend the sexiest girl in the place. I'm not sure what possesses me, but on some wild reckless impulse I veer from my path to freedom and go up to Melanie and grab her around the waist with one hand and put the other behind her head and reach my fingers into her thick dark hair to cradle her skull in my palm and I smash my mouth against her perfect mouth and taste her tongue and feel her heavy chest against mine and her slightly round stomach against mine and just as she gets over the shock and tries to pull away I reach down and grab one ample asscheek and squeeze hard and hear a high squeek escape her throat and then I'm gone, into the night and the hard cold rain coming down.

At least I'll always have that moment I think as I head for my car becoming soaked almost instantly in the downpour. And I will remember it the way I choose, with no one to contradict me: the two perfect boys turning from my disappearing form to support the breathless weak-kneed Melanie who felt the searing heat pass between us fusing us together in a manner most primal and who knows that whatever possibility there might have been for us, it is gone, because somehow she understands that I too am gone forever and she feels the inexplicable loss of something she cannot even name.

THREE

I CAN'T GO home, obviously. I'm a fugitive. My god, how did I get into this mess? I drive through the night aimlessly. Where can I aim? I'm lost. The rain cascading down my windshield like a cosmic reflection of the tears streaming down my own face. If I was crying. Which I'm not. Not outside, anyway. But I'm bawling like a 2-year-old inside.

I realize soon enough that I must abandon my car. I'm sure the police are looking for it even as I drive. APB white BMW 318 license plate whatever my license plate number is. Where would they get that anyway? DMV? Is DMV even open?

Doesn't matter. They'll find it. They're good at that shit. I just wish I knew how long it's going to take them so I'd know how much time I have. I just have to assume they already have it. That's the only safe play. And I have to play it safe, super cautious. But isn't there still a chance that they'll realize it was an accident? That they'll believe my story? Believe that I often sit on the roof of an evening watching the sunset with a greeneyed white cat named Charlene and that, while I've never before fallen off  
(and no I wasn't drinking), somehow, right when Billy Nakajima stood directly below, I slipped or more likely was pushed (by whom? Well obviously by Charlene... Who else could it be? We were the only ones up there, as we're always the only ones up there) and I would have surely died if it hadn't been for poor sweet Billy Nakajima's considerable bulk being there to break my fall, even as my lesser bulk, magnified however many times by the fourstory velocity of my fall, broke Billy's back pretty much in half, killing him (I hope to god instantly or at least quickly with little to no pain).

But I can't say because I was knocked out myself, surprised to wake up not dead, and I don't know how long I lay there...it could not have been long...but amazingly I was able to get up and leave under my own power, leaving dead behind me poor Billy Nakajima, surely my one true friend in this world. Despite our differences and his anachronistic and aggravating fu manchu mustache I loved him like a brother and I swear the last thing I would ever do is kill big bearish harmless Billy Nakajima, and no, I have no clue what he was doing there. I've never seen anyone there before and I certainly had no idea he'd be there. You have to believe what I'm telling you! It's the goddamned truth!

Of course they'll never believe it. Who in their right mind sits on a goddamned office building throwing large fruits and watching sunsets? And then gets pushed off by a cat? If it hadn't actually happened to me (I swear I can still feel the little paws on my back) I'd never believe it myself. Not in a million years. So I can't ever go back. In fact, I've pretty much proven my guilt—in law enforcement's minds, anyway—by running from the scene of the crime. I mean accident.

But come on, I was hurt, in shock, confused. And I didn't go far, after all. The Green Spoon is only a few blocks from the office. It's not like I immediately headed for Mexico. (Mexico? Hmm.....) I needed a drink to calm my nerves, to figure out what just happened.

Well, I had my drinks. I smoked my cigarettes. And what did I do after that? I ran. Making me look pretty damn guilty. But that was only a few hours ago, after all. Maybe it's not too late to turn myself in. Maybe at a hospital. Just act like I'm still in shock, mentally impaired. Anyone would understand. I mean, after all, it was a pretty traumatic experience by anyone's standards. Especially seeing a dead man bent in half like a broken fishing pole. Especially when that dead man is your friend. And especially when you're the one who bent him like that. Inadvertently. Very much inadvertently.

That could work. Just say I've been wandering around in a daze until now. Head injury. It might just work.

Except for one thing. Or should I say three things. Well, four. At least. Four things named Mike the Bartender, Connie the Co-worker, Melanie the Slut, and Dennis the Twink. Only the laziest slob of an investigator wouldn't quite quickly beat my alibi into the dirt by talking to any of those four, who would all testify to my lucid state of mind in the bar.

So that's it. Running is my only option. Somehow I am not surprised. Somehow I knew it all along. Somehow I've always known, my whole life, that it would end this way. All I've ever done is run. First it was from my older brother then my two older sisters then my mother, then on the crosscountry team from the prospect of coming in last and being laughed at, and then from the specter of failing at relationships and jobs, and on and on.

No wonder I'm so damn tired. No time to rest now, though. Got to run faster than ever.

To where? I rack my brain even as I recognize the street I turn onto. I should recognize it—I grew up on this street. The rain has let up and I can see my house up ahead on the left, white wood siding under a sagging shingle roof that my father refused to replace. I see my twin sisters on the front lawn, all golden hair and fluttering white dresses, and my brother throwing walnuts at them from the porch, aiming, naturally, at their heads. Until mom comes out with the broom and starts beating the crap out him. Him laughing and protecting his head and leaping off the porch to run shouting obscenities down the treeshadowed street, kicking up red orange yellow leaves, running across lawns, jumping hedges. And how I loved him and hated him and wanted only to be part of his life.

And now I'm passing the house and it's night and wet and there are cars I don't know in the driveway and I slow down to look in the big front picture window I've looked out of ten thousand times wondering where I would end up in this big frightening world, and here's the answer: back looking the other direction at unknown people sitting in front of their fire—oh, not fire, television—and wishing that boy there looking out at me looking in at him was me, and wanting so much to stop and go to that door and ask beg plead for succor, for safety, ask to come home to a home I never really had, but I don't stop because I know it's too late forever and these people are strangers to me and I turn my face away from the window, away from that glowing face there and the eyes following me down the street.

I ABSENTMINDEDLY TURN on the wipers even though it's no longer raining. They pass back and forth unseen and it is the eventual squelch of hot rubber on glass that brings me around to turn them off again.

And then it hits me. I know where to go. I know exactly where to run. Texas. To the one relative I have who can possibly advise me, if not take me in under these extraordinary circumstances: Uncle Orem. This situation will be barely remarkable to Uncle Orem. He's the skeleton in my whole extended family's closet (closets? Can one skeleton occupy multiple closets? If it's a metaphorical skeleton simultaneously occupying multiple metaphorical closets? Sure, why not?).

Plus, if the authorities ever do manage to track down Uncle Orem out there in Texas, it will take months if not years to do so, and I will be long gone. And even if I'm not, they'll still have to go through him to get to me, and if I know my Uncle Orem (and I like to think I do), that will be a pretty tall order. He loves nothing more than a pointless and unwinnable fight.

The only reason I even know about Uncle Orem is because he once crashed a stolen light airplane into Grandpa Willy's barn in Utah and we just happened to be visiting Grandpa at the time. I am ten years old, the barn goes up in flames along with the plane, and Uncle Orem, who until that moment I had never heard of, walks away with nothing more than a sprained wrist and his clothes burnt off of him. And I finally have a hero.

I hope he's still in Texas. He wasn't at Grandpa's very long after the crash—he wasn't about to hang around and go to jail—but we spent some time together before he disappeared. He took a liking to me right away, probably in part because when he asks for a stiff drink to ease the pain of his minor burns I am the one who immediately fetches him the Jim Beam from the hidden stash under Grandpa's workbench in the garage. My brother found the stash, but I'm the one who runs out there before anyone can stop me. Uncle Orem is Mom's brother, and she is so determined to keep my brother and two sisters away from him that she forgets about me. As usual.

At the pond down the hill from Grandpa's house I sit on a tree stump and watch Uncle Orem cool himself in the water, waving his arms slowly in circles, and I listen transfixed as he tells me about himself and about my mom and straightens me out on a few things in that regard. Then, before he takes his clothes and the now-half-empty bottle of Jim Beam and disappears into the woods singing something about an Arkansas woman he has me memorize his address in Texas and promise that I will come see him someday.

I never do, but I never forget him or my promise, and now it is time to keep that promise. But how to get there? I have to abandon my car. The stupidest thing I can do is try to drive to Texas. I might just as well drive right to the police station. Then how? Plane? Train? Bus? Won't they all be staked out? Not yet, of course, but surely by the time I try to buy a ticket. No, that won't work.

There is only one option left. And the more I think about it, the more brilliant it seems, the more it suits me and the situation. Uncle Orem would approve, I am sure.

I ditch the car early that morning and within two hours I have my bootcut jeans and my pearlbutton shirt and my kidskin gloves and my pointytoe boots and my silver Star of Texas beltbuckle and my felt hat and my horse and I am headed out of town in the general direction of the Lone Star State.

AFTER ONLY THREE or four hours I haven't gotten very far and my feet are killing me. Clearly cowboy boots are not designed for walking any kind of distance at all. At least these ones aren't. I should probably at least attempt to ride the horse, but I haven't the first idea how it's done. He doesn't even have a saddle. When I snuck him out of Margaret's yard early this morning before the sun was up I tried to put a saddle on him but it was a lot more complicated than I expected and Tango was getting upset. Or impatient, or annoyed, or something. I really can't fathom the mind of a horse. They do have minds, right? Brains, sure, but minds? I always heard they're the stupidest large animals on god's green earth. Another reason I'm not in a big hurry to jump on Tango's back. Even if the saddle hadn't fallen off within a dozen yards after I thought I had adequately secured it.

But of course I have to have a horse in this ridiculous getup I'm wearing. A lone cowboy strolling down the road would really attract attention. But a cowboy leading a horse, well, that's perfectly natural. "Oh, look at that rugged cowboy strolling by with his horse," people will comment as I pass. "How considerate of him to walk his horse." "What do you mean?" "Oh, well, obviously he's been riding for hours and he's giving his horse a rest." "Ah, I see." Then a long pause. "What do you think happened to his saddle?" "I don't know. Maybe he's been riding so long his saddle broke." "Could be. Or maybe that's why he's walking. No saddle." "Nah. An old cowhand like him? I'm sure he can ride bareback, no problem."

Well, that's all well and good and kind of cool, too, strolling along squinting hard under my tipped-back hat like Clint Eastwood's Man With No Name, until my head starts to ache, and then I stop to lean against a streetlight and smoke a cigarette, still cool as hell. But my feet I think are bleeding or at least seriously blistered and now Tango is leading me. Enough is enough. Time to swallow my pride.

I find a busy street and try to ignore all the stares and eventually flag down a taxi. It's a new-looking white and green car and when I lean into the passenger window the driver, a silver-bearded black man, looks at me dubiously.

"Hey, there, Slim," he says, looking at Tango tied to the meter and then back at me. "Your horse?"

"Good guess."

"Now listen, Slim—"

"Sorry. I'm a bit worn out." I lean down and pick my hat up off the street where it fell when I put my head into the windowspace and knocked it off. I slap the hat against my leg, very cowboy-like. The driver is not impressed.

"Well," he says with a mock drawl, "are you-all a-gonna be getting in or not?"

"I reckon so." I toss my hat into the front seat. "Can you pop the trunk?" He does. I untie Tango from the meter and lead him to the back of the car.

"Hey!" The driver yells out the window. "What the hell do you think you're doing? Your horse is not going to fit in my trunk!"

"No, no, I'm just going to hitch him up to something in here. I'm not sure he'll follow us otherwise. I just want to make sure he stays with us."

"Stays with us? Are you insane?" He's out of the car now, walking back to look incredulously at us as I search in the trunk for something to tie Tango's lead to.

"We don't have to leave the trunk open," I explain. "I just want to make sure his lead doesn't slip out."

The driver stands with his hands on his hips, mouth open, but nothing comes out until I've tied Tango's lead to the trunk latch and closed the trunk.

"Are you a fool?" the driver finally says in a kind of mean-spirited way.

"I know this is unusual but don't worry, he'll keep up. I haven't been riding him, so he's pretty fresh, and he's fast. His father was a racehorse."

"I don't care if his father was Sea Biscuit, he's not going to be running behind my cab."

"It's okay. He'll keep up. I'm telling you, he's an excellent runner. Just don't stop too quickly, if you don't mind. He'll end up on top of your taxi if he doesn't realize you're coming to a stop." The cabbie just shakes his head and mutters something under his breath that sounds like "Now I've seen everything and I can die a happy man" and stomps back to his open door. He reaches in and the trunk pops open.

"Untie him," he says. "Right now. Let's go." I do. He pushes me backward and slams the trunk much harder than necessary. He gets back into the car muttering and shaking his head and when there's an opening in the traffic he drives off. He only gets a few dozen yards before he slams on the brakes, his white reverse lights come on, and he backs quickly toward us. I have to pull Tango back. His bumper bounces to a stop six inches from my knees. I see my hat spin out of the passenger window. It lands on its brim and rolls into the gutter as his tires squeel and the taxi roars back into traffic.

I pick up my hat, disgusted with his display of uncommon discourtesy. Asshole. You would have thought I was asking him to break the sacred oath of taxidrivers or something. If there is such a thing. Probably not. He just has something against cowboys.

FOUR

I COME TO the conclusion an hour later that the entire brotherhood of taxidrivers, including the female brothers, have something against cowboys. Seven tries, and my hat ends up rolling into the gutter pretty much every time. I don't understand it. This is San Francisco, not New York. This is my town. I grew up here. And these creeps are treating me like some kind of ignorant country bumpkin. I'm starting to think it's the clothes. Maybe if I change into something a little more "city", like a suit, or maybe just lose the hat and boots.....

Then my luck changes. A taxi van pulls over. My first reaction is to wave him on, but then I reconsider. It's a pretty big van. Maybe this is providence rewarding my persistence. I never even thought of a van taxi. What I also haven't considered up to this point is making sure the driver understands that I plan on making it worth his while if he'll help me out.

I hold my hat out of sight behind me and open the sliding door. The driver is a toffee-colored young man with thick shiny black hair cut rather recklessly. His teeth shine at me under a thin neatly trimmed mustache and he seems to understand instantly my desperation without words even passing between us. Immediately I know that this is the one I've been waiting for.

Even so, it doesn't hurt to proceed carefully. "Hello. How are you doing today?"

"Oh, I'm very good, very good indeed, sir. Climb on in, sir." He waves me in. "You can sit up here with me if you like. Or in the back. Anywhere you prefer, sir."

He hasn't noticed Tango up ahead. Probably because I tied him to the railing of a staircase well back from the street. I take in the spacious interior of the van. I make a rough reckoning of the volume in relation to the torso of a not especially large horse.

I put my hand on the center seat. "This comes out, doesn't it?"

The driver looks perplexed for a moment. Then his stunning smile returns. "Oh, yes, sir. It is removable. Yes."

Perfect.

"How does that work, exactly?"

"Excuse me, sir? You wish to remove the seat?"

I don't respond. I'm busy trying to find the latches to disengage the bench from its moorings. "Can you give me a hand here, driver?"

"Oh, no no no, sir. It is strictly forbidden to remove the seat, sir. I am sorry, but it is against the company regulations."

"Listen, Ahmed, I don't doubt your comprehensive knowledge of company regulations, but I really need you to remove this seat."

"I'm so sorry, sir. I would love more than anything to be able to accommodate your wishes, sir, but it is impossible. I am so sorry."

I am prepared for this and withdraw my bulging wallet. I don't make it a rule to carry this much cash around, but circumstances being what they are, I went to the bank and cleaned out my checking account and now there's roughly forty-five large stuffed into my wallet. And by large I mean twenties. I don't know how much exactly that comes to, but it's all I have to my name. I wasn't even sure I could take it all out from the ATM, but it worked.

I flash a handful of bills and wave them nonchalantly. I watch Ahmed's eyes follow them like a kitten with a ball of string. A ball of string being swung back and forth in front of it. In short order Ahmed has the bench seat tied to the roof rack. I can tell he figures I must like a lot of leg room. And he's absolutely right. Except it's not for me.

"I'll be right back, Ahmed."

Another twenty joins the three I've already stuffed into his shirt pocket. He seems pretty stoked with how things are going. He's probably thinking about the good lovin' he's certain to get from his cute little mamasan when he gets home with a shirt stuffed with cash. I'm just guessing that he's got a Japanese wife, of course. There's really no way to know for sure, and I don't have the time or interest to ask Ahmed himself.

I grab Tango and have him halfway into the van before Ahmed notices. He's counting his money and thought, I'm sure, that I was retrieving some luggage. I don't blame him for the misunderstanding so when his eyes shoot open and he drops the cash and a cry escapes his throat I'm not totally surprised.

"Sir sir sir! What are you doing, sir? I cannot allow you to do this, sir!"

The thing is, I already have. Don't ask me how I did it. I can't believe it myself looking back. But I did it. I think opening the windows on the other side so Tango can stick his head out helps. I manage to slide the door closed by climbing over Tango, who sensibly lies down and curls his legs up. You know, like he does this all the time. He's pretty damn smart for a horse, I have to admit.

Ahmed is looking frantically in every direction holding his head causing his already unruly hair to become positively unkempt. But no help is on the way. He's stuck with me and Tango and he might as well get used to the idea.

"Let's get rolling, Ahmed," I say with finality. "You're stuck with me and Tango and you might as well get used to the idea."

Ahmed fights the inevitable for a bit longer, but the combination of Tango's placid bulk settled into his van like some veteran traveler and another two hundred dollars in his pocket persuades Ahmed to acquiesce and we are on our way. But not without establishing some ground rules.

"I will drive you, sir. But I am telling this to you right now: I will not tolerate any horse poop. No, sir. If your horse poops in my van, sir, I will have no choice but to let you out. I hope this is not unreasonable, sir, but I must my foot put down on this!"

I can't help but laugh out loud. Horse poop. "It's called manure, Ahmed, not poop, and he can't evacuate until he stands up, so calm down."

"I hope you are correct in what you say, sir. Because I am not joking about the horse poops, sir, I assure you most assuredly."

"You have my word, Ahmed."

"And it is not, Ahmed, sir. I am not an Arab, as you can clearly see. My name is Singh. Rajeet Singh."

"Good to meet you, Ahmed Singh. I'm..." I draw a blank. I can't tell him my real name. I can't leave a trail for the authorities to track. Man, that was a close call.

"Yes, sir? Your name is?"

"My name is Sergio Leone." I smile at my cleverness. I almost said Clint Eastwood.

"Leone? Sergio Leone? Like the famous Italian director of spaghetti westerns?"

Shit. Just my luck. A Punjabi film buff. "Yeah. Funny coincidence, eh? Haha. He's the famous one and I'm the good-looking one. Haha."

I see Ahmed eyeballing me in the rearview. I duck and pat Tango on the leg. He tries to pull his head in but he can't. I notice we're getting a lot of long stares from passing cars. Like they've never seen a horse in their lives. Idiots.

"Sir," says Ahmed. "Where are we going?"

"Oh, uh, just keep heading this way until I tell you."

"This way, sir?"

"Yes, this is fine. Straight ahead."

"Yes, sir." Ahmed cocks an eyebrow in the mirror but says no more. He puts his mind on more important matters. That is, the money.

FOUR HOURS LATER we're heading south on 5 somewhere near Coalinga and Ahmed won't shut up about horse poop. I can't get a minute of sleep with him going on about how if my horse poops in his van he's going to lose his job and how is he going to make his house payments and send money back to his parents in Calcutta or wherever the hell they live and finally he gets it out of me that we're going to Texas and since at this point I'm virtually broke having paid Ahmed every half hour we've been out of San Francisco that's about the end of our adventure together.

"Texas?" Ahmed screams in a pitch typically heard from prepubescent females at boyband concerts. Not that I would know. The way he brings the van to a halt I'm afraid my flight from injustice is about to come to an unexpected and grisly end in the middle of god knows where. But somehow Ahmed, through skill, luck, and dead reckoning, manages to spin the van in the shoulder dirt only 180 degrees. We come to a rocking halt amid a cloud of grit and let me tell you, Tango is not amused. He's trying to stand up and now I'm thinking how absurd it is that I'm going to meet my end kicked to death by a terrified horse inside a taxivan.

"GET OUT!" Ahmed bellows, drawing out the words for what seems like a full minute. But I'm just estimating because I don't hang around to admire his lung capacity because I'm diving for the sliding door as a matter of simple self-preservation, scrambling over Tango's struggling form, and as I dive out the door headfirst I hear Tango's hooves battering the back seat where I had been moments before. I slam into the dirt all akimbo like a discarded toy and I swear I bounce, just so I can enjoy hitting the ground twice. The breath is knocked out of me and I am unable to breathe in, which is probably just as well since I'd be breathing dirt anyway, still enveloped as we all are in the dustcloud Ahmed's reckless maneuver has engendered. I scramble crablike on my heels and palms even though I'd much prefer to just lay there in my pain because I see the massive bulk of Tango's hindquarters looming over me as he extracts himself somehow from the van and I know that I still haven't escaped ironclad death.

Then I do. I'm sitting not far from where the van quietly rests, watching the dust drift out across a fallow field as Tango runs down the side of the road throwing his head about and I know I don't have enough money left to change Ahmed's mind. I stare after Tango and hope he has sense enough not to run into the road. Then I hear Ahmed scream in rage, incoherent Hindi curses, and look over to see him standing at the open sliding door grasping the handle and staring at the huge steaming pile of horse manure on the floor of his van. I chuckle. Good for you, Tango. I don't know how you did it, but good for you.

Then I'm running down the embankment and stumbling across the field with an enraged East Indian taxi driver giving determined chase yelling, "I'm going to kill you Sergione Leone! I'm going to kill you, Sergio Leone! And your shitting horse too!" I can probably take him, but I'm laughing too hard at this point to fight effectively. Eventually he gives up, probably because his deeply ingrained taxidriver instincts won't let him stray too far from his taxi.

After Ahmed drives off and I'm sure he's gone, I backtrack and pick up the remaining twenties I threw behind me hoping they would slow Ahmed down. He ignored them in his bloodlust. Good thing, too. That's all the money I have left.

I STAND ON the shoulder of the road slapping the dirt off my hat and looking up and down the road for Tango. I found my hat by the side of the road, stove in by a small East Indian foot. But Tango is nowhere in sight. I put on my battered hat and head up the road toward where I last saw him. He could be anywhere. Like I said, he's a fast horse. At least that's what Margaret said. "Isn't Tango just the most beautiful horse you've ever seen?" she'd say. I could practically see the hearts in her eyes. I would just grunt, hoping that would satisfy her and we could go wherever it was we were planning to go. But no, that was never enough for Margaret. "And he loves to run, Corman. You should see him run. Doesn't he look fast?" I would study him carefully, give him, you know, my full consideration. "He looks kind of stupid to me."

You can probably guess that my relationship with Margaret was short-lived. Intense, like a burning barn, but not meant to last. How could it? She loved Tango more than me. I mean, it wasn't even close. She's probably out of her mind with worry right now, as a matter of fact. I feel bad about that. But I don't know anyone else with a horse, and as far as I can tell she doesn't let Tango out much. Despite how built for speed he is. She just brushes him for hours and tells him how handsome he is and so forth. So I figure I'm doing old Tango a favor bringing him along. He didn't fight me much at Margaret's, and he seemed to be enjoying the taxi ride until Ahmed blew a gasket. And now he's run off. Thanks, Ahmed. If Tango's as fast as Margaret always claimed, he could be in Arizona by now.

I'm walking pretty slow at this point, on account of my blistered bare feet hurting like they do. I took off my boots in the taxi and no doubt they're still there. Even though weren't exactly cheap, I can't say I'm that sorry to see them go. I'd pay twice as much right now for a decent pair of Air Jordans. Like a man in the desert will give his fortune for a glass of water.

I stop when I notice a sound behind me. The sound stops. I turn and there's Tango. I wonder how long he's been following me. He nickers and throws his head up and down like he's just played a big joke on me. Which I guess he has. Maybe horses aren't so dumb. Or maybe Tango is some kind of genius horse. An equine Einstein.

"Very funny," I say, scratching his cheek. He nudges me with his nose. "Yeah, I'm hungry, too." I look around. Nothing but dirt and low hills with a few sparse scrubby oaks and this ugly graphite pencil line of a road we're on stretching on forever. I haven't seen more than a few vehicles, and any thought of hitching a ride goes out the window now that I know Tango hasn't run off to Colorado to join a pack of wild mustangs. Because I'm not going to just leave him here by the side of the road. I fully intend to return him intact to Margaret at some point.

"Okay, big guy, it's time for you to earn your keep. Like it or not, I'm getting on. You're the only one of us who was smart enough to hang onto his shoes."

Not that I expect it to be easy, but getting up on Tango's back is ridiculously impossible. It's like trying to climb onto a polished beer barrel that's up on a chairless table. How in the hell did the Indians do it? They didn't have saddles with stirrups and pommels and such. Did they get a boost from their buddies? Climb up on a rock first? Did they ride little horses they could just jump up on? Because this is a joke.

Thankfully Tango is an extremely patient horse as well as an allegedly fast one. He tolerates my frantic scrabbling and seems bemused if anything. Finally by taking a three-step start like a basketball player setting up a dunk and grabbing a handful of mane in midleap I manage to actually mount him. In a manner of speaking. It's not the classic mount, by which I mean sitting upright with one leg on either side. I'm laying across Tango's spine with my head and hands down one side and my legs hanging down the other. Kind of the way a dead body would look, I imagine. It's not what you might call a sanctioned horse riding posture, but it is surprisingly comfortable. I consider staying in this position for a while. The weight is off my damaged feet and I can even feel a cool breeze pulling the heat off them. It feels wonderful.

I'm also afraid to move. Even the slightest movement might upset the perfect equilibrium of my position and send me sliding off Tango's back in one direction or the other. With my luck, probably headfirst rather than back onto my feet where I might stand a chance of landing with a little dignity. The problem is, Tango hasn't moved. And I can almost read his mind: "Waiting on you, boss." I can hardly giddyup him from this position. I'm sure he's never had anybody ride him this way. I can't blame him for being confused. So there's nothing for it but to get myself upright.

I lay there for a good two or three minutes thinking the thing through. I'm only going to have one chance at this, because I'm not sure I have the energy or inclination to jump back up onto Tango again, even into this useless position. Eventually I conclude that the best strategy is an incremental approach. I figure that there must be a central pivot point, a center of balance around which I can rotate without overcommitting my weight in any single direction. Makes sense, right? Does to me. If I'm right, I should be able to slowly spin me head toward Tango's neck until I can line myself up on his spine, like a stripe down his back. Then it will be just a matter of sliding both legs down his sides at precisely the same rate until I can safely sit up.

All of this depends, I realize, on Tango staying absolutely still during this tedious process. I pray that no cars drive by and spook him and along those lines I carefully turn my head and look down the road in both directions. Oh, shit. There's a car coming from the north. I can barely make it out, and I hope it's just a trick of the light, just the fact that I'm looking at the road sideways. But no. There's definitely some kind of vehicle coming our direction. It's still a long way off. Or is it? Too hard to tell. It could take twenty minutes to get here, or it could be here in two. I have no idea. Should I risk it and start turning? Or wait until it's passed? What if I wait and Tango reacts when it passes and I fall off anyway? That would suck. I will probably have a better chance of staying on if I can sit up properly and hang onto Tango's mane or something.

I'm still watching the vehicle and now I can see that it's white but doesn't seem to be getting any closer. How is that possible? There's a lot of heat coming off the pavement and the vehicle seems to be floating above the road and suddenly it's much closer and I know that any chance of manuevering into a sitting position before it arrives is long gone. So I wait. And wait. And it's getting tough to breathe and my back is really hot in the direct sun and I can tell that Tango is losing patience too, and it occurs to me what I'm going to look like to a passing driver. Like a dead body on a saddleless horse.

They will probably feel obligated to stop, which is sure to spook Tango, and I'll wind up on my ass in the dirt again, so when the car is close enough that I'm sure they can see us clearly I lift my head up and smile as big as I can and wave them on as if to say I'm okay nothing to see here just taking a little siesta on my horse keep moving thank you and even though I see their faces briefly, a young white couple, and see the confusion and amazement therein, they don't even slow down and I thank god for that.

My reorientation scheme works and I get my legs on either side of Tango and sit up, and despite a momentary lurch where I'm certain that I'm going to topple off and probably break my neck out here in the middle of nowhere I manage to hug Tango's thick neck and save myself, and in short order after securing double fistfuls of mane I tap my heels into Tango's ribs and say, "Okay, boy, let's go," and we do.

Thankfully Tango seems well aware of the precariousness of my perch and walks slowly and evenly. I know he could shrug me off his back with less effort than it takes him to flick flies with his tail, but he takes pains to keep himself underneath my unsteady form at all times. As though he feels my tension through his back. As though he takes his role as my courier quite seriously. As though he understands how helpless I am out here without a car and a cell phone and a clue.

He's a damn good horse. I admit it.

Tango actually picks up the pace slightly when, through sheer fatigue, I am no longer able to squeeze my thighs into his sides and I have no choice but to relax. He looks back at me and if a horse can smile I'm sure he is.

FIVE

THE PALE SUN is kissing the hills over my right shoulder casting a flat hazy light across the fields and the shadow of horse and rider stretch far across the road and it's getting cool. My feet are in fact cold, but I don't mind. We follow a bend in the road where a stand of cottonwoods butts up against the shoulder and we smell the grillsmoke before we see the diner and attached garage with its paintchipped ancient gas pump.

Something inside me relaxes, some knot I didn't know was tied there. "Civilization," I say to Tango. And food.

I tip my hat to the few ladies we pass as any decent cowboy worthy of the name would and when Tango has stopped near the front door of the diner with quite a number of the nearby patrons gawking at me through the windows I pause to consider exactly how I'm going to dismount. I don't relish the idea of landing on my sore feet but landing on my face is even less attractive. I needn't have worried, as it turns out. Because I land flat on my ass.

"You okay, cowboy?" A hint of laughter in the voice.

I'm looking up from my back at long brown hair and what appears to be an inverted pretty face and my tailbone aches from the landing. I see Tango's head tilt over to eyeball me and Prettyface reaches out and pats his neck.

"He's okay, boy." She turns back to me. "What happened to your shoes?"

"Boots."

"Of course."

"Long story."

"My favorite kind."

She leans down and I feel strong hands under my shoulders. She lifts me onto my feet as though I'm a small child. I put my hands on Tango for a moment and she brushes the dirt off my back. I jump slightly when she dusts off my rump.

"Thanks." I turn around and she hands me my hat.

"My pleasure." A twinkle in her eye.

She appears even prettier right side up. A lot prettier. She's a few inches shorter than me in a plaid shirt and very tight jeans and cowboy boots. Her blue eyes sparkle in the light from the diner windows and I could swear she's looking directly in the vicinity of my belt buckle when she says, "Nice bit of horseflesh you got there."

"Haven't had any complaints yet," I say. And instantly regret it. I mean, it doesn't even make any sense. I should have said something like, "How nice of you to notice," or, "That's what all the ladies tell me." I always think of the perfect reponse after the perfect moment to respond is long gone. But, strangely, she doesn't roll her eyes in disgust or shake her head and walk away or even look perplexed. She laughs. And the sound is like medicine to a dying man. Then she sticks out a hand.

"Lace."

I take her hand and her grip is iron though her hand is velvet. "Corman. You seem to know your way around a horse, Lace."

"I should. Grew up riding."

"Not me." No point trying to play it off. She doesn't seem the type you can fool too easily.

"I kind of got that impression, Corman."

"What tipped you off?"

"Saw you ride in bareback, like some kind of Comanche. And you ain't no Comanche, Corman."

"No, I ain't, Lace. I'm more what you might call a city slicker."

"Except for the slick part."

"Right."

"Well, you look right nice in those duds, I must say."

"So do you."

She laughs again, throwing her head back. Then she puts her hand into her thick hair and kind of scratches her head looking at me with amusement.

"Can I ask you a question, Lace?"

"Why not?"

"What do horses eat? And do you think they might have some of it here?"

She steps over to Tango's head and rubs his nose. "I think what this boy needs right now is to be watered."

"Watered? Like a plant?"

"No, Corman, not like a plant. A horse is still a mammal. They drink water pretty much like you and me."

"Right. I knew that." I can tell my face is shading to red but hope Lace doesn't notice in the low light. She does, though.

"Nothing to be embarrassed about, city boy." She takes his lead and we both follow her around the corner of the building where underneath a covered light there is a large galvanized tub next to a spigot. She lets go of the lead and picks up the tub, angles it to see inside. She flings the dirty water out into the darkness and puts the tub under the spigot, turns the X handle until water is pounding into the tub.

She shouts over the sound, "What's his name?"

"Tango."

"Tangle?"

"Tang GO."

"Oh. Tango. He's beautiful."

I nod and mean it. Tango's already nosing into the tub but lets Lace push his face away repeatedly, talking to him so only he hears her, and they play this game until the tub is filled to Lace's satisfaction. She turns off the water and says, "Go ahead, boy," and he does, burying his nose in the clear water. I'm suddenly extremely thirsty and consider joining him. Lace looks up at me and must see the look on my face because she says as she ties Tango's lead to the spigot, "What say we go in and get something to eat, Corman?"

"That would be fantastic. What about him?"

"He'll be here for a while yet. We'll feed him when we're done."

"Sounds good. I'm so hungry I could eat a—" She waits, eyebrows raised. "Very large meal."

"Then let's get you one."

I'M TUCKING INTO a two-inch-thick steak as big as my hand with buttered mashed potatoes and peas and it's the best thing I've ever tasted and I finally look up to see Lace hasn't even started on her cheeseburger but is watching me in amazement.

"I like a man who likes his food."

I stop eating long enough to chug down half my beer which surprisingly is pretty good despite not being microbrewed then I wipe my mouth and belch.

"Sorry."

Lace shakes her head let me know it's no big deal then drinks the rest of my beer in three seconds and after slamming the glass onto the table lets out a belch that puts mine to shame. She giggles, hand on chest, and flags down the waitress to replace my beer.

After pie and ice cream we sit with our coffee cups in front of us and her pack of cigarettes and lighter on the table and smoke in something like a binge-induced daze.

"Where did you say you were from, Corman?"

"I didn't." I feel stupid, not clever saying that. "Sorry. San Francisco."

"You're a little ways from home. Did you ride all the way?"

"No, thank god. We took a taxi most of the way."

She choked for a second on her coffee. "A taxi?"

"Taxi van, actually."

She looks out the window. I can tell she's mentally calculating how to fit Tango in a van.

"We took out the center bench," I say to help. It doesn't help.

"If you say so." She looks at me through the smoke she blows upward in front of her. "And where are you headed?"

"Texas."

She nods. "Of course." She taps her cigarette into the dirty glass ashtray. "And where's your taxi? Excuse me, taxi van."

"He decided he didn't want to take us all the way to Texas, the bastard. Not that I blame him."

"He didn't know you all were going to Texas."

"Not right away, no."

"So now what? Another taxi?"

"Probably not."

"Wise decision."

"I think Tango's pretty well soured on taxis."

"But you're still determined to get to Texas?"

"Yes."

"What's in Texas?"

"I'd rather not go into it, Lace. If you don't mind."

"Okay by me. Man's gotta have his secrets."

"It's not that. It's just that, well, I ran into a little trouble back home and, well, you know—"

"You don't want a nice girl like me getting mixed up in it."

"Something like that."

"Because you're trouble. Bad news."

"Well, it's not that—"

"Dangerous."

She's teasing me. I fix her with my best this is no laughing matter look and hold it for a few beats before saying in a low even tone, "Maybe I am."

She slowly leans forward until her face is inches from mine and narrows her eyes. "Maybe I'm looking for a little danger in my life, cowboy."

I don't know what comes over me though it's probably the beer of which I drank a copious quantity but more likely it's the smell of her hair and those deepwater blue eyes but I lean in closing the small gap between us and softly put my lips on hers and she doesn't move until I'm done and sit back. She's still leaning forward on her arms holding her elbows with the cigarette burning between her fingers and she opens her eyes.

"What was that for?"

"Just thanks. Thanks for rescuing a poor tired soul who's a long way from home."

She reaches across the table and grabs the front of my shirt, pulls my face back to hers and kisses me back.

"You're welcome." She sits back and takes a pull on her cigarette then twists it out in the ashtray. "Now lets go take care of your horse."

TANGO MUNCHES ON the oats I bought from the kitchen.

"This will hold him for a minute," she says, patting Tango's shoulder. "What he really needs is a good bunch of hay."

A childhood taunt sings through my head: Hay is for horses, not cows like you. This in response to a call of, "Hey!" Silly, but accurate in terms of feedstock, it turns out. Probably some farm witticism originally, though San Francisco is a long way from the farm belt.

"Where do I get hay?"

She ignores the question. "Were you planning on riding Tango on to Texas?" I can tell she's finding it hard not to laugh.

"I guess."

"I would recommend a saddle. Your impressive Apache bareback skills notwithstanding, you're going to find it much easier going with a saddle. For a lot of reasons."

I'm caught slightly off guard by the word "notwithstanding" coming out of this cowgirl's mouth. She's full of surprises. I find myself wanting to know more about her.

"I know that. I put a saddle on him. I wasn't planning on riding him without a saddle. I didn't really think it all through, to be honest."

"Yeah." She smiles. I know she thinks I'm a fool, but somehow I'm not offended in the slightest. She's just too damn cute. "And what happened to the saddle, exactly?"

"It fell off. It stayed on for about seven or eight steps I'd guess. I didn't have it cinched down quite tight enough apparently."

"Indeed." Indeed. She's killing me. I'm starting to suspect that she's talking this way just to tease me.

"It just slid right off. Then it was in the mud and that thing was damn heavy so I just left it. I was planning on walking anyway."

"From San Francisco to Texas? With a horse?"

Now I laugh. "Maybe not exactly. I don't know, Lace. I was kind of in a hurry to get going and maybe I didn't think the whole thing through."

"So you said." She gave my shoulder a little punch. "I'm just messing with you, Corman. I gotta respect you for giving it a shot. That took balls."

"Uh, thanks."

"I want you to wait here for me."

"Where are you going?"

"Just go in and have another piece of pie and I'll be back before you even start to miss me. Twenty minutes tops."

"Okay."

"You will miss me, right?"

"The odds are good."

"Good." She kisses Tango on the cheek and slaps me on the butt before walking away. Seems like she got that backwards, I think, watching her butt swing around the corner of the diner, considering as I do so the tightness of her jeans. They are very tight. I put my hand on the spot her hand made hard contact moments ago and think how it smarts and how different I feel about this pain than all the times I felt a similar pain growing up. And how I want to feel it again now, as long as it's her hand. And feeling that she could do anything she wanted to me and I would welcome it.

Tango's nose is out of the feedbag and his head is turned looking at the corner where Lace disappeared, wondering, it seems, if she's coming back.

"Not for a while, boy."

He seems to understand and goes back to his oats. I hear what sounds like a diesel engine start up and the grind of its tires in the gravel parking lot in front of the diner. I walk to the corner in time to see her taillights pull onto the asphalt. I watch them head south until they disappear into a hollow where the road dips then I head into the diner.

There's a new set of people inside, mostly weary-looking truckers out of the halfdozen rigs parked fifty yards away in a huge open dirt area, and my bare feet get a new set of looks. I sit down in a booth facing the door next to a window that looks out over the parking lot and wonder which empty space had been occupied by Lace's truck. I look down and see the dirty footprints leading from the door to where I sit. I notice that a few people have noticed them too and follow them to me and I stick my feet right out into the aisle and wiggle my toes and they look at me briefly then look away with a shrug or shake of the head.

I SIT SMOKING and staring at the crumbs and the gray scratches on the small white plate in front of me. I look at my watch again. Twenty minutes passed twenty minutes ago. I accept that she is probably not coming back. That she is probably not even from around here and is now driving down the splitlane freeway laughing her ass off at the faux cowboy idiot she ran across at a truckstop diner somewhere between Redding and Los Angeles. Hell, her name's probably not even Lace. I leave some bills on the table and go outside to see if Tango is still there. I peek around the corner and he's there standing stock still like a fiberglass cigar store horse. I wonder if he's okay. I wait for a long time but he doesn't move at all. Margaret will really be pissed if I killed her horse. For all I know he's some kind of prizewinning show horse worth a fortune and I just walked him to death. I killed Billy Nakajima and now I've killed sweet Tango.

"It's okay. He's just asleep." A whisper from right behind me. I jump like someone stuck a live wire up my ass. I turn and Lace is standing there with her hand in her back pockets and I just want to wrap my arms around her. Instead, I just say the obvious.

"I didn't even hear you come up."

"I walk in silence like the wolf, paleface. Thank the Great Spirit I did not desire your scalp."

"Thanks, Great Spirit, that I do not possess a scalp worth desiring."

"Oh, I wouldn't say that. It's just that I've already reached my scalp quota for the week."

"Blind luck, then."

She approaches Tango and he turns his head before she reaches him. I can hear her talking to him in soothing tones so as not to startle him. She unties him and he follows her back to us.

"My truck's over here."

I walk with her around the few cars parked in front of the diner and see over near the eighteen wheelers a big white truck with a horse trailer hooked on behind. In short order she's walked Tango into the trailer and closed the gate and we're on the road heading south. The cab of the truck is spacious and warm and my beatup cowboy hat is on the seat between us. I watch the road for a few minutes until it begins to blur and then I'm asleep.

LACE'S HAND SHAKING my leg wakes me.

"We're here, cowboy."

The machinery of my brain is struggling to start up and I try to focus my eyes on the vague patterns in front of me. I hear Lace's door slam and shake my head and blink and stumble out and almost fall, unprepared for the drop to the ground from the cab. The cold night air on my face helps me wake up but my head is still feeling pretty thick as I walk back to the end of the trailer. Lace is just backing Tango out and I ask if I can help.

She hands me Tango's lead. "Walk him over to the fence there." She gestures behind me with her head. "I'll be there in a second."

I finally look around. We're parked in a long dirt driveway that in one direction leads to a white one-story house surrounded by trees and in the other direction disappears into the dark. I get the impression from how quiet it is that we're some distance from the freeway. There is a garage thirty yards in front of the truck, the door bright white in the headlights, and the house a bit further away has a glass jar porch light lighting three front steps and a covered porch. There is a light on inside the house, illuminating a single window with a yellow glow.

I turn and can just make out the wood posts and crossbeams of a fence next to the driveway. As I approach the fence I see the bulk of a wood building to my left and I hear snuffing inside. That must be the horse house or whatever it's called. Stable? Corral?

Tango has stopped behind me at the end of his lead. He's listening to the snorting and stamping coming from the building and his ears are standing straight up and swiveling now again independently of each other. He seems slightly tense, the first time I've seen him like this.

Lace comes up and strokes Tango's ribs, says, "It's okay, boy. That's just Paint and Redbo." Then she takes the lead from me. "He's just nervous. He smells my horses and he's not sure if he's going to be welcome here or if they're going to run him off."

"I know the feeling."

"I just have to introduce him, that's all." I follow her as she walks Tango down the fence to a gate just past the end of the stables. A circle of dirt on the other side of the gate is lit by a light high up at the peak of the roof. She unlatches the gate and leads Tango in and across the paddock. She ties him to the fence on the far side then comes by and closes the gate.

"You just stay out there, Corman."

"Why don't I just stay out here."

"Good idea."

She goes over to the stables and unhooks two catches and swings open two doors that start halfway up the wall. Two horse heads immediately poke out. Lace latches the half-doors open and talks to Paint and Redbo who look at me briefly then back across at Tango barely visible stomping in the dark. Lace talks to the horses and rubs their noses briefly then grabs something hung on the stable wall and crosses over to Tango. I'm looking at Paint and Redbo, and it's easy to tell who is who even though all I can see is their heads and necks. Paint is splotchy black and white and Redbo is solid colored with a darker mane. I'm guessing he's reddish, but in the dim light he just looks dark grey.

The next thing I know Tango is coming around the fence toward us very calmly and Lace is up on him holding reins that lead to a bit in Tango's mouth. As she passes I see that she's riding bareback but unlike me looks right at home and completely comfortable. She passes Tango in front of Paint and Redbo without slowing down and they calmly watch and she controls Tango's head keeping him from turning toward the other horses. She circles three times at a walk then nudges Tango into a trot and circles a few times more, passing Tango ever closer to her two.

I'm amazed to see that as Lace brings Tango down to a walk on the far side of the enclosure Paint has already retreated back into the dark of the stable, seemingly satisfied with whatever message Lace has just communicated. Lace walks a relaxed Tango slowly across the paddock to the stable and he and Redbo toss their heads a bit but eventually touch noses and Paint is obviously no longer interested in the newcomer because she does not make an appearance.

Lace walks Tango away from Redbo then gracefully swings her leg behind her and slips down to the ground, pushing away from Tango slightly but leaning toward him and keeping both hands against him. So that's how it's done. Much better than the tailbone drop technique I used.

She leads Tango into the stable through a wide doorless opening in the middle of the building. A light comes on, throwing a wide bar of light out onto the dirt. After a few minutes the light goes off and Lace emerges. She closes and latches the two windows, Redbo's head having gone back inside as soon as she brought Tango in.

After she closes the gate I say, "Who's the Comanche now?"

I follow her to the front door of the house. She turns suddenly at the top of the steps and I almost crash into her.

"And just where do you think you're going, cowboy?"

I look up at her a step above me. "What?"

"You're sleeping in the stable. No better way to get comfortable with horses than to spend a night or two with them."

I stand there for a moment with the swell of her breasts underneath her flannel shirt in my face. Then I turn and walk back down into the cold grass. I turn and look up at her smiling there, hands on hips, hair backlit like a halo. I don't know what I was thinking. What's wrong with me? She's a nice girl taking pity on a pitiful man lost in the night and it's probably Tango she's most concerned about anyway.

"Can I at least get a blanket or two? It's kind of chilly out."

She doesn't answer and I shrug and start to turn and I'm already wondering if there's a stack of hay or something I can crawl into in the stable when she busts out laughing.

"Come on, Corman. I'm not going to have your death on my conscience." She skips down the steps and takes my hand and leads me into the house. She closes the door and then grabs me by the front of the jacket and pulls me close.

"Now kiss me, cowboy, before I change my mind." And I do.

BEFORE WE GET down to it as it's clear by now we're going to because she actually wants me as much as I want her she sits down on the edge of the bed and crosses her legs and leans back onto her elbows and tells me to strip. I do, and she won't let me turn my back to her and I'm wishing I would have spent a few more hours in the gym, but when I'm standing there nude and grateful that at least she didn't turn on every light in the room she looks me up and down hungrily and apparently approves then points behind me to the bathroom.

"Now get yourself into that shower and don't be stingy with the soap. You're not getting into this bed until you smell at least as good as those horses out there."

"Ouch. You really know how to make a guy feel good."

I turn and am accelerated on my way by a solid slap on the ass. Just before I close the door I say, "You wouldn't care to join me, would you? Make sure I don't miss anywhere?"

"Get going." I close the door and hear her yell, "And do not shave, you hear me? I want that face rough and ready."

Wow. I wonder with a moment of uncertainty what I'm in for. Well, whatever it is, I'm up for it. Or will be soon. I stand in the old clawfoot iron tub with the circular showerpole and the hot water feels amazing. The blisters on my feet hurt like hell and my feet are so filthy that I finally give up trying to get all the dirt off and hope she won't notice but I make sure that every other inch of me is sparkling. By the time I'm finished, trying to balance thoroughness with haste, the hot water has relaxed me to the point where I'm starting to feel groggy. I shake my head and try to snap out of it. There's a beautiful horny cowgirl waiting to jump me and I'm about to keel over unconscious. I slap myself across the cheek. Come on, Corman. There'll be time enough to sleep when you're dead.

I towel off briskly then after debating briefly the best way to reenter the room—completely naked? With a modicum of modesty?—I wrap the towel around my waist. I pass my hand over my chin. Rough and ready or not, here I come.

The room is not completely dark, but the only light is a small lamp on a tiny desk by the window. I see that Lace is already under the covers and I see her long dark hair flowing over the pillow. She doesn't react, doesn't move. I pause and listen and hear her steady deep breathing. Shit. I took too long. Or is she pretending? Teasing me again?

I strip off the towel and let it drop then slip carefully in beside her. She doesn't move. I touch her arm underneath the sheets, slide my hand down to her wrist, then touch her hip with my fingertips. She's wearing underwear. I feel lace. Still she doesn't react. I'm aching to grab her and pull her on top of me, run my hands and my mouth all over her, feel her and taste her, but I can't. I won't. Because she's really asleep. I gently slide my hand onto her stomach, smooth and warm, and leave it there, feeling the air move in and out of her. In and out, in and out, a steady unbroken rhythm.

I feel warm and safe and in short order I join her in peaceful oblivion.

SIX

I WAKE UP with yellow light streaming through the almost transparent curtains and Lace is already awake and kissing me hungrily, her hands exploring as soon as she knows by my response that I am awake too.

SHE CLIMBS ON top of me and her hair is everywhere and I hold her muscular hips in my hands and her hands are claws on my chest and we look into each other's eyes like two people in a deep ocean holding desperately onto each other to keep from drowning.

LACE GASPS AND digs her fingernails into my chest and the pain only adds to the intensity, and then, finally, she collapses onto me and we're both breathing hard and I feel her shudder. And shudder again.

FOR A WHILE we're silent, listening to each other breathe. Then she giggles.

"What?" My voice comes out husky.

"That's the best ride I've had in a long time."

"You're welcome. I think my chest is bleeding." She laughs.

We make love again an hour later and this time we take our time. Then we sleep.

LACE STUDIES ME over her coffee cup. I'm busy putting away the eggs and bacon she threw together in a wellworn black castiron skillet. I stuff another huge forkful of dripping golden yolk into my mouth following by a big bite of toast. "These eggs are amazing," I say around the food. It comes out, "Thizzexer mazng." She's already eaten her single egg and slice of bacon and the other half of her toast sits on her plate.

"Fresh as they come," she says.

"Mm?"

"My own chickens. Got three running around out back."

I swallow a gulp of coffee to wash down the food. "Don't tell me this bacon comes from your own pig, too."

"Sure. I just slice off what I need."

I can tell something's on her mind by the way she sits holding her coffee cup in front of her with both hands and watching me eat. I put down my fork.

"What is it?" I say.

"What? Oh, nothing. Just thinking."

"Come on. Spit it out." It's always been strange to me how two people can reveal themselves so intimately, share themselves without reservation and feel impossibly close, then find it hard to have a meaningful conversation a few hours later.

She puts her coffee cup down. "Did you steal him?"

"Steal who?"

She frowns like she thinks I think she's an idiot. "Tango, obviously."

"Oh, him. No, of course I didn't steal him."

"He's not your horse, Corman. Don't bullshit me."

"I'm not trying to bullshit you, Lace. I never said he was my horse."

"I guess it never came up. But you didn't steal him?"

"No, I did not steal him. I promise."

"Because if there's one thing I won't abide it's a horse thief."

"What is this, 1870? Are you gonna string me up, Sheriff?"

"Where did you get him?"

"And what if I did steal him?" I'm starting to get kind of pissed now. "You didn't seem to have any qualms screwing the lights out of this potential horse thief last night."

"This morning."

"Okay, technically this morning. But the point still stands."

"So I lost my head. My mistake."

"It was a mistake?"

A slow smile. "No. I don't regret it. I'd do it over again in a second."

Now it was my turn to smile. "I'm glad to hear you say that. You want to know what I think?"

"Tell me."

"I think the possibility that I did steal Tango is what got you so excited in the first place. I think the idea of screwing a notorious horse thief turns you on."

"Screw you."

"Don't say it if you don't mean it."

I FEEL BAD about the broken plates and coffee cups but taking Lace on the kitchen table like the horny desperado she thinks I am overrides any thoughts of shattered crockery. After, when we're both still and breathing hard and covered in a sheen of sweat, I say in my best desperado growl, "And I might just steal your horses, too, lady."

"Over my dead body," she gasps.

"If you insist." I look around. "Now where the hell did I put my sixshooter?"

WE SIT DISHEVELED smoking at the table ignoring the mess around us. She has her head back, eyes closed, and it occurs to me that I've never seen a more beautiful woman than the one sitting right in front of me.

"I borrowed him," I blurt out. She opens one eye and looks at me. "Tango. I borrowed him."

"Is that what they call it in San Francisco? Borrowing?"

"No, really. I know this nutcase Margaret who's mad about horses. I borrowed Tango from her."

"Girlfriend?"

"One of many."

"I believe it. And does Margaret know you 'borrowed' Tango?" I don't answer. But that's answer enough. "Uh huh. Thought so." She sucks on her cigarette and nods and eyes me.

"Look, Margaret buys this horse then just brushes him all day long and goes on and on about how beautiful he is and his bloodlines and such and as far as I can tell never even rides the damn horse and that doesn't seem fair, such a nice pretty horse and all, so what's the harm in letting him out and get some fresh air and stretch his legs for once?" I start puffing on my cigarette like a madman until there's a cloud of smoke hovering over the table.

"What are you getting all excited about? I'm not saying anything."

"It's in your eyes."

"My eyes."

"Your eyes."

She sings: "You can't hide your lyin' eyes..."

"I'm going to return him, okay? I never planned on keeping him."

"I think you should at least tell her."

"I left her a note."

"What did it say?"

"Margaret. I can't go into a lot of detail, but I need Tango for a few days. Thanks. Cormac."

"A few days?"

"I didn't want her to worry."

"Or call the police."

"That either."

"And when was that?"

"That would be yesterday."

She studies her knee, scrapes at something with her thumbnail, then taps her ash out in the ashtray. "If somebody was to 'borrow' Paint or Redbo, I'd be hunting 'em with a shotgun soon as the sun came up."

"I believe you would. But Margaret doesn't own a shotgun, and she knows I wouldn't take Tango without a good reason."

"And what exactly would that reason be?"

"I really don't want to go into it."

"Fair enough."

She's quiet for a long time. I want to tell her the truth, tell her everything, but I can't, and I ponder why that is. I think it's because I don't want to admit that I ran away from the situation. That I'm a coward for not facing what I did and the real possibility that I will end up in jail. Better to let her think it is something so horrible that I don't want to shock her with the gory details. Although she doesn't seem like the type who shocks easily.

AFTER A LONG hot shower together we tumble into bed and mess up the sheets and fall asleep in each other's arms. When I wake up she's gone. And I mean gone. I get out of bed and wander around the empty house then see that her truck's gone. I pull on my jeans and shirt and find a cold Budweiser in the frig. I'm kicking back on the porch swing in the shade halfway through my second pisstasting Bud when I see in the distance the dustcloud from Lace's truck and then the truck glinting white in the sun and then she slides to a rock spitting halt in the driveway honking the horn. She jumps out with a box under her arm.

"There you are," she calls when she sees me.

"Here I am. That for me?"

"Sure is." She hops up onto the porch and tosses the box into my lap. It's heavy. "Well open it, ya darn fool."

I pull out a pair of grey cowboy boots with fancy stitchwork along the sides.

"Can't have you running around in your bare feet like some kind of white trash."

"Wow," is all I can say. "These are really nice."

"They're not made for lookin', ace. Put the damn things on." They fit perfectly once I get my feet into them. "Now you look like a cowboy."

"It's a start, anyway."

"Gotta start somewhere." She skips down the steps. "Now let's go."

I follow her out to the stables, where begins my education as a true cowboy. I learn how to saddle a horse and words such as halter and horn and bridle and withers and fetlock. Lace shows me how to swing up into the saddle and after about twenty tries I start to get the hang of it. Then she saddles up Paint and we circle around the enclosure and I learn how to walk and trot and canter. Walking and trotting aren't too bad, but the rhythm of the canter is more than my puny brain and reflexes and weak leg muscles can handle. And when it's clear that I'm not going to figure it out anytime soon and I'm just about to snap my tailbone on the saddle as my legs give out Lace has pity on me and rides up and grabs Tango by the rein and slows him to a walk.

"I swear Tango's trying to kill me," I say, standing in the stirrups and rubbing my aching ass.

"He'd be laughing if horses could laugh."

"You don't have to join him."

"That's enough for today."

"Thank you."

AFTER WE UNSADDLE and brush down Tango and Paint we lead all three horses out to the pasture and let them graze. We lean against the gate and Lace slides her hand into the back of my jeans and massages my tailbone.

"That's not the only sore spot," I say.

"No? Where else does it hurt?"

"Put it this way: I may never have children."

"More children?"

I know she's looking at me but I keep my eyes on the horses with their long necks stretched down snipping the long grass with their sharp front teeth.

"Any children."

She turns and leans sideways against the gate and gently cups my groin with her other hand. "Let's go inside and get some ice on these poor babies."

"Let's not."

WE'RE BEHIND THE house looking across about thirty feet of dirt at six beer bottles tied by string at the neck from a long rope suspended between two trees. Beyond that is an expanse of hilly woods. Lace extends her gloved right hand and points the shiny Colt revolver at the bottles. It's an Old West model that she told me she got from her father right before he died. She stands square to the targets with the palm of her gloved left hand resting on top of the hammer. With a sudden movement she cocks the hammer with her left hand then squeezes the trigger and the hammer breaks and there is an explosion dulled by the yellow foam earplugs she gave me and the leftmost bottle disappears leaving only a few inches of neck spinning from the string.

She levels the gun and repeats the process and another bang and the next bottle disappears and then she does it again. Three shots, three dead bottles. She holsters the gun on her upper thigh and puts her hands on her hips and looks at me with a big smile.

"Pretty good for a girl, eh?" she says loud enough to cut through the earplugs.

"You're just showing off."

She pulls her earplugs out and I do the same. "Ever shoot a pistol, Corman?"

"Never."

"Tain't hard." She withdraws the Colt and flips it in some deft way I can't follow that results in the handle toward me. I take it carefully like it might be extremely hot. It's heavy.

"Couple things. This is a single action revolver, not a modern double action. So you can't just pull the trigger. You have to cock the hammer first. Now I do it quickdraw style, with my left palm, but if you don't know what you're doing it tends to pull the barrel way off target, so what you want to do is—here, give it to me." She takes it by the barrel and then holds it pointing downrange with her left hand wrapped around her right in a squaredoff stance, both arms dead straight forming a triangle.

"Now cock the hammer with your left thumb." She raises her left thumb and places it on the etched hammer roof, but doesn't pull it back. "Then once it's cocked drop your thumb back and squeeze the trigger. Got it?"

I restrain the impulse to say something smart alecky. What does she think I am, a child? And what's with this two-handed grip shit? Does she seriously think I can't handle something as straightforward as your basic Old West sixshooter? Come on! I'm a guy! That's like having to explain to a guy how a hammer works, or how to throw a baseball. These things are part of our genetic makeup. We're born with them. This is fucking caveman stuff: hit with rock, throw spear, wrestle antelope.

"Gimme that thing," I grunt, ripping the gun out of her hand. I stand sideways like Clint Eastwood with the Colt in one hand and ignore Lacey's shouts of, "Ears! Ears!" and cock the hammer, which is a lot harder than I expect, and sight through my right eye and pull the trigger.

The damn gun practically flies out of my hand and the sound is like getting punched in both sides of the head simultaneously and my knees buckle and I bend forward and say something like, "Ahh!" or, "Shit!" or maybe, "Madre de dios!" and when I look up the three remaining bottles hang placid and undisturbed.

When the ringing in my ears abates some I hear Lace laughing her ass off. I don't look at her as I put my earplugs in and take a few breaths and line up again, right leg and right arm forward. This time I know what to expect. I cock the gun then grit my teeth and hold the damn gun as tight as I can with my whole arm as rigid as a steel rod and pull the trigger and it booms with a cloud of blue smoke and its only when I open my eyes that I realize I closed them and still the bottles hang there mocking me so close I could probably hit them with a rock.

I try again, this time taking my time aiming and making sure I squeeze the trigger slowly slowly but the kick still feels completely out of control and I miss again. I hear Lace say, "Still low and left." At this point my shoulder is starting to ache and the barrel of the Colt is shaking visibly so I let my arm drop and mutter, "This is ridiculous."

I take a step forward and she says, "Where are you going?"

"Where do you think? I'm going to get a little closer so I don't miss."

"You might want to reload first."

"Oh." I hand her the revolver and she pushes a lever on the frame and the cylinder swings free. She ejects the shells onto the ground then takes six cartridges out of the pocket of her jacket and reloads the cylinder then pushes it back into place with a click.

"There you go. And I've got plenty more."

"You won't need 'em, darlin'. I don't aim to miss no more."

And I'm not joking. This time I don't miss. How can you miss from three feet? Those are three dead bottles when I'm done and as the smoke clears I say to the swinging bottle necks, "Take that!" and turn to see Lace standing there arms folded, a scowl on her pretty face. I shrug.

As she's tying up six more bottles, she says, I think to make me feel better, "You know, that's a forty-five caliber round. It takes some time to get used to if you've never shot a pistol before. And ten paces is a lot further than it looks when your barrel is only six inches long."

It doesn't make me feel better. Especially when she comes back and shatters three bottles with three shots left-handed, quicker than the first time. Another shit-eating grin when she flips the Colt over and hands it back to me.

"Lots of practice."

This time I swallow my pride, determined to actually figure this out, and use two hands like Lace instructed. It takes all three shots, but I'm getting accustomed to the trigger and not anticipating the kick so much and finally on the third shot a bottle breaks.

"There you go!" She slaps me on the shoulder.

"If only that's the one I was aiming at."

TWO HOURS LATER my shoulders are killing me but I'm consistently hitting fifty percent of the time. As long as I really take my time. Lace shows off her quick draw skills, shooting from the hip in a blur that doesn't seem humanly possible. She stands in a slight crouch with her left leg slightly forward, her right hand a few inches from the gun handle, and her left hand flat just above her right hip. When she moves it's like a rattlesnake striking: sudden and precise and deadly. She tells me that thirty feet is much too far for any reasonable accuracy using a quickdraw motion, and sure enough she misses more than she hits. But when she moves in to about a dozen feet she's deadly accurate and doesn't miss once.

"That's a pretty small target," I say. "A lot smaller than a person."

"That's true. But I'm trying to kill him dead, not wing him. That bottle is the bad man's heart."

"Ah." Then I say, "Give me a rifle and I'll hit him in the heart at a hundred yards."

She looks at me. "Are you serious?"

"I grew up hunting. Been shooting rifles and shotguns since I was ten."

"In San Francisco?"

"Sure. You didn't know about the herds of elk that roam the city? And of course the homeless are always in season. No, my dad was from Canada. Nothing else to do up there but play ice hockey and hunt."

"You play ice hockey, too?"

"No, Dad wasn't much for hockey. He just loved to hunt. We'd take these long road trips into the mountains, up to Washington state a few times. But California's a big state, you know. Lots of good hunting."

She goes into the house and after a few minutes comes back with a lever action rifle and hands it to me. It's a beautiful Winchester 1894.

"Wow. This is nice."

"That was a present. Haven't really used it much."

"Loaded?"

"Eight rounds, .30-30."

"That'll work. Good deer round."

"Well don't just stand there gawking at it. Show me what you can do."

She sounds a little skeptical, maybe figuring I'm just talking shit to salvage some dignity after the abysmal display with the Colt. Like I wouldn't expect her to actually have a rifle to call my bluff with. But it's no bluff. I can shoot a damn rifle. I find that I'm a little nervous even so. Shooting an unfamiliar weapon is always tricky, even if it hasn't been fifteen years since you last went shooting.

"I've never shot one of these," I say. "I've only hunted with bolt-actions."

"Quit making excuses, Annie Oakley. And don't go shooting one of those bottles, either."

I smile. I'm not even considering it. That's not shooting, not with a rifle. I look out past the strungup bottles and spot a dead tree at about the right distance, between ninety and a hundred ten yards. I walk a few steps to my left to get a better angle then call Lace over. I gesture with my head.

"See that old dead tree out there?" She looks and nods. "See that broken branch sticking out to the left, about halfway up?" She nods again. "Say goodbye to it." She smirks.

Before bringing the rifle to my shoulder I study the trees for any breeze and figure a slight right to left blowing maybe three to five miles per hour. The doomed branch in question is almost horizontal, so I aim a few notches to the right of the knob I can just make out about halfway between the trunk of the tree and the end of the branch. I'm estimating that the branch is slightly bigger than my ankle, with the knob being about the size of my knee. Thirty caliber at a hundred yards will drop maybe one inch from dead flat, and the chances are very good that this rifle is zeroed at a hundred yards already. I'm counting on the branch being dry enough for the bullet to have the desired effect, but even so I can't be more than half an inch off center for it to work.

I bring the butt up to my shoulder, find the right spot, and pull it in tight. I lock both elbows down and set my cheek against the stock. God, it feels great. I lever in a round and gently put my finger against the trigger and take up the slack. I line up the sights and regulate my breathing until the tip of the rifle settles down. Then I slowly breathe out a final breath and when the sights move right on target I squeeze the trigger.

The rifle barks and I feel it jolt into my shoulder and I can't see through the smoke but I know I'm right on the money when I hear Lace say, "Well good god damn!" I lower the rifle and see half the branch lying on the ground snapped off right at the knob. There's a tiny puff of disintegrated woodpulp floating gently away from the truncated half still attached to the tree.

I take out my earplugs and Lace claps me on the shoulder. "That was one hell of a shot, cowboy!"

"You should see me with a scoped thirty-ought-six on a proper rest. Shoot the head off a squirrel at four hundred yards."

She pulls her Colt out and spins it like a Wild West cowgirl then lets out a banshee-like, "Heeeeeyahh!!!" and shoots a couple rounds into the sky.

SEVEN

THINGS ARE GOING so good with Lace that I know it can't last. Nothing good ever does. And I'm right. I also know that I can't stay forever, though I'm beginning to wish I could. I'm even beginning to think she wants me to stay, too. But, like these things tend to do, the end begins with a whisper, not a bang.

I'm slowly getting the hang of riding and we're venturing farther and farther from the house. On a day of mild weather and cotton candy clouds we bring along some lunch and are lying on a blanket eating cold fried chicken (from the market, not the backyard) and making our way pretty rapidly through a bottle of merlot I picked out. Yeah, I know you shouldn't have red wine with white meat, but I'm starting to feel like a goddamn cowboy, and I'm not drinking any girly white wine. And neither is Lace, by god.

The hobbled horses graze nearby and we watch dark clouds stacking up against the low hills to the west.

"Looks like rain's coming on," she says. Her face looks peaceful and perfect in the red sunlight.

"How long you lived out here, Lace?"

"My whole life, practically. Daddy came out here from Montana with me when I was three. Found a job on a ranch running cattle, the old Pendergrass spread. It got all split up and Daddy bought this place when I was about thirteen."

"How big is this place?"

"Originally it was two hundred twenty acres, give or take, but I've since sold off maybe fifty."

"You said your father came out here with you. Where was your mom?"

"Near as we could figure, she died."

"Near as you could figure?"

"Twister ripped through the mobile home park back in Montana, missed our place by ten feet. Daddy told me she was outside and the twister picked her right up off the ground and she flew away. Never saw her again."

"Jesus! What was she doing out there?"

"Trying to protect us, is what Daddy said."

"Protect you? How?"

"Standing out there with a shotgun yelling at that bastard twister to get the hell away from her family or else. Daddy said she got a shot off before the wind took her, and he always swore he heard another shot right after he lost sight of her." She looked over at me and forced a grin. "Daddy said she always did have a wild streak and wouldn't never take shit from nobody. Just bit off more'n she could chew this time."

"I'm so sorry to hear about that."

Lace shrugged, picked up a pebble and tossed it at a pink wildflower a few feet down the hill. "To be honest, I don't remember her or Montana or the freak twister. Maybe I blocked it all out."

"You were only three."

"Yeah."

"Your father never remarried?"

"Oh, sure. A bunch of times. They all left him eventually. He had a pretty mean streak, especially when he drank. His seventh marriage only lasted a week. Not long after that he drove his truck into a tree going fifty miles an hour. I heard they never even found all the pieces."

"Of his truck?"

"That too."

I take her hand and we don't talk for awhile. I feel terrible for her, and sorry that I asked about her past, since it turns out it was a real nightmare. I consider how my upbringing was pretty tame by comparison. Just some last child neglect, distant neurotic mother, workaholic father who died young of hypertension, manic depressive brother in and out of prison (in, last I heard), twin sisters with doctorates who pretend I died in childhood. Pretty standard stuff. Not even worth mentioning.

"But what about you?" I finally say, unable to stop probing.

"What about me?"

"Sexy cowgirl like you must have your pick of the herd. And you're single? Doesn't add up."

"I've tried serious relationships, Corman. Can't ever make it work. I have a bad habit of picking real horse's asses. Dangerous types who turn out to actually be dangerous. Or at least nasty."

She turns to study me. She says, "Maybe I just don't trust men anymore. Maybe I can't."

"I understand." I don't know what else to say. I don't know where that leaves me, where that leaves us, but more than anything I want to prove to her that I'm different. That not all men are bastards.

Lace studies the dark ruddy clouds building on the horizon like harbingers. Her voice is almost a whisper when she says, "Maybe it's time my luck changed."

"I'd say you're overdue."

Then we kiss, of course, a long and tender kiss.

TROUBLE ISN'T LONG in coming and it comes after two days and nights of rain. It's relatively early in the morning and I wake to Lace's kisses on my shoulder. I'm lying on my side facing the wall away from the window. The room is dark, the curtains pulled together, which strikes me as strange because Lace normally likes the window open at night, even when it rains. Especially when it rains.

Lace is behind me and I can feel the heat of her. Then her hand is on my hip as the kisses continue and she moves her hand down my thigh then suddenly stops as do the kisses. There is stillness and then she reaches over my leg and roughly grabs my nuts and her hand is far too large and nowhere near soft enough and then a deep voice says in alarm, "What the fuck?" and the sound of it scares the sleep right out of me and I leap out of bed.

The curtains are pulled open violently, light floods the room, and I see a naked black-haired man standing there at the window holding one of the curtains in his fist and looking at me in what can only be described as shock and revulsion. I can relate, because I'm standing against the wall, also completely naked, with what I'm positively convinced is the exact same expression on my face.

Now it's my turn to say, "What the fuck?"

We size each other up. There's no other way to say it. He's about my height, probably a few years younger, hard muscles and, unlike me, not an ounce of fat on him. His chest and stomach are covered with curly black hair and his dick is half engorged and looks just as angry as the rest of him. I notice him looking at my slightly less engorged and quickly diminishing dick and I look down and have to admit that he's got me in that department, too.

"Who the hell are you?" I say as he chuckles and straightens, obviously having decided that I pose no physical threat to him. I rise from my fight-or-flight crouch and try not to look scared.

"Who the hell are you?" he says back.

"I asked you first."

"Name's Johnny Ray. I'm Lace's husband."

"Don't you mean ex-husband?"

"Is that what she told you? Lyin' bitch." His eyes narrow. "And now it's your turn, partner. What the fuck are you doing in my bed?"

He lets go of the curtain and starts moving toward me. The bed is between us. I don't answer. I'm transfixed by the sheer physicality of this man, the primal threat of imminent destruction. He leaps onto the bed, standing over me with his hands in massive gnarled fists and I'm like a rabbit frozen in terror before the approaching wolf.

"Leave him alone!"

Lace's shout freezes both of us and I realize that I heard her running steps before I heard her voice and as Johnny Ray and I both turn to look something white flies across the room, barely missing Johnny Ray's face, and an egg splats against the green and red wallpaper behind the bed.

Lace stands there in the doorway with an egg in her hand, arm cocked, and another in her other hand.

"Well good morning to you, too, baby," says Johnny Ray flatly. "I see you ain't been wasting any time while I was gone." Lace lets fly another egg but Johnny Ray easily dodges it.

"You throw like a damn girl." No sooner are the words out of his mouth than the last egg shatters against his forehead. He shakes his head then growls, "You little bitch," and starts toward her. Without thinking I leap forward to grab him, but he sees me coming and stiffarms me in the face, then grabs me by the throat and forces me backward. I hit the wall hard and just as I'm congratulating myself on keeping him from going after Lace I feel the point of his knee slam into the pit of my stomach.

Pain arcs through me from my ass to my molars and all the air in my lungs leaves and I don't think it's coming back anytime soon. My knees give way and I feel myself sliding down the wall, Johnny Ray's hand still on my throat. He squeezes and I absurdly think how stupid it is to choke me when I can't breathe in anyway because my diaphragm has shut down. I grab his wrist with both hands, reflexively, but his arm feels like a carved piece of wood and I can't budge it.

I'm almost sitting on the floor now and I open my eyes and look up and he's above me with this crazy look in his eyes. I mean, there's way too much white around his irises and I wonder if he's going to kill me. He moves suddenly and his fist crashes into my face. I see sparklers erupt and oddly note the fact that a punch to the face is far less painful than a knee to the gut. Then he kneels on my nuts and I experience a whole new level of pain. It feels exactly how I imagine it would feel if someone was gutting you like a fish with a butterknife. I'm sure I would cry out if I had any air in my lungs.

Then I start to see sparks dancing before me and now I really want to get some air but his hand is squeezing my throat and somehow I know he is smiling and winding up for the coupe de gras when suddenly his hand is off my throat, which opens up and welcomes the great gasps of air I pull in. In seconds my vision clears.

I look up and Lace is there, her arm outstretched and the shiny beautiful barrel of her Colt pressed hard against Johnny Ray's temple, forcing his head almost sideways. She must have said something but I was too busy getting the shit beat out of me to hear it. But I hear what she says now.

"And not only that, you sonofabitch, but he's better in bed, too."

Johnny Ray stands up slowly and Lace keeps the barrel pressed into his head. I rub my throat with one hand and cradle my aching nuts in the other. The butter knife is still lodged in my lower intestines and it may take me a few minutes to stand up. But Lace seems to have the situation under control.

"You ain't gonna shoot me, Lace."

She pulls back the hammer with her thumb. "Try me."

Johnny Ray turns and backs up against the wall with a smile on his face. "Don't make me take that gun away from you. You know I'll do it." I look over at Lace and see just the slightest hint of something pass over her face, some kind of uncertainty. The barrel of the gun is only inches from Johnny Ray's face as he stands there with his hands up almost casually. He doesn't look scared. Could he actually take her gun?

I'm not going to wait and see. Johnny Ray's now pathetic-looking wrinkly sausage and its two hairy partners are almost eye level in front of me. I let go of my own balls and swing my open palm into Johnny Ray's nuts as hard as I can. My aim is true and with a grunt he collapses onto the bed in a fetal position. He's lying there groaning and I'm on my hands and knees looking at his bicycling feet in front of my face and just before I can grab one and bite off a few toes Lace pulls me to my feet.

"Put some damn pants on," she says. I glance at Johnny Ray, who is curled up with both hands between his legs, looking at me in pure rage. I pull my jeans off the back of the desk chair and notice that the closet door is open wide. Hanging on a hook on the inside of the door is Lace's gunbelt.

"Get up, J.R.!" Lace yells. "Get your ass up off my goddamn bed! Get up!"

Johnny Ray rolls off the far side of the bed. He raises himself to his full height and I can see it hurts to do it.

"I just come to get what's mine, girl."

"Oh? Is that why you were in my bed naked?"

"Nah. That was just for old time's sake."

"Well you're just bound to be doubly disappointed, then. Redbo ain't yours anymore."

"Now Lace, that ain't fair, and you know it."

"Fair, J.R.? That's what the judge decided, and you know it. And I agree it ain't fair. You don't even want to know what I think would be fair."

The coldness in Lace's voice is chilling.

Johnny Ray stares at her with a look of pure hatred and then slowly leans down toward the crumpled jeans on the floor next to his discarded shirt and carefully placed boots.

"Nope. Leave 'em. Just get the hell out of here."

Johnny Ray stops, bent over, hand extended.

"Now. Leave."

"If you think I'm going to walk out of here buck naked—"

"It's either that or carried out on a door."

Johnny Ray's face darkens and he reaches for his pants. There is an explosion and smoke fills the room and Johnny Ray jumps back and yells, "Shit!" A wisp of smoke rises from the hole in the crotch of his jeans. Johnny Ray turns and looks at Lace as at a madwoman, and she recocks the Colt.

"You crazy bitch!" he says in a low voice.

"Oh, I'm just warming up. Reach for those clothes again and you're going to be missing fingers."

He pauses, weighs, then comes to a decision and storms from the room. Before he gets to the front door he turns and says, "We're not done, Lace." Then he looks at me and pulls the door open with a bang that breaks some of the glass in the diamond panes.

"Oh yes we are, J.R. We're done," Lace calls after him.

We walk to the open front door and watch him and his naked ass marching away. When he gets off the small front lawn and onto the gravel driveway he turns and yells, "At least give me my boots, for god's sake. And my wallet. Lace!" He's almost pleading now. Lace lifts the gun and with deliberation aims it at his heart.

"All right, all right! Fuck!" He turns and heads down the muddy driveway swearing.

We watch him go about fifty yards and it's a truly pathetic sight. Whatever vehicle he drove here in is out of sight. Wanted his arrival to go unnoticed. Just as I'm wondering how the hell he's going to drive it without keys Lace decocks her pistol and hands it to me then goes into the bedroom. She emerges with Johnny Ray's boots in one hand and her gunbelt on her waist. I hold out the gun and she takes it and holsters it without pausing then leaps down the front steps. When she gets across the lawn and to the driveway she yells until Johnny Ray hears her and turns around. She reaches into one of the boots and throws a wallet toward Johnny Ray. It opens and flaps and lands in a puddle. Then she reaches back into the boot and throws his keys and they twinkle in the air and I can hear them splat when they hit. Johnny Ray only hesitates a moment before trudging back up the driveway. His feet are black with mud.

When he gets to the keys and digs them out of the muck, Lace puts his boots upright and together in front of her then backs off about five paces. She stands with her hands on her hips facing him as he walks forward and picks up his soaked wallet. Johnny Ray hesitates, watching Lace, who doesn't move. He's looking at the gun in the holster. No longer in her hand.

He approaches his boots and I can see the gears turning in his head like his skull is plastic: Can I make it? He's calculating whether he can rush her from where the boots are, knock her down, get the gun. It's only a few steps, even though the mud makes his footing questionable. I want to shout: Lace! What are you doing? Be careful! But the words get stuck in my throat.

Then I understand. She knows exactly what she's doing. And sure enough as Johnny Ray slowly leans forward, reaching toward his boots, and at the precise moment that he must be about to spring toward her, Lace moves and one of Johnny Ray's boots jumps into the air and flies spinning lazily behind him, spraying mud in a wide arc.

Lace stands in a slight crouch with her gun at her hip and her left hand poised just over it. Johnny Ray is still leaning over, his hand reaching for a boot that is no longer there. He looks up at Lace without standing then Lace moves again, another bang and smoke, and the other boot flies away. Johnny Ray straightens and stares into the barrel that Lace points at his face. They exchange words but I'm too far to hear anything. I see Lace cock the hammer with her thumb and whatever convincing Johnny Ray needs, that seems to do the trick. He turns and walks away. Lace keeps her arm raised, the gun on him, as he picks up his boots and jams his mudcaked feet into them. He walks away at a leisurely pace and doesn't look back.

Lace lowers the gun and I hear her yell, "Just keep walking, you bastard!" His hand comes up, middle finger extended, but he doesn't turn. I have to admit the butt-nekkid cowboy walking into the sunset in gunshot muddy boots almost makes me laugh. And I might, if not for the swelling of my left eye, which is beginning to block my vision, and the girl in the road with a gun still in her hand.

YOU OKAY?" I say when she comes back to the porch.

"I was going to ask you the same thing."

"I'd be a lot worse if not for you."

"I couldn't just stand there and watch him beat the living shit out of you."

"I was just playing possum. He fell right into my trap."

"You're clearly a lover, not a fighter."

"I think I heard you tell him that."

"I told him. I wasn't lying."

"Thanks."

"You pack a pretty mean nutslap, though."

"Learned that move from my brother when I was just a wee lad. It was one of his favorite ways of showing his affection. The other was throwing darts at the back of my head."

"That's so sweet."

"Enough about my wonderful childhood. You got anything in the freezer I can put on my eye?"

She studies me, shakes her head. "That's going to be real pretty tomorrow. C'mon." She takes my hand and we go into the kitchen. She sits me down at the table then roots around in the freezer.

"Who was that maniac? He said he was your husband."

"He would. We've been divorced for six months after being married for three years. He won't accept that it's over."

"Does he come by here a lot?"

"Every once in a while. I thought I was quit of him. Haven't seen him for about a month, ever since I changed my number to keep him from calling me. I should have let him have Redbo six months ago so he wouldn't have an excuse to keep coming back. But that horse is too good for him."

She pulls a bag of frozen beans out and shuts the door. She places it gently on my eye. "Hold it on here for fifteen or twenty minutes."

She takes off her gunbelt and hooks it over the chairback then goes into the bedroom and comes back out dialing her cellphone. She stands looking out the kitchen window as she talks, looking down the driveway.

"Hi, Merle. It's Lace Cantwell."

I didn't even know her last name was Cantwell. She never mentioned it.

"J.R. was just here. At the house. No, Merle, I am not kidding you. Well what do you think he wanted? Same thing he always does, Merle. Yeah, I'm okay. But it got real ugly. I actually had to draw on him, Merle. Do you hear what I'm saying? No, I didn't shoot him. Damn near to it, though. Sure wanted to. No, he's gone. Left here in nothing but his boots. Well I'll be sure to tell you sometime. But Merle? Do you remember what you told me last time I saw that bastard? I'm not asking you to keep him locked up. I'm just asking you to put the fear of god into him so he stays the hell away from me. Well, you'd better do something, Merle, because next time I will shoot him. I swear to god. I'll do it, Merle. You do that. I thank you kindly." She pushes the end call button and drops the phone onto the counter.

"Sheriff Merle Rains. Said his hands are tied unless J.R. actually touches me."

I nod. "Like he touched me. Where I come from it's called assault and battery."

"Around here it's called a minor disagreement."

She sits down and lights a cigarette, hands it to me, lights another for herself. "Last time I saw him he told me he'd changed, told me he'd stopped drinking and acting wild. Said he wouldn't ever—" She stops and stares at the table for a bit. "Said he'd treat me right, like in the beginning." She laughs, looks at me. "You saw how much he's changed." She looks down again. " Asshole."

Then she says, "I wanted to shoot him. There, in the driveway. Just put a bullet right through that smug face. I'd say through the heart, but he ain't got one."

"I'm glad you didn't. Shoot him, I mean."

"Yeah. I guess. Hey, you want a beer?"

"It's kind of early."

"Just one. I could really use a beer." She gets up and opens the frig, takes out a Sierra Nevada Amber Ale. "Even one of these homo beers you like." She holds it up, raises her eyebrows in question. I give in and nod, reach for the bottle. She grabs another one and pops the lids with a bottle opener from the silverware drawer.

We clink bottles and she says, "To exes. May they all rot in hell." She takes a long drink. "I should have at least kept his keys. Made him walk back to town like that."

"Why didn't you?"

"Didn't want to give him a reason to come back."

BUT HE DOES come back. With guns ablazing. It's only three or four nights later. It's late, sometime after midnight. Lace is in bed sleeping, and I'm still up watching some stupid movie on TV. I don't hear his truck because he parked down the hill again. The first I hear of him is his boots on the porch. Then the door swings open and he walks right in, leaving it open. Lace never bothered to lock it. She said she'd never live with locked doors. So Johnny Ray strolls right in with a gun in one hand and a beer in the other and says, "Hello, fuckface," and shoots me.

The bullet hit me in the chest and slams me back into the couch where I've started to rise from. It feels like I've been kicked by a horse and I hear another boom but don't feel anything as I'm falling sideways. I grab my chest and my hand is instantly covered with blood but I'm still conscious and I see Johnny Ray look around with red eyes and yell, "Where are you, bitch?"

He looks down the short hallway and sees the closed bedroom door. He strides down the hallway and kicks the door off its hinges with one kick and then he slaps the wall a few times and the light comes on and past him I see Lace sitting up in bed with her breasts exposed.

"Who's got the gun now, you stupid bitch!" Johnny Ray shouts, his words slurred. I try to move, try to get off the couch, but it's like my arms and legs are deadwood. I wonder if the bullet hit my spine and paralyzed me.

"Get the fuck out of here!" I hear Lace scream. "Get out of my house!" Johnny Ray is moving now, around the bed, the gun still pointing at Lace.

"I'll leave, all right. But not before I get what I came for." I see Lace get out of bed and she's naked and she tries for the door but Johnny Ray grabs her by the hair—that long beautiful hair—and throws her onto the bed. She bounces up but he kicks her in the stomach and she collapses. I try to yell, but nothing comes out but bubbles and I taste blood. I will my legs to move and they do but it's like I'm underwater or under a ton of dirt and I have no strength at all.

I see Johnny Ray on top of Lace and her legs are flailing and her arms whirlwind at his face even though he is holding her down with one hand and pointing the gun at her. I see him raise the gun and point it at the ceiling and then swing it like a club and then Lace falls limp. And then the fear is replaced by something else and it's pure rage and all I want to do is get up and get my hands on that sonofabitch and choke the life out of him. I start to sit up, watching as Johnny Ray gets off the bed and undoes his belt buckle and pulls his pants down, and I see his goddamn naked ass again and he puts the gun down on the bed and pulls Lace's legs apart and I try to scream NO! but nothing comes out.

I'm sitting up now as he climbs on top of her and I hear him saying something, talking, but I can't make out the words and I'm almost on my feet now, but then a massive pain blasts through my chest and right down my spine and up into my brain and the room starts rocking and fading and I fall, fall like a useless weakling onto my face and everything goes dark.

But I don't think I pass out completely because the lights come back on and I'm on the floor looking down the hallway from under the coffee table, but I can't see too well and I all I hear is my own blood pounding in my ears. I try to get up but I can't move and then there is a flash of light in Lace's room and an explosion and I feel a shock hit me because I know oh god I know that it's a gunshot and that he's killed her and I think I scream but I'm not sure it might be just in my head and then I black out.

(To Be Continued......)
