 
177

The Amish Spaceman

by

Stephen Colegrove
Copyright Information

THE AMISH SPACEMAN

Copyright 2014 Stephen Colegrove

First Edition: January 2014

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as permitted under Sections 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written permission of the Publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate per-copy fee to the Copyright Holder. Requests for permission should be directed to Stephen Colegrove via e-mail at colegrov@hotmail.com.

Cover design by Stephen Colegrove, Paul Colegrove, Jerry Farris

Editing by Alice Dragan (alicedit.com)

Soundtrack by Stephen Colegrove and Alice Dragan

Find out more about the author and upcoming books at the links below:

amishspaceman.com

 Facebook

Twitter @stevecolegrove

Also by the author:

A Girl Called Badger

The Dream Widow
Table of Contents

Title

Copyright Information

Author's Note

Not A Foreword

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Spurious Footnotes

Full Soundtrack

Coming Soon
Author's Note

At the beginning of each chapter is a selection of three musical tracks, intended to complement the reading experience like a box of wine complements a Mars bar. Speaking of which, a box of wine (any flavor) and a chocolate snack would be a perfect addition to the enjoyment of this novel. I'm not saying it's required, but it would certainly be appropriate and definitely ironic to read the book half-drunk and with a belly full of sugary sweets, as this was the same state as the author when he wrote it.

Since my legal team advised against hand-delivering a mix CD to the home address of everyone who purchases the book, I have created a soundtrack on Spotify. The full tracklist is also included after Chapter Twenty.

 The Amish Spaceman on Spotify

Alternate link

I wanted to dedicate this book to several individuals important to the creation of this work and to whom I paid vast sums of treasure, but like my therapist, they were adamant that no form of public acknowledgment was necessary or even desired. In any case, you know who you are, and if you don't, here's mud in your eye!

S.C.
Not A Foreword

Against the advice of my editor, publicist, agent, lawyer, and gardening team, I've decided not to include a foreword. I find them tacky, offensive, and a waste of time. For me, not the reader. The twelve minutes I'd need to write and edit a proper foreword is twelve minutes taken from my life. That's twelve minutes when I could be pulling the cat from the crawlspace, teaching the children musketry, or farming virtual trading cards on Steam. I think everyone who's still reading and hasn't skipped this bit will agree that those activities are a far better way to spend the currency of life.

My editor has just informed me that just because I say this isn't a foreword doesn't make it not a foreword, and that I should stop typing everything she says and grow up this isn't the way adults discuss things anyway Steve and you know, right, that you're not getting paid by the word like I am. Of course I knew that.

Enjoy the book!

S.C.
**Amish spaceman** |ˈämiSH ˈspāsˌmaen, -mən|

compound noun ( pl. Amish spacemen )

  1. (offensive) a person, usually male, focused on a single hobby or occupation to the detriment of a personal life (see otaku, Japanese)

  2. a dork

Tracklist:

Moi Je Joue - Brigitte Bardot, Alain Goraguer

Saturday In The Park - Chicago

Computer Games - Mi-Sex

1

The book flew from the hand of the publishing executive, bounced off Dean's face, and hurtled out the open window. The spinning, half-pound snowflake of doom fell ten stories and struck a girl from Kamchatka who would later become Dean's wife.

Dean rubbed the sting from his forehead. Ignoring the screams from outside, he pointed a trembling finger at the pants-suited executive.

"Listen––that's no way to treat a semi-athletic Caucasian man of average height in his mid-thirties!"

The woman tapped fingernails on her desk and Dean began to sweat, as if the sound was the drumroll of his literary execution. After having his novel chucked in his face, he wouldn't have been surprised if she reached into a drawer for a double-bladed axe. Any tool of wood-choppery or medieval off-head-putting, in fact, would have complemented her severe bun of blonde hair and tailored black suit.

"Mr. Cook, there's nothing average about you," she said. " 'Below average' is the word I would use, with 'shockingly' as the preceding modifier. Modifiers, of course, are something with which you're intimately familiar. I haven't seen this much purple prose and overuse of adjectives since high school, and don't get me started on the bad grammar, shifting perspective between chapters, and the sexist cover!"

"How dare you," said Dean. "How absolutely ... dare you. The goldmine of your publishing career lands in your ample lap and this is the response I receive. Is this America or was I suddenly transported to a Gestapo colony on the Moon? A man who is legally confirmed to have spent a third of his life in college, thank you very much, writes the story of his formative years beneath an abandoned Mercury Grand Marquis on the banks of the Ohio with nothing but a stick called Pickle to sing him to sleep and you have the absolute nerve to call it rubbish?"

The editor slowly removed horn-rimmed glasses from her face and rubbed her eyes.

"I apologize, Mr. Cook. Before our relationship on this Earth––or, as you allege, the Moon––has ended, allow me to say one thing: SHUT UP AND GET OUT!"

Dean brushed a hand through his feathered chestnut hair. "That's two things."

"I can't sell a book with a mud-covered, naked woman on the cover!" sputtered the executive. "Not to mention the title, which is 'Space Clothes.' Are you on medication ... yet?"

Dean held up his hands. "I know, I know, but that wasn't me, that was the marketing guy––I mean team, marketing team. A naked girl cannot fail to attract the male demographic, and that's not mud, it's chocolate. We all know women go crazy for the stuff. 'Space Clothes' to attract both nerds and women who don't fancy chocolate. They like fashion. And shopping, but that's just common sense, a bonus when you're doing business with Dean Cook and Kiss the Cook Productions. When I slide up to the publishing table, you don't get an author. Well, you DO get that, but you also get a marketing genius. I've got one finger on the carotid artery of the American consumer, and the other four sort of near the artery but not pressing too hard. I don't want anyone to pass out."

The editor gave Dean a shockingly dour look, one that would have fit in perfectly behind the reception desk of Nazi Moonbase Ein.

"I'm calling security," she said.

WITH AS MUCH HASTE as a middle-aged man can muster when he is the one upon whom security has been called, Dean took the steps two at a time. Behind him clattered an Asian woman in sensible heels, cardigan, and denim skirt.

"Dean, slow down!"

"No time," he gasped between breaths, wondering if the tai chi classes he'd taken for five years at the community college had finally shown their value.

Soaked in sweat, he stopped at the steel door to the lobby, and the Asian woman collided into his lower back like a tiny linebacker. Dean slammed painfully into the steel surface and both crashed to the floor.

"Lin!"

"Sorry! I'm sorry."

She scrambled to her feet and tugged on Dean's left arm like the butter-churning queen of Lancaster, Pennsylvania.

"Bad arm! That's the bad arm," yelled Dean.

"Sorry! I forgot."

Dean stood up and rubbed his shoulder.

"Lin Alice Anderson, how could you forget? Your personal assistant star has been hitched to my rising motivational speaker star long enough to remember it was your fault I dislocated the thing."

"But––"

Shouts and a thunder of galloping shoes came from the stairs above.

"Never mind that!"

Dean pushed the door into the lobby and narrowly avoided another thundering herd, this one dressed in tuxedos. He flattened against the wall of the lobby as a stream of elegantly dressed men rushed by, words of a strange language on their lips and concerned looks on their pale faces, as if they were missing a really good sale.

Dean raised his voice to be heard over the slap of dress shoes on marble.

"See anyone you recognize?"

"Just because I was born in San Jose doesn't mean I know everyone," said Lin. "This isn't Ohio."

Dean shrugged and surveyed the black-tie marathon. Even in a strange state like California these dapper dandies dressed too well to be security. He suspected something incomprehensible such as a charity 5K for sacrificing young ladies to Mitsubishi the Cat-God or to prevent such horrors, but this chaotic gathering was most likely the funeral for a reality-TV star, or a retirement party for a member of the state senate.

The herd had thinned to a few cardio-challenged stragglers, when the glass doors of the lobby slammed open and a female Golden Horde burst inside, their high heels tapping a staccato below dresses as tight as garden hoses. The babbling stream of embroidered tubes clicked over the marble, seemingly propelled by 747-sized contrails of Chanel No. 5. The women were of all ages and pale of skin like their male vanguard. Strange, frantic words burbled from their red-lipsticked mouths, while their dark eyes looked Dean up and down and quickly discarded his existence. They were definitely searching for someone, but like most women he'd met between the ages of sixteen and sixty, it was definitely not Dean.

A burly, gray-uniformed guard erupted from the stairwell with a slam of metal.

"There he is! Get him!"

Dean certainly did not want to be "got" and immediately became as panic-stricken as the worst of the finely dressed women. He grabbed Lin and pushed into the protective eye of the female hurricane, shouting words he thought sounded foreign. The crowd exited the building through the west entrance, startling twelve passers-by and one pigeon. With Lin right behind, Dean squeezed free of the packed women like a melon seed and ran to the street. He waved at a green-and-white taxi and it stopped next to the curb.

"Where to?" asked the cabbie.

"Foolappa lippa loppa––sorry, I mean Sunnyvale," said Dean.

DEAN GREW UP ON A FARM in Ohio so distant from anything that the Amish came there to "get away from it all." Even people from Cincinnati thought he lived in the sticks. The general opinion in the countryside was that if you could hit your neighbor's door with a .22 rifle then you were "boxed-in" and "might as well move to the city and wear pantyhose," as Dean's mother used to say.

For reasons not unrelated to women's hosiery, his parents eventually moved to northern California. After his graduation from college, Dean chose to live in Sunnyvale, the safest splotch in the vast and violent sprawl of the Santa Clara Valley. The fact that the firefighters of this enterprising municipality were all sworn police officers and carried firearms was the prime reason for the security, in Dean's opinion. Even more critical than that critical fact, it was where Dean's roommate slash girlfriend lived, and that meant he slash lived there slash had his mail slashed open there too.

Dean had the cab pull over a few blocks from the house in case he was still being followed by security from the publisher. He attempted a rakish posture by leaning inside the cab to speak to Lin. This was futile, since every second-grader knows it is impossible to look 'hip' or 'cool' or 'sick' with your upper body inside anything.

"Head to Michael's and buy some card stock and red food coloring," said Dean. "When you get back, I'll dictate a letter to that Nazi editor."

"Nazi who?"

"Never mind that, just get going!"

Lin nodded and the cab zoomed away, almost garroting Dean around the neck with the door frame.

The morning was bright, and even though he'd just experienced a triple negative of rejection by a publisher, tramplation by strange foreign ladies, and almost-head-removation by a cab window, Dean was happy. Somehow he obtained a delightful contentment from the bland panorama of California suburbia: the well-sprinkled lawns, the waves of whispering leaves on the branches of oldish-growth trees, the streets full of beautiful houses in a perpetual state of refurbishment, refinance, and resale. He knew the book would sell once he found an agent, but in many ways it didn't matter––the conference was next week and who was a keynote speaker? He was! Due to persistent, unsolicited, and anonymous emails from Dean, Robert Timmins was guaranteed to attend, guaranteed to hear Dean's words of wisdom, and guaranteed to have the razor-sharp message of Dean's motivational spear chucked through his forward-thinking brain. He'd have no option but to hire Dean Cook as opening act for the spring tour of "Timmination."

Dean marched confidently up the walkway of his house with the stride of a conquering hero, opened the front door, and Joanie punched him in the face.

"What the flip!" he said, as he sprawled backwards into the flower garden, trying and failing to avoid the camellias.

"You bastard," said Joanie. "Who is she? How long has this been going on?"

"What are you talking about?"

Joanie shook her head. "Say something less predictable, please. How about: 'Ooo, look at me. I'm Dean Cook, a princess like my father and clean as the wind-driven snow.' Yellow snow is more like it!"

Dean waved at the elderly man peering over the fence next door. "Yes, hello, we're fine, Mr. Gunderson."

"I never let those college boys come to the house," said Joanie, in a matter-of-fact tone. "And when they wanted to invite the rest of their friends, I put my foot down. I have some decency about me, not like you––I went over to the frat house instead."

"I don't understand."

"Shut up and listen, former ex-boyfriend."

Joanie turned, and her blonde hair fanned in a flat, golden circle: the mirror image of Dean's favorite Pantene commercial. This never failed to disrupt the electrical impulses in Dean's sinoatrial node, and she knew it.

Dean clutched his chest and gasped. "Former ... and ex ... That's a double negative."

"Quiet. I'm trying to explain why I never brought the three lumberjacks that I met at the Blue Onion back here: we got a room at Quality Inn like decent human beings. Everything stays out of the home, Dean. Do you think the eye exams I had every week with Dr. Goldhammer were real? That all the police johnnies use my first name because I clean the department every Friday? Isn't it strange that our phone goes out at night and the repairman needs me to go out to his truck and help fix it? You can't be that dumb. Or are you?"

"I ... uh ... I thought you were just being nice."

"No, I sleep around. What I don't do is have sex where I sleep. You broke that rule, Dean, and I want you out."

"But I didn't do anything! Honestly, I have no idea what on earth is going on."

Joanie crossed her arms. Dean tried to keep her gaze and not catch a last glance of her tight yoga pants. Intuition told him that he wouldn't be seeing much of her toned thighs in the future. Not that he saw them frequently, anyway.

"A girl left five minutes ago," she said. "Chirping and burbling with a strange accent. She was crying, literally kneeling at my feet and begging for something. Do you know what that something was?" She touched Dean's nose with her index finger. "You. Dean Cook."

"I swear I don't know her!"

"Then this fat woman pushes inside like a tank roaring up Omaha Beach. She tells me you owe them money, that you have to marry the girl." Joanie spread her arms. "Is that what it's come down to, Dean? Giving money to underage whores who can't tell a soul about the horrible things you do to them? My mother was right. She may have thought squirrels were messengers from God and that beer kept the body hydrated, but she was right about you."

"Joanie, this is all a big misunderstanding."

"I'm sure it was. I'm sure the poor girl didn't realize how little you were planning to pay for a private show of 'Superman Meets Batgirl.' When the fun was over and the yelling started, Dean, did you hit the girl? Or did you simply jump out her bedroom window?"

"It's nothing like that!"

Joanie touched his nose again. "I'm only going to say one thing––"

Dean sighed. "Okay, I'm leaving."

JOANIE GAVE HIM five minutes to pack. Dean threw clothes and as many books and promotional materials as he could into a suitcase. Joanie offered to drive him somewhere like the Quality Inn, but a breeze blew through the last shreds of his pride and Dean refused.

He walked toward the nearest intersection, grimly holding a giant sombrero onto his head as a breeze tried to blow it straight to the bay. The hat was a reminder of the trip to Cabo with Joanie, the best trip he'd ever had in his life, and he'd be damned if it was going to stay on her wall or be filled with nacho chips by the next football team in her life. On Maude Avenue he waved down a cab and took it to Lin's house in Palo Alto.

The high branches of old-growth trees covered a street resplendent in faux neo-Edwardian, faux neo-Italianate, and faux neo-modern design. Lin owned a nice enough faux post-Eichler ranch house with a well-tended hedge and lawn. The only problem was the pink ambulance in the driveway. Gray primer spots covered the battered vehicle and a white racing stripe slashed diagonally across the left side.

Dean held his sombrero in one hand and pushed the doorbell with the other. A speaker crackled with a young man's voice.

"Go away. I'm working."

"Chip, it's Dean. I need to speak to your mother."

"About your horrible fashion choices?"

Dean sighed. "No, Chip."

"About Chip? That's me!"

"Stop acting like a teenager and open up."

A mechanism clacked inside the lock and Dean pushed the door open. He stepped into an environment of stark contrasts, an extreme battle zone of cultures. Framed prints from Target gave a slight impression of Impressionist flowers, while paintings of Parisian trolleys faced a variety of wrinkled posters of bikini-clad girls, all unbelievably ecstatic while holding a bottle of beer, showering in beer, or both. Discarded cans of Mountain Dew and empty fast-food boxes were scattered across the furniture and competed with carefully tended orchids for breathing room.

A squishy noise and synthesized screams of horror came from upstairs. Dean left his suitcase in the living room and walked up the steps to the second floor. A female mannequin with a giant bust and equally massive assault rifle blocked the stairwell. Dean squeezed past the extremely large lady-parts and climbed the rest of the way to Chip's room.

If downstairs had been a battle zone, Chip's bedroom had lost the war. Movie and game posters covered the walls and darkened the windows. Green and black video game boxes cluttered the floor along with empty cans of Diet Pepsi. A man-sized Godzilla costume stood in one corner.

Chip sat in front of a widescreen monitor larger than the last television Dean had owned, and which unfortunately for him, now belonged to Joanie. On the huge screen in front of Chip a cartoonish man on a bicycle pedaled furiously across a bridge of steadily falling bottles. He didn't pedal fast enough and fell into a pit of spikes with a horrific splat and shower of blood. Chip sighed. He clicked a button and the screen refreshed, with the cartoon man and his bicycle at the starting line.

"That's completely unrealistic," said Dean. "The human body doesn't contain that much blood. Out of anyone, I should know."

The gimbals in Chip's office chair squealed as he turned to glance at Dean.

"And here's the pizza boy. Say hello to everyone, Dean!"

"Everyone?"

Chip waved at a camera clamped above the monitor. "You! I'm recording."

"Oh. Hello, everyone. It's a bit odd not knowing who I'm talking to. I hope they're not bloodthirsty aliens watching us from orbit. Exterminate, exterminate, we need the bodies of your women for fuel, ha ha. I'm sorry, that's sexist."

"Girls and aliens don't watch gaming videos on YouTube, Dean. Mom's not here?"

"I sent her out for some supplies."

"Not for a 'red-light special,' I hope. You said you wouldn't make her do that anymore."

Dean flushed. "I didn't! She's shopping for craft supplies."

"I don't know what's more embarrassing for you, Dean––needing my mom to pick up hookers, or needing my Mom to pick up craft supplies."

"That was just one time!"

"It's a joke, boss. Don't have a stroke. Wave goodbye to the PewPew Party."

Dean left without acknowledging the unseen party behind the camera; a severe violation of several interstellar protocols if they had been extraterrestrials who preferred confectionary of a human female nature. He leaned his sombrero against a wall of the living room and cleared off the sofa to relax. He wanted to lie down for only a moment but fell into a deep sleep, even with the plethora of squishes and screams emanating from upstairs.

A hand touched his shoulder. Since he had retained from birth that not-quite-peculiar trait of waking instantly upon being touched, Dean woke instantly.

"Mother!" he yelled.

Lin stood over him, a shopping bag in her hand.

"I'm sorry, it's me. Here's the food coloring and the craft paper you wanted."

Dean sat up. "I'm glad you're back, Lin, but we've got more important problems. Kiss The Cook Productions has been forced to vacate."

Lin touched his forehead with a cold hand. "Are you feeling okay?"

"I'm fine. Well, not really. Joanie kicked me out."

"Why?"

"It doesn't matter, I just need to stay here tonight. Obviously not HERE here, because Holy Space Cats look at the stains on this sofa, but 'here' in general, by which I mean your house. Definitely not your bed; I'll stop you right there if that was the next question."

Lin put a hand on her waist. "Right, Dean. But why not a hotel?"

"I know that staying here is a violation of employer–employee relations, Lin, but do you want me to sleep in a crime-ridden, urine-stained hotel? Or even worse, on the crime-ridden, urine-stained streets?"

"This is Palo Alto, Dean, not Richmond. The streets aren't like that."

"Lin, if you write up a temporary contract for lodging, I promise to review and probably sign it. Submit a daily, itemized report for any food and toiletries I use, and I'm sure it will be approved as quickly as possible. By me. No report––no reimbursement, that's my motto."

"I thought your motto was 'I Give Up.' "

Dean scowled. "Get with the program. That's just for the punters in the peanut gallery. I'll need you to also create a database of rentable apartments in the area. Nothing above two grand."

"But I thought you were flying to Charleston tomorrow?"

"I'll need someplace to stay when I get back."

LIN PREPARED A DINNER of noodles and vegetables foreign to anyone born east of Lodi. Dean disliked trying to remember what the dishes were called because something important would have to be shoved out of his brain. Did he want to replace the memory of stripping off his clothes as a six-year-old and running happily through the pasture until his mother called the state policeman who slipped in a cow-pie and broke his leg, with the name of a vegetable dish? Exactly.

As Lin's boss, mentor, and now sub-lettor, Dean felt uncomfortable making small talk at the dinner table. After approximately thirty seconds, however, Chip's bored expression began to grind away at his patience.

"So, Chip, me ol' mucka me ol' pal ... I thought you were at Stanford."

"I was. I quit a few months ago."

Lin smiled broadly. "He's an entrepreneur now."

Dean covered his mouth and leaned closer to her. "I know this is California, but that's too personal," he whispered. "I don't need to know these things."

"What are you talking about Dean? He's got his own company."

"Right. Yes, I see. That's what I meant, of course. Does this company make video games?"

"No, just playing and recording them for a million subscribers," said Chip, through a mouthful of noodles. "I had an interview with the L.A. Times last week, and Microsoft wants me to host their awards show at E3."

"What's an E3?"

"Only the biggest electronic entertainment expo in the world."

"He makes twelve thousand a month," said Lin.

Dean coughed and a bit of green vegetable flew from his mouth.

"I see," he said hoarsely. "Do you think I could record a few videos? I'm extremely good at Transport Tycoon, and in college I was so well known for playing Uncharted Waters that they called me ... 'that guy that plays Uncharted Waters.' "

Chip shoved more noodles into his mouth and chewed slowly for a change. He swallowed at last and cleared his throat.

"Subscribers want the latest games like Irresponsible Dad or PTSD Babe. Transport Tycoon––even if we're talking about the deluxe version––was popular in Germany twenty years ago and won't get you viewers or have the gaming industry beating a path to your door."

Someone began beating on the door. On the off-chance that it was still security from the publisher's building, Dean turned out the lights and motioned for Lin and Chip to keep quiet. After an uncomfortably long wait the knocking ceased.

The three finished the meal in complete darkness. This gave Dean a feeling of security, which was balanced by the fact that he dropped half a quart of noodles in his lap and knocked over a bottle of wine.

AFTER THE BLACKOUT MEAL Lin excused herself and retired for the night.

Chip drained another can of Coors Light, and tossed it at a basketball hoop that hung over a garbage can in the kitchen. He missed, and the shiny cylinder banged across the linoleum.

"Your turn."

Beside him on the sofa, Dean raised a can. "Thanks, but I don't think your mother would appreciate half a can of beer sprayed across her kitchen floor."

"Half a can? Sounds like ol' Dean Cook is getting too old for drinking."

Dean rolled his eyes and tipped the can at the ceiling, finishing the beer in a few swallows. Emulating a participant in a game of darts, he made several careful motions at the kitchen target, then tossed. The can bounced off the basketball hoop and spun into a pile of books on the living room carpet.

"That's the spirit," said Chip.

He opened a hatch in the sofa arm and handed Dean another Coors Light.

"Ingenious contraption, your little fridge there," said Dean.

Chip raised his beer to Dean. "Thank you. Also doubles as a urinal."

"I see."

Dean held the top of the unopened beer with his fingertips and pulled a tiny bottle of clear liquid from his pants pocket. He squeezed Purell over the surface of the aluminum can, an act of unexpected cleanliness which unfortunately sounded like unexpected flatulence.

Chip watched this process with stunned boredom. He waited until Dean had finished the can-cleaning ritual, then poked him in the shoulder.

"You should be nicer to my mom."

Dean shrugged. "She's paid a fair market wage, commenss ... commits... equal with her experience in life."

"That's crap and you know it. She does everything for you, from typing up fan letters to Richard Hatch to camping outside the Apple store."

"That was worth it, though. It's quite an amazing phone."

Chip leaned closer. "Three days, man! You could have given her a sleeping bag!"

"It's very important to keep costs down, what with the bad economy and ... what else? I've got it! Global warming."

"Just treat her like a human being, okay? That shouldn't be hard, even for you."

"As long as there's no direct cost involved, I promise."

Chip made a sound between a squeal and a gurgle, then drank the rest of his beer quietly. Dean heard the faint ticking of a clock somewhere.

"How's your book coming along?"

"That's a matter with which my proverbial plate is loaded down at the moment, metaphorically speaking," said Dean. "I have a slight disagreement with a publishing editor, but things should be Nagasaki very soon."

"Naga-what-ee?"

"Looking up. You know, like there's a bomb coming and you're looking up at it saying, 'Hey, there's a something coming straight at me. It's probably really cool!' "

"Dean, stop trying to come up with the next hot expression. We'll never have another 'Where's the beef?' "

"Sorry."

"What kind of disagreement between you and this editor?"

"She threw my book in my face and called security."

"Every relationship has ups and downs," said Chip. "Your girlfriend kicked you out, too. Do you have a problem with women, Dean?"

"I don't have a problem with them, but somehow they find problems with me. My father's a woman and my mother's a woman, so I've got twice the women in my life."

"What did you say?"

"Somehow they've got problems with me?"

"After that," said Chip. "Did you say your father's a woman?"

Dean cleared his throat. "No, I definitely did not say that. There was a thing that I said that sounded like woman, another completely different word that doesn't have that kind of fatherly-womanly meaning, and it was ... Mormon. That's right––my father's a Mormon. Is this normal beer? It seems very strong."

Chip shifted his weight on the couch. "It sounded like 'woman' but whatever, dude. I still say there's something wrong with you, Dean. You don't drive, talk like Doctor Who, and dress like Oliver Twist. One of those might be the reason that females look at you like you've flung open a trench coat and exposed yourself."

"I'm getting fashion tips from the owner of a pink ambulance?"

"It's the PPPP, get it right."

"Pretty Please Pass the Peas?"

"No, ding-dong––PewPew Party Patrol. Woo, woo! PPPP coming code three to Dean's house with an emergency organ transplant for his girlfriend, yeah!"

Dean stood up from the couch.

"Too soon?" Chip smacked the couch. "Come on, sit down. I'm sorry. When I get drunk I tell it like it is, and it is what it is, whatever it is."

Dean sat down and drank the rest of his beer. He missed the garbage can and Chip handed him another Coors Light. Dean opened the top and drank it all in a few gulps.

Chip nodded. "Nice."

Dean crinkled the hollow aluminum in his fingers. "I'll tell you what the problem is, Chip or PewPew or whatever who drives a pink ambulance. It's not that no one wants to publish my book. It's not that Joanie kicked me out of my own house. The problem is tomorrow's my birthday."

"Sorry. I didn't get you anything."

Dean shook his head and spoke thickly. "You don't understand. I have never, ever had a normal birthday. Something always goes wrong. Not the TV-sitcom wrong that you're thinking about where the cake is made from concrete or full of laxatives. Every single year my birthday is the apogee of pain, anguish, and dead zoo animals."

"Don't be so dramatic. It can't be that bad."

"Okay. On my sixteenth birthday our cattle broke out of the fence and rampaged through the school football field."

"So?"

"It was during the game!"

"I see your point."

"Not to mention my best friend used me to break up with his girlfriend, her brother punched me in the ear, and my cousin started a forest fire we spent the rest of the day fighting. There was absolutely no time for a party."

"Was your dad a firefighter?"

"No, my mother," said Dean. "She's like a pit bull when there's a fire around. I take it back, she's like that all the time."

"A very nice, motherly pit bull?"

"I wish. Every year she tries to organize my birthday party, which either means fifteen boxes of wine and a car chase from the police, or ten cases of cheap beer and a car chase from the police."

"Now I know you're kidding."

"I've never, ever been more serious in my life," said Dean. "Apart from one day I spent in Berlin."

"What happened there?"

"Nothing. I was just very serious."

Chip sighed. "Can I turn the lights back on?"

"In a bit."

"Whatever. Oh, and cheers, birthday boy. It's midnight."

Tracklist:

Maui Waui - Chuck Mangione

Ain't Nobody's Business But My Own -

Tennessee Ernie Ford & Kay Starr

Hells Bells - AC/DC

2

Something warm and soft covered Dean's face. As he breathed, it puffed out like a dreamy spider web and floated back to his dry lips.

The couch leather stuck to his cheek like a postage stamp. Through the fuzzy pain in his head Dean realized he'd fallen asleep, and someone had covered him with a sheet and blanket.

He turned sideways on the lumpy furniture and a female voice sighed, a sweet sound of longing and exhaustion saved for lovers or extremely long road trips. An arm slid across his shoulder.

Dean considered the possibility that the couch might not be lumpy after all but supported a population of more than one, including himself. He rejected this absurdity and tried to shoulder his way through the door of sleep, but felt a rising pressure from his bladder. Humans are similar to mountain gorillas and the embarrassment of urinating upon a sleeping female increases exponentially with the status of the sleeping female: she could be a friend of Chip's, a Oaxacan prostitute, a state senator, or all of the above. He pulled the sheet away from his face as carefully as the previously mentioned and now frightened mountain gorilla.

The dim light revealed a pale neck and dark brown hair woven in complicated braids and covered in tiny gold jewelry. Was that a French twist? Dean added "daughter of senior French consular official" to the list of females not to be micturated upon.

He rolled off the couch, intending to land on all fours like a baby gorilla but instead dropped onto the substantial chest of an obese and suddenly wide-eyed woman.

She screamed in Dean's face and yelled unintelligibly as he scrambled up the stairs on all fours. Dean collided with Chip's life-sized doll of PTSD Babe and for a panicked moment both of his airways were covered by another substantial chest, although in this case, the busty components were fake. He extricated himself and after a bit of banging, Lin opened her bedroom door. She looked at Dean wearily and cinched her robe with a sudden, efficient motion.

"Another bad dream?"

"Lin! Do I scream like a woman?"

"Of course not." Lin took him by the arm. "You've never done that every single time you sleep over. I'll make you a hot cup of milk like every time you never screamed and it never happened."

A poster of a girl in a bikini shivered on Chip's door and he wearily opened it.

"Please see someone, Dean. Probably a doctor."

"It wasn't me!"

"Denial is a river in Egypt," said Chip.

"No, it's not."

"Can we save this debate for later?" asked Lin, and turned Chip and Dean around like a farmer's wife leading errant goats to their pens. "Back to sleep."

Dean shrugged her hand from his shoulder and spun around. "Stop! There are two women downstairs, one who could be French and another who could be a gigantic French roll. I know that sounds silly, but I'm just going with what I've seen with my eyes and the things I've felt on my face. Since I don't remember anything past midnight, going with what I've seen and felt is a bit of a gamble at this point."

"We didn't go anywhere or do anything," said Chip. "You fell asleep after your third beer."

Something clattered and rolled like a marble on marble, and all three rushed downstairs.

Lin flipped on the lights. "There's no one here."

Dean's sheet and blanket were piled on the floor. He lifted the cloth and peered underneath, then felt several depressions in the leather couch. Near the arm of the couch he sniffed like pig searching for truffles.

"You're disgusting," said Chip. "That's where I was sitting last night."

"It smells like perfume."

"I've never heard anyone say that before."

"No, the girl was here. Look––I found a clue!"

Lin shook her head at the long strand of hair between Dean's thumb and forefinger.

"Dear me, look at the clock. Who wants a cup of morning coffee?"

"It's the best part of waking up!" said Chip.

DEAN SHOWERED after breakfast and prepared for his flight by double-checking promotional materials for the conference and repacking the small suitcase.

He considered the possibility that Joanie had hired French Girl and Fat Lady to destroy his reputation in the motivational speaker community, a reputation he'd fought hard to keep over the years. If there was anything the famous Robert Timmins hated more than a lack of punctuality, it was the French. He would never hire someone caught in flagrante au sofa with a Francophone, much less two of them.

To confuse any pursuers, he struggled into Chip's Godzilla costume and left precipitously out the back door. After Lin had circled the block a few times, Dean clambered into her car for a ride to the airport.

"Take off that silly thing," said Lin. "It's ridiculous."

Dean's muffled voice came from inside the lizard head. "I'll wait until the last moment. It's actually very comfortable."

San Jose International was international in the sense that you could catch a flight to Puerto Vallarta. The newly designed terminal was wildly popular, but Dean thought the huge wave of gray steel resembled a squashed rattlesnake on the road.

Lin swerved through the traffic on the road that circled the airport. "Throw out any liquids. You don't want to make that mistake again."

Dean raised his scaly arms. "If anyone makes a bomb from Crest and eczema cream they deserve a medal. Orange juice and toothpaste I can understand––that's an explosive combination."

"It's for your own safety."

"Safety's not the point, Lin––it's to embarrass celebrities. If the media reports that Dean Cook uses a generic brand of moisturizer, then I could lose advertising contracts with Stevens Creek Honda and the Mac Shack! They have standards, after all."

"Just don't make a fuss about it."

Dean sighed through the costume's breathing hole. "Air travel should be exactly like that scene in Doctor No, when Sean Connery and Ursula Andress enter the secret underground fortress on a moving belt. Stripped naked, disinfected, and given white jumpsuits––that's the future of airport security."

"Speaking of suits, we're here now so you can take it off."

"Take off before takeoff?" laughed Dean. He fumbled at his neck with the huge green hands of the costume. "Something's caught on the zipper and I don't want to break it. I'll take it off inside."

Lin pulled up to the curb near Departures and took Dean's suitcase from the trunk.

"Have a good trip!"

"Thanks, Lin."

On the sidewalk a pair of young children laughed and pointed at the giant lizard pulling a suitcase. Inside the terminal he was immediately slammed to the floor by a security guard the size of a pre-fabricated garden shed. Poured concrete foundation included, of course.

"Tango down!" yelled the massive human, his knee on Dean's sternum.

Dean gurgled and moaned from inside the costume––noises that strangely enough sounded like a squashed lizard––until a second guard pulled off the green, scaly head.

"Get off," Dean gasped. "Can't breathe."

"He can't breathe! Starting CPR!" yelled the first guard, whose size and appearance hearkened back to a time when the fastest-moving locations in real estate were caves. He grabbed Dean's jaw and bent down.

Dean squirmed away from the open lips. "No, no. I'm fine now," he said.

"Another false alarm," said the guard. "It's just a costume like the last one."

"Of course it is, Terry!" said the other, and held up the lizard head. "The eyes are too small to be the real thing."

"Too small? You mean Son of Godzilla," wheezed Dean from the floor. "A classic movie, but inconsistent and cartoonish."

The two guards helped him up.

"Cartoonish? That's the best movie of all time," said the second guard. "And my favorite."

"The one with King Kong is better," said the first guard.

"You don't know anything––he lays an egg in Son of Godzilla."

Dean raised both scaly hands. "Can we not have this discussion right now? Everyone knows that a males don't lay eggs and I personally don't accept a female Godzilla as canon."

"Speaking of cannons," said the giant. "We need to search this guy."

"Driver's license, please," said the other.

"Don't have one."

"Passport?"

Dean clawed at his suitcase with costumed fingers until the second guard helped him open the latch. Dean handed over a blue booklet, but when the guard opened the passport, a rainbow of confetti fluttered to the ground.

"Oh for the love of Crom," said Dean.

The guard stared at the shredded pages, then poked a finger in Dean's scaly chest.

"Is this a joke?"

Dean smiled nervously. "Do you think it's funny?"

"No," said the giant guards together.

"It was my girlfriend," said Dean. "Now that I think of it, it really was a joke. I'm sure that wasn't my real passport. It was a joke passport. Everything's fine. It's fine! I'll get the real one."

He smiled at them, backed slowly toward the exit, and sprinted away as fast as a middle-aged man could possibly sprint away in a Godzilla costume. The guards leaped after Dean but the first giant slipped in the confetti and the second tripped over Dean's suitcase.

Dean found a cab easily, as strange as he looked with a normal head and lizard body.

HE PACED ACROSS the living room, the rubber scaly feet of the costume squeaking madly.

"You can apply for another one," said Lin.

"The conference is in four days. There's no time!"

"Another driver's license, I mean."

"Lin! That means a test. A driving test! Did you forget the last one?"

She shook her head. "I wish I could. Don't you have another I.D.?"

"I've got that matricula consular card from Mexico, but that won't get me past airport security. This isn't the land of free love and honey, or for that matter, the Land of Dairy Queen."

"How about a private plane?"

"I'm not made of diamonds and gold, Lin. I'm made of water and salt and other nasty bits that aren't worth anything."

"Well, I don't like saying this, Dean, but you'll have to miss the conference. There's no way around it."

Dean put hands on his hips and stared at her.

"All right, I'm sorry," she said. "I just don't see how you're going to get to Virginia––"

"WEST Virginia."

"Okay. I don't see how you'll get wherever it is without flying."

"West Virginia may be a dangerous heap of coal trucks, Cracker Barrels, and John Denver, God rest his soul," said Dean, "But it's definitely more than a 'wherever.'"

A rock-guitar riff burst from his cell phone.

"That sounds familiar," said Lin.

"It's the opening music for Space Questions. Hello?"

His father's voice floated into Dean's ear. "Morning, son."

"Good morning."

"Is something wrong, Dean? You don't sound well."

"It's nothing. Just having a rough day."

"Anything I can do?"

"No, don't worry about it."

His father laughed. "Happy birthday, anyway. Your mother is on her way over, so your day is looking up. She's been talking about the party forever. I really want to be there too, but I have to go to Santa Cruz with my favorite son Steve and lay out. Did I say favorite son? I'm sorry, I meant favorite son-in-law. If I don't get some color on these legs soon, people will be throwing holy water and pounding stakes through my chest. Which reminds me, I'm absolutely starving."

"Thanks, Dad. It's the thought that counts."

"I'm glad you agree. Oh––I have to go, Steve's calling."

"Right. Bye."

Dean shoved the phone in his pocket. "We're leaving now."

"What's wrong?"

"Stop asking questions, Lin! My mother will be here any second!"

Lin scrambled for her keys and purse as Dean's scaly green claws pushed her out the door.

The familiar blat-blat of a massive V-8 vibrated the neighborhood. Try to imagine that scene from Duel but with frightened Bengal tigers on Harleys being chased by an F-350 with missing exhaust, then wipe that image from your mind because how could you sleep at night, friend?

Dean groaned. "Too late."

The pink monstrosity of Chip's ambulance––otherwise known as the PPPP––sat on the driveway nearby. Dean and Lin sprinted across the concrete and crouched behind it.

A black F-350 with missing exhaust roared down the street and slowed in front of Lin's house. The driver parallel parked with expert precision and window-rattling revs. The engine died with a clatter, and Dean's mother stepped out.

Short and muscular like a wrestler, she wore ripped jeans, dusty work boots, and a wife-beater T-shirt with a faded "What?" across the front. Her short, strawberry-blonde hair stood out from her head in angry spikes. She lunged across the lawn in wide, confident steps and banged on the front door.

"Let me talk to her," whispered Lin. "I'll say you're out or something."

"We tried that last time," said Dean. "She broke through your barely adequate psychic defenses around the third syllable."

"Well, what do we do? We can't hide in this driveway forever."

Dean rubbed his chin. "I'd call the police, but she probably has a few warrants out and muggins here would be the one posting bail. Maybe she'll get frustrated and leave."

His phone rang. Dean looked at the number and cleared his throat.

"You've reached the voicemail of motivational speaker Dr. Dean Cook. I'm currently out of the office right now. In Barbados, actually. It's very nice this time of year. Barbados, by the way, is in the Caribbean and very, very far from where I usually live."

"Pick up, Dean," yelled his mother.

"Please leave your name and number and I'll get back to you as soon as possible. From Barbados, which is in a different time zone, and it's probably three in the morning right now or something so I'm sleeping. BEEP."

He closed the phone.

"She won't believe you're in Barbados."

"I panicked, Lin."

They lay on the oil-stained concrete and peered under the ambulance. Dean's mother banged on the door for a few minutes, then sat in a wicker chair on the porch. She leaned back and rested her boots on the wooden railing.

"Bad news," whispered Lin. "Looks like she's in it to win it."

"What?"

"She's not going anywhere for a long time, Dean."

Several plans for escape were whispered between them and discarded, when a car parked behind the F-350 and Chip walked up with yellow bags from Best Buy. Dean's mother stood up and shook his hand. After a short conversation, Chip opened the front door and escorted her into the house.

"Time for Plan B," said Dean.

"What's that?"

"When the first plan doesn't work."

"I mean, what's YOUR Plan B?"

"Chip's ambulance has a bed, right?"

Lin nodded. "It's like a small camper. He spent a lot of money on the interior. There's even a chemical toilet."

"Let's go while they're still inside."

"I can't steal my son's car!"

"We're just borrowing the vehicle. Seriously, Lin, how many cars does one person need? We'll drive in shifts and make it to Charleston in time for the conference. If my sister drove cross-country in three days, so can I."

Lin sighed. "This isn't a good idea."

Dean nodded and painfully cracked the back of his head on the ambulance undercarriage.

"That stung a bit. You're right, Lin, it's a horrible idea. Let's go inside, put on our best smiles, and have my mother and her friends throw the same kind of birthday party as last year. Joanie and I had to buy new furniture and cats, and the neighbors still think we were filming the sequel to Road House."

"I'll drive," said Lin.

DEAN'S MOTHER STOOD in front of a life-sized doll in a tank top and cut-offs holding a ridiculously massive assault rifle. She poked a finger in the woman's navel.

"Nice Barbie, dude."

"That's not a Barbie. It's PTSD Babe," said Chip.

"Movie star?"

"Video game character."

A sound emerged from Dean's mother like an unfortunately depressed dingo with a sinus infection.

"Kid, whatever Vietnamese child laborer made this doesn't know the difference between a rifle and Kentucky Fried Chicken. The ejector port of the ACR is on the wrong side, and there's no way in seven Chinese Hells the poor girl could fire it one-handed. I know––I've tried."

"I guess you're right, Mrs. Cook, but it's just a game."

"Spare me the excuses. It's just a game, it's just a movie, it's just another pill, it's just a small Asian country that needs American boys to die for it."

"Yes, ma'am."

"Don't call me ma'am or Mrs. Cook. The name's Billie."

"Fine, no problem."

Billie swung her arms wide like a mad karate warm-up. "Is there a trash can in this mess?"

Chip pointed to the kitchen. Billy reached inside her lower lip with thumb and index finger and tossed a brown wad into the trash. She pulled a can of Skoal from her back pocket.

"Want some?"

"No, thanks."

Billie pointed the green hockey puck of Skoal at him. "Didn't think so. You look like the sort of weed-smoking loser who spends all day in front of his computer until he turns forty, then panics and orders a bride from Lower Karjackistan because he's too afraid to talk to girls around the corner."

"Excuse me?"

Billie stared at Chip with her pale blue eyes and stuck a pinch of snuff in her lower lip.

"Excuse me, what?"

"Nothing," said Chip.

Billie closed the plastic lid of the can with a loud snap. "Are you trying to get rid of me, Mr. Chips? I'm starting to question this theory that my son's out for a walk."

"I honestly don't know where Dean is. Like I said, he could have gone somewhere with my mother. Her car's out front, but I haven't seen her around."

Billie poked him in the chest. "Today's my son's birthday and I'm going to make it the best I can, all right? His noodle-headed girlfriend said he came here yesterday. It's always up to his family to throw him a party, because the poor boy doesn't have one friend worth a fish fart. Now, I've got ten cases of MGD sweating in the back of my pickup, so I'm two seconds from punching a hole through your drywall. Is what I'm saying getting through those clouds of reefer smoke? Are you picking up what I'm putting down?"

Chip raised his hands. "Okay, okay! Let's see if they're back."

He walked outside with Billie's heavy work boots clomping behind.

"Holy mother of cats!"

"What?"

Chip pointed at the oil-stained concrete driveway. "The Party Patrol's missing!"

"You mean the pink ambulance? If someone stole that pile of trash you should count your blessings."

"It's not a pile of trash!"

Billie shrugged. "I've seen better decoration sprayed across the inside of a Tijuana jail cell. Now that I think about it, that wasn't paint."

"Lady, the engine on that thing is worth more than your entire truck. It's got a custom-built interior, top-of-the-line driverless navigation system, and enough electronics to send a NASA scientist into sugar shock. So don't talk to me about the paint job! I wanted it to look bad so nobody would steal it."

Billie sniffed and spit across the porch railing. "Cool plan, dude. It's miles away by now."

Tracklist:

Born To Run – Bruce Springsteen

Something About You – Level 42

Jubel (Original Mix) –– Klingande
3

Dean waved frantically. "That's the ramp!"

Lin jerked the wheel and swerved two lanes across the path of a Toyota Yaris, earning a barely audible honk from the tiny car. The white lines on the highway ramp curved to the right and Lin merged the ambulance into the light-speed traffic of southbound 101.

"You could have just started World War III," said Dean.

Lin held a hand over her mouth. "Oh, no. Was he Russian?"

"I doubt it, Lin. It's the butterfly effect," said Dean, his hands at the neck of the Godzilla costume. After a short, Herculean effort, the metal fastener broke and Dean pulled down the zipper. "A pensioner kills a butterfly in Lodi, Mad Ivan on the Arctic Circle dies of a heart attack, and his face smashes the launch button. Haven't you seen Jurassic Park?"

"I don't remember."

Dean squirmed out of the scaly costume. "What? The greatest movie of a generation? Only a communist would say something that ridiculous, Lin. Are you really from California, or a spy from Pretty Red China? Your cover is blown, if that's the case."

"It's the People's Republic of China, not whatever you said."

"Only a spy would know that!"

"Dean, you've known me for ten years, so stop being silly and focus on navigation. Are we going north or south?"

Dean squirmed his lower body out of the green costume. "Geography, Lin. West Virginia is east of California. Don't swerve like that!"

Lin pursed her lips. "I know it's east. What I mean is, should we take the northern route through Wyoming and Colorado, or south through Arizona and Texas?"

"Definitely north. I had a bad experience the last time I was in Houston."

"What happened?"

Dean shrugged. "Nothing. There just wasn't anything on TV."

"In that case, we'll go north. Can you program the GPS?"

"Of course I can," sniffed Dean. "When you tell me what it is."

"That big screen in the dash. I can't do it and drive at the same time."

"Leave it to me."

In stark contrast to the flamingo-pink and primer-spotted exterior of the ambulance, the inside of the cab was immaculate and luxuriously appointed. Thickly cushioned seats were covered in brown swaths of what Dean imagined was rich Corinthian leather. Electronic screens, multi-colored toggle switches, and buttons with tiny labels covered the dashboard and overhead panels. Many glowed faintly, while others flashed in patterns of light that could have been Morse Code.

"This reminds me of the set of Space Questions," Dean murmured.

"The what?"

"Space Questions, the best show on radio."

"Dean ..."

"It's a sort of sci-fi radio Jeopardy, starring Nando Phoenix as Captain James L. Sparx. I know you've heard of it because I've talked about it before. Next you'll be telling me you've never heard of Nando Phoenix! That's like someone who's never heard of Coca-Cola. Or freedom, for that matter."

The slight Asian woman rubbed her temples, one hand still on the wheel. "I think my headache is getting worse."

Dean squeezed into the rear of the ambulance. "There has to be a first-aid cabinet. I'll look for aspirin and trucker pills––you've got lots of driving ahead."

The large patient area had been converted to an office that included a writing desk and a tiny computer with LCD monitor. The cabinets on the walls were clear and framed in aluminum, and were filled with video games, books, and camping gear.

"I know Chip installed a refrigerator," Lin shouted from the cab.

Dean crossed his arms. "Where, oh, where did you put it, Chippy boy?"

He tugged at the silver latches on the cabinets but nothing budged. At last he wrenched open a small compartment to find a yellow-lit row of rocker switches. A center switch was labeled "UNLK." Dean thumbed it down and all of the cabinets clacked loudly.

"There's the ticket," he said.

A tiny moon-and-stars symbol below another rocker switch caught his eye.

"Wonder what this is?"

Dean flipped it down and slapped hands over his ears as a screech like a mechanical egret filled the ambulance. The metal chair and table folded down and the compartment walls shuddered. Dean stepped back and narrowly avoided being squashed as a bed levered out from the wall like a lowering drawbridge.

"Holy Space Nazis!"

"What's wrong, Dean?"

A very fat, dark-haired woman lay on the mattress. Her long blue robes resembled a sari, with layers of fabric delicately embroidered in pink roses and spiraling vines. However, numerous sweat stains and the corpulent frame of the wearer canceled any effect of elegance or royalty intended by the designer of the robes. Ejaculating loud phrases of foreign language, the bulbous woman squirmed off the bed and grabbed the front of Dean's shirt.

"What's all that racket?" asked Lin.

"Pull over," Dean shouted over the noise coming from the strange woman. "We've got a stowaway."

"I'll need a second! The freeway is packed."

Dean nodded and smiled at the blue-robed woman as she continued to give him volumes of her opinion on matters that Dean might have agreed were important if he spoke her language. He added a few eyebrow-raises and concerned pouts to the variety of his facial expressions, just in case any of those meant "Leave me alone, please" in her country. He contemplated whether he could survive a leap outside at highway speeds or not, when the ambulance swerved to a stop.

Lin jumped out of the cab, ran around the front of the vehicle, and pulled open the sliding door at the side.

"Where did she come from?"

Dean nodded and smiled at the woman's insistent burbling. "From one of the cabinets."

"That's impossible!"

"Lin, much as I would enjoy a debate on the improbable circumstance of this woman's existence within an enclosure not designed for her particular girth, I suggest we table that discussion and just get her off me."

"Sorry."

Lin touched the vice-like hands of the woman to gain eye contact, then waved her arms in the open-palmed, universal gesture that had the dual meanings of: "stop doing that" and "I'm not with the government, please don't shoot."

The woman released Dean and began talking excitedly to Lin.

"What's she saying, Lin?"

"How am I supposed to know? The only foreign language I speak is French."

Dean spread his arms. "That's the point! This is the woman that slept on your floor last night. She's probably from the French embassy."

"She doesn't dress like someone from an embassy. They don't usually sweat that much and have so many grass stains."

"Don't be racist, Lin. She's obviously a high-level attaché in disguise who became lost during a top-secret diplomatic mission."

"What mission? To break into my house and cuddle up next to you?"

"Just ask her," said Dean.

Lin said something in French. The woman immediately hugged her and began speaking in a different sort of burbling that made Dean think of red wine and girls planting potatoes in fresh black earth. After a lunch of garlic and horse genitals, of course.

"She does understand French," said Lin. "She's got a strong accent, though."

Dean nodded. "They hire foreign spies all the time, it's easier to infiltrate the drug gangs."

"She's saying something about a girl in the ambulance. Wait––outside the ambulance."

The woman led them to a compartment on the driver's side and tugged on a silver latch as cars on the interstate zipped a few feet away.

"Lin, watch for traffic. I don't want to be on the evening news."

Dean jumped inside the cab and scanned the rows of toggle switches. After a series of choices that included violent, rocking hydraulics and flashing lights, he pressed a switch marked "OC2."

"Got it," yelled Lin.

Dean heard the squeal of metal hinges and a murmur of French. He slid out of the cab, walked a few paces to the open compartment, and froze as stiff and motionless as if he'd stepped into a minefield. His trepidation was not caused by a buried canister of explosive, however, but by the peculiarly beautiful young woman who squeezed out of the narrow compartment.

He'd been struck dumb only twice in his life––once when an Italian girl removed her shirt at a pool party and secondly, upon viewing Trisha Yar in the flesh at a Star Trek convention. For a motivational speaker with a mind like a steel mousetrap like Dean, love at first sight did not exist, was a fabrication before or after the fact by over-romantic high school boys and under-appreciated housewives. Upon seeing this young woman, Dean realized he'd been wrong, as wrong as he'd been about the positive effect of an ice cream bath or the need to check the expiration date on Spam. Dean saw no whizzing traffic or blue sky, felt no rumble in his stomach or pull of gravity. If someone held a shotgun packed with rose petals and Novocaine to his forehead and pulled the trigger, the effect would have been exactly the same.

"Holy action figure," he murmured.

The girl was taller than the fat woman and wore filmy red robes layered in gold embroidery like a Mumbai princess. A sheer veil edged in tiny embroidered daisies framed black hair and an oval face with skin like warm sand. Almond-shaped eyes stared back at Dean, eyes as clear as the pond in a Japanese temple and as fearless as a child's before she's been told not to be. She smiled and tilted her head in a gesture of polite greeting, but received no response from an open-mouthed, glassy-eyed Dean Cook.

"Dean ..."

"Dean?"

"Dean!"

Car horns beeped and hands dragged him away from the traffic maelstrom.

"You can't stand in the road like that," said Lin. She lowered her voice to a whisper. "Do you need some warm milk?"

Dean rubbed his face. "No, I'm fine now. Who are these people?"

"I could ask, or we could do that other thing––drive across the country to Charleston."

"Right, right. Tell them to get inside and we're going to Kohl's or Jo-Anne's or some other place women are always desperate to get to. We're losing time!"

Dean followed the girl and her stout protector into the back of the ambulance and slammed the door. With a roar of flying gravel, Lin merged onto the freeway.

The two ladies sat on the bed and Dean stood in the rear compartment trying to remember the nonchalant, JCPenney-model poses he used in high school as the vehicle rocked and swayed at high speed.

"My name's Dean," he said to the girl. "If you were trying to get an autograph, you could have just asked. I'm easy."

The girl whispered in her older companion's ear, then folded her hands in her lap. The polish on her fingernails sparkled like crimson diamond dust, and Dean found himself transfixed. He barely noticed as the fat woman spoke his name and burbled a series of phrases.

"Translate, please," said Dean, over his shoulder.

Lin chuckled, and glanced back from the driver's seat.

"They don't want an autograph, but what she said sounds like a joke. She's saying you have to marry the girl."

Dean held up his hands in front of the two women on the mattress.

"Stop right there, little missy and bigger missy. I've never had a love-crazed superfan but I guess there's a first time for everything. Even shotgun marriages, of course. I've been there and done that, as the kids say."

The fat companion pulled a copy of Dean's autobiography from her robes and waved it, all the while babbling paragraphs of French.

"She claims your book fell out of the sky and struck the girl," said Lin. "She says any man who touches a bride on her wedding day has to marry her."

"That sounds fishy," said Dean. "I've never been blackmailed before, but I guess there's a first ..."

He trailed off as the girl in the red dress pulled back her silk veil. She turned her neck and exposed an intricate weave of black braids and clinking gold jewelry. The fat companion grabbed Dean's hand and held it on the soft hair at the crown of the girl's head.

"She wants you to feel the lump," yelled Lin.

Dean cleared his throat. "I ... um ... it's ... There's definitely something. Is it hot in here?"

He closed his eyes and breathed deep, trying to remember his qigong meditation. The scent of lavender floated to his nostrils and Dean snapped his fingers.

"You're the couch girl, the one I slept with! I'm sorry, that came out wrong. We lay together on the couch. No, that sounds too Biblical. I'm not even certain if it's 'lay' or 'laid,' and that's even more shameful for a writer than being caught with his proverbial hand in the proverbial cookie jar, if you know what I mean. I don't think you do. Let's start over: I was sleeping in a particular location, and you were sleeping in a particular location. As it happens––and not intentionally, mind you––these particular locations happened to be on the same couch."

The girl turned her face to the ceiling of the ambulance and laughed, a sound of clear and honest amusement.

"You're a silly person, Mr. Dean Cook."

Dean pointed at her. "This one talks!"

"Of course I do."

"But what about the large one? Why doesn't she speak English?"

The girl tilted her head and the jewelry in her braids clinked. "She grew up on a farm and had no chance to learn English. She is strong and loyal, and my wedding guard. The wedding that you stopped by hitting me with your book."

"I see." Dean swallowed. "Before we approach the subject of delicate international reparations and possible marriage, would anyone like a drink?"

"Yes, please. We are both thirsty."

Dean searched the unlocked compartments and found a refrigerator packed with Sunny D. He brandished the bottles high in the air like a pair of trophies filled with cold orange liquid.

"Sweet nectar of the gods," he said. "Here you go, ladies."

"I'd like one, please," said Lin.

"Coming right up."

Dean opened the wide-mouthed top of the orange bottle, but as he leaned forward to hand it to Lin, the ambulance jolted into the air. Whether this bounce was the result of a deep pothole, irregular pavement, or the ambulance tires striking a snazzy frame bought at Target and unwisely tied to a car's roof, the result was the same. Dean fell forward onto the center console and spilled a considerable amount of fake orange juice into the electronics.

CHIP SMACKED THE side of his laptop. He jiggled a pair of wires that ran from a port on the computer to a large antenna on Billie's trash-covered dashboard.

"Piece of garbage," he said.

"It's a poor farmer that blames his mules," said Billie. "We've had that signal all the way up 680, so don't stop now."

Chip rolled up his window and the wind-tunnel roar of the cab quieted down a bit. He typed on his laptop's keyboard, adjusting the size of a map on the screen.

"It was hacked together to start with," he said. "Maybe they went inside a tunnel."

"Ain't no tunnels on 680," said Billie. "Unless your psychic-geek superpowers of the mind just created one."

"That's redundant. Psychic means mind."

"You'll be redundant when my fist breaks your jaw."

"Sorry."

"If we don't get that signal back, I'll let you out somewhere and you can call the cops," said Billie.

"Hello? Number one, that vehicle's chopped up and modded out the tailpipe. It's as legal as an underwater hairdryer and there's no way the cops are getting their sugar-coated fingers on it. Number two, I take care of business."

"Aw, yeah! Fist-bump," said Billie. "TCB is fine with me. I just wanted to see if you left your 'man card' at the hair salon."

Chip's phone buzzed and he glanced at the number.

"It's Dean."

"Well, don't just sit there looking cute, princess––answer it."

"Hello?"

Lin's voice crackled on the line. "Can you hear me?"

"Yeah, mom."

"I'm sorry, Chip, but I had to borrow your car. It was just a little thing and I don't want you to worry."

"The Subaru?"

"No, the ambulance. We'll bring it back in a few days."

"Why?"

"Dean's got a conference in Virginia. Sorry, West Virginia. Don't worry, I'll call again."

Chip heard the faint sound of Dean's voice on the other end.

"Hang up, Lin. They can trace it."

"Mom, just stop somewhere or turn around," said Chip. "Why do you have to drive that old thing?"

"Gotta go, son. Bye!"

Billie watched as Chip shoved the phone back into his cargo shorts.

"What do we do now, genius?"

"Dean's taking her to Charleston," said Chip. "But there's something strange in my mom's voice. I'd feel better about all of this if I knew she was safe. There's also the PPPP that I spent six figures on."

"Gotta change that name," said Billie. "You sound like a two-year-old that really needs to go."

"But it's trademarked!"

Billie sighed. "West Virginia, here I come, right back where I started from ..."

DEAN WIPED THE CENTER console with a squishy, orange-stained rag and tossed it out the window.

"That's the last of it."

"You didn't have to throw away the towel," said Lin. "Also, can you stop spritzing Windowleen everywhere?"

"It's for your own good. Sunny D on a hot dashboard is like Satan's breath in the morning after a night of Little Caesar's and MGD. The North Koreans probably stick a tray of it on the windowsill when they interrogate tourists who've strayed off the beaten path looking for wool rugs and pirated DVDs. A few hours of that orange mist and one of us would turn into a homi-suicidal maniac."

"A homo-what?"

"A person who murders everyone in a 7-11 then kills himself. Or herself––crazy is equal opportunity, Lin."

He squeezed into the rear compartment, where the girl and her wide-bodied guard relaxed on the bed.

"Sorry for that interruption, ladies," said Dean. "Had a bit of cleanup and a phone call to make. It's go-time all the time when you're a famous author like me."

The young woman watched him placidly while her large guardian wiped Funyun dust from her lips and ripped a cannonade of French at Dean. This display was complemented by wild swings of the large woman's arms, which the girl leaned away from gracefully.

"She's asking when you're getting married," said Lin.

"That's better than what I imagined she said."

"Which was?" asked the young woman.

"The climax to the 1812 Overture."

She giggled and spoke a phrase to her large guardian, who promptly turned up the volume on another string of foreign phrases.

Dean raised his hands. "Cease fire! Miss, I don't even know your name, or that of your massive friend. How can I marry anyone without a proper introduction?"

The girl whispered to her guardian and fell silent, her eyes on the floor of the compartment.

"You're a bit shy for two ladies who've snuck into a man's bed," said Dean. "Everyone knows who I am, but just to break the ice I'll go first. I'm Dean Cook. To be clear, not the vulgar stand-up comedian but the author, speechmaker, and dandified ne'er-do-well splotch of useless protoplasm. Those aren't just my words, it was all in the Palo Alto Weekly. I'm on the cutting edge of goal-making motivational speaking and currently single. Single in this country, of course. Once my foot crosses a particular border, all bets are off."

"Do you want to drive?" shouted Lin from the cab.

"Just a minute, Lin. We've all had our share of excitement and raised voices for the day, so let's calm down, breathe deep, and enjoy a little social time."

"Emerson! That's my name," said the girl.

"The poet and Transcendental philosopher? The premier figure of American self-reliance?"

"No, the clock radio."

"The what?"

The girl pointed to the glowing red numbers of a digital clock on the wall. Dean peered closer and read the manufacturer's label in white script.

"You're named after that?"

"Not that one exactly. After the factory."

"I see," said Dean, rubbing his chin. "So in your country ... which is where, by the way?"

"I am from Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky. It is in Russia."

Dean shrugged. "Emerson doesn't sound like a Russian name, but I'm not one to judge. The world's full of Chip-chops, Flip-flops, and Plip-plops, I can't keep track of everything. What's the name of Fatty Boom-Boom? Sorry! I mean your wedding guard."

Emerson whispered in the ear of the woman.

"Fanta," said the tubby matron with a smile.

Dean held up a purple can of soda. "This Fanta?"

"Not that one exactly," said Emerson, "After the––"

"––factory, I get it," said Dean. "You know, it breaks my heart that you can't find a thing that's made in America these days." He clasped his hands together. "But, all's well that end's well. Lady Emerson and Fanta, what a pair. Where can we drop you off?"

"I have told you already," said Emerson. "We have to be married, and it's not a joke. On the wedding day, if a girl is touched––"

"By a man not her fiancé, yes, I know, he has to marry her. I'll be honest with you––I've had extremely bad experiences with lightning marriages. One question: how did you find me?"

Emerson opened Dean's book to the first pages and began to recite. "If this book is misplaced, please return to Dean Cook, 433 Matilda Avenue––"

"Right," said Dean, rubbing his face with both hands.

Seeing this as a sign of reluctance, Guardian Fanta began another finger-wagging sermon until Dean covered her mouth with his hand.

"This is ridiculous," he said to Emerson. "You can't really want to marry me. Let me rephrase that. Of course you want to marry me: I'm handsome, charming, and successful. Any girl would be crazy not to want me or throw me out of her house, but this sounds like a teenage prank. Possibly the pilot of a low-quality episodic reality show on a female-centered cable network."

"I'm telling the truth," said Emerson. "You are famous author, you have house and car, you have face without scar and matching set of arm and legs. There is no problem for a girl to marry you."

Dean sighed. "If only every woman thought that way ... I mean, of course they do, of course they do. I've had to swat them away like flies! Beautiful, lovely flies with beautiful red mouths ..."

Fanta bit Dean's hand and he jerked it away.

"What about your fiancé? He can't be overjoyed at being left at the altar. Call me paranoid, but I'd say he's in the midst of homi-suicidal rage this very moment." Dean looked out the rear window at the zipping highway and a suspiciously black Dodge Charger.

"He is horrible man. I never wanted to marry him," said Emerson. "He is richest man in Kamchatka, he fly all his family to have wedding in most famous city San Jose, but he is also worst, filthiest, disgustingest man in Kamchatka."

Dean grabbed onto a ceiling handle as the ambulance swerved in traffic. "Why do you say that?"

Emerson turned red and looked down. "His men come to all the houses and steal the socks of girls, but that is not the worst. The monster that is Duke Nichego knows magical spells and causes a horrible tentacle to grow from his body. He jabs this unspeakable thing into pretty girls, and months later a sickening tumor will grow inside their bellies. The poor girls are sick to stomach every morning and ask for strange food like pickle and ice cream. They are always taken away and never seen again, but of course they could not survive with such a huge, disgusting thing growing inside their bodies."

"That ... doesn't sound like magic," said Dean.

"What else could it be?"

Dean put his hands over hers. "Never mind. I won't let the Duke hurt you again. Unless he's bigger than me. Or has a gun. Actually, if he's holding anything sharp I might have to back off my previous statement. A nasty look I should be able to handle."

Emerson burst into tears. "Please help me! Since that day in the sock department my entire life has become horrible!"

Tracklist:

The Modern World – The Jam

Our House – Madness

Runnin' Down A Dream – Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
4

The Town Car rolled to a stop on the quiet, tree-lined street, the polished surface of the car reflecting branches and leaves like the deepest and blackest of mirrors. The driver's door opened and a man in a sky-blue suit and chauffeur's cap jumped out.

A pair of teenage girls in plaid skirts passed him on the sidewalk. The man rubbed his black mustache with two fingers and watched the girls walk to the end of the block. The Lincoln's horn beeped, and a tinted window in the rear of the car swished down.

"Vassily ..." murmured a deep voice.

The chauffeur spread his arms and replied in Russian, "Boss, I gave the signal but they did not stop!"

"They are pretty ones, Vassily. Just make me happy."

The window rolled up, and Vassily sprinted down the sidewalk as if Beanie Babies were back in stock.

"Ladies! Wait!"

The two schoolgirls, a blonde and brunette, turned as Vassily slid to a stop on his slick leather shoes.

"Excuse me for bothering you," he said. "I am looking for missing Asian-looking woman. Have you seen a lady in red dress? She is maybe with very fat woman." He waved a pair of photos under their noses.

The blonde shook her head. "Sorry, mister."

Vassily sighed and rubbed his eyes. "It is a big problem. Have you seen Julia Roberts vehicle, Runaway Bride? It is like that, only she is not horse face. She is pretty woman like famous actress Zhao Wei, and the Richard Gere character is billionaire of Kamchatka."

The girls giggled.

"It is okay," said Vassily.

He made a show of pulling a fat roll of bills from his trouser pocket, and waved a crisp, hundred-dollar note at the girls.

"This is actual cash of America, not Russia."

He bowed deeply, ripped the bill in two, and gave half to the blonde.

"One more question, girls. If you say yes, I give other part of century bill."

"Century what?"

"The bill. This money here," said Vassily.

The brunette pulled at the blonde's arm. "Marcy, this is getting weird."

"Don't worry, I am not child-like pervert!" Vassily turned and began to walk away. "If you do not like, I go now."

The blonde rubbed the fragment of paper money between her fingers.

"Wait! Tell us what you want, but believe me, I'll scream if you say anything nasty."

Vassily nodded. He looked up and down the quiet street, then cleared his throat.

"Can I have your socks?"

KNUCKLES RAPPED tinted glass and the window slid down.

"Angelika?" asked the voice inside.

Vassily tossed a small white bundle into the car. "They did not see her, but the yellow-haired one gave me her socks."

"She had the cutest little feet. Did you video?"

Vassily patted his breast pocket. "Yes, camera is running."

"Excellent."

The sound of pencil scratching across paper came from inside the car. Vassily waited a moment for the inevitable snap of a notebook cover, then opened the door.

A man in a wrinkled black tuxedo emerged. Tall and young, his cheeks were as hollow as a scarecrow who'd just returned from a night out at the most expensive champagne clubs. Pale skin stretched tight across his face like Saran wrap on a bowl of grandma's banana pudding. The severe military flattop of his blonde hair contrasted sharply with his tailored tuxedo and the gold jewelry on his fingers. If a Palo Alto trophy wife in the midst of her daily morning muddle had walked past him at that very moment, she would have given little notice to this skinny, awkward-standing individual. Unless, of course, she happened to see his eyes.

Those lucid gems were blue and bright enough to cause more than a few strong-willed men and women to humorously crash into a table of Girl Scout cookies or trip over a fire hydrant. Illegally transplanted from a panther or perhaps an unlucky South American ocelot, one glance from those glistening orbs could turn a field mouse into a nasty burrito of shivering rodent goo. (Given the relative infrequency of mouse and man encounters in modern life, this was a rare occurrence.) If a helpful voice knelt down to the crumpled body covered with Thin Mints and whispered that the man with the eyes was a cannibalistic war criminal or a serial killer who collected socks, you would believe it. However, if the voice said this man was the great-grandson of Adolph Hitler, you would laugh and perhaps choke to death on your watermelon Jolly Rancher––everyone knows Der Fuhrer lives on the moon with the rest of the Space Nazis.

The man with the ocelot eyes spread his arms and gestured dramatically at the suburban smorgasbord of California post-war, detached housing and nitrogenated lawns.

"Now, Vassily. Which is the house?"

The chauffeur pointed across the street. "The white one, Duke Nichego. The one with the strange pink van."

An unholy cacophony of clattering exhaust pipes and rubber tires in the shape of a Ford truck barreled around the corner and screamed to a stop. Nichego and Vassily watched a short woman with spiky blonde hair jump out of the truck and stride across the lawn.

"Is that him?" whispered Vassily.

Nichego shook his head. "The loud-mouthed girlfriend who owned a number of silk stockings said he does not operate a motor vehicle. That is obviously cleaning lady or strange prostitute."

"Lady? But she's wearing pants! And look at the hair!"

"She is definitely a woman. The hips are too wide and her build is too small to be a man. Remember Vassily––this is America where a woman is free to make her own fashion choices, even very poor ones."

"Still," said Vassily, "In Kamchatka––"

"Who are you speaking to––the squirrels pounding their nuts in the trees? I am Duke of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky! Of course I know it is different."

"Sorry, boss. Should we capture the man-like cleaning lady and rip off her thumbnails?"

"No. Drive me to the 7-Eleven on the corner. I have a need to 'blow up the toilet,' as the Americans say."

When they returned, the pink ambulance had disappeared from the driveway.

"Something is different," said Vassily.

"You wasted too much time bargaining for a Fresca," said Duke Nichego. "They are strangely not flexible on price."

"Look," said Vassily. "The cleaning lady is coming out."

Billie and Chip tossed a suitcase and a large box into the back of Billie's truck and drove away with an ear-shattering roar that frightened a dozen squirrels and caused an overstressed starling to re-evaluate the location for his afternoon nap.

"I don't think she is cleaning lady," said Vassily.

"You are dangerously close to learning sometimes," said Duke Nichego.

He opened the door of the Town Car and walked up to Lin's house, inhaling the air and examining everything with the blue gems of his eyes.

Vassily trotted up. "Do we have time to search for socks?"

Nichego held up a hand. He sniffed the air around the porch, then dropped to his knees in the driveway and breathed the fumes over the oil-stained concrete. He suddenly jumped up and sprinted to the Town Car.

"Angelika was here," he shouted. "Catch the manly woman!"

CHIP TOSSED THE circuit board out the window. He watched in the side mirror as the green electronic square shattered into a thousand pieces behind the speeding truck.

"We'll need to find a Radio Shack if you want that tracker working again."

Billie laughed. It was a loud, abrupt sound, one that reminded Chip of an angry police dog who wanted everyone to know he was only three days from retirement.

"You need to learn how to hold a beer, if you want people to think you've got more in your shorts than loose change," said Billie.

"There's more to life than drinking! It's not my fault––you swerved."

"Oh, I'm sorry. I was trying to get through this traffic and catch up with my son. But you're right, I should probably slow to the walking pace of an arthritic chimp."

Chip shook his head. "Whatever. Are there any electronic stores between here and Reno?"

"No, just mountains, log cabins, and filthy rich bastards barreling down mountains on skis. Unless you can make another tracker out of those, we'll have to wait. Dean's taking the Donner Pass, so I know about where he is."

Chip was quiet for a moment. He watched the white peaks of the Sierra Nevadas approach over the crests of yellow hills.

"This is a grand adventure, isn't it? The kind that people tell their children about years later, or make into movies."

"The only adventures I've had end up in the newspaper under the police blotter," said Billie. "Adventures are always more fun when other people are having them. And don't worry about telling any children. I have a strong feeling you're the last of your kind."

Chip sighed and turned back to the speeding hills outside the window.

"Don't take this the wrong way, Mrs. Cook, but you and Dean are nothing alike."

"Well, sometimes the apple falls close to the tree, and sometimes it falls off the tree and rolls down the hill into an open septic system. I blame his father."

"Does he live around here? Maybe he could––"

Billie jerked the wheel and threaded the gap between a pair of eighteen-wheelers.

"His father? That man's a duck with four legs, a national disaster complete with sandbags and FEMA trailer," she said. "Asking him for help is the same as using a hurricane to clean your sidewalk."

She slammed on the gas pedal, causing the truck to buck like a herd of demonic goats pulling Satan's stagecoach. As they zoomed to the left of a large Postal Service truck, Chip saw a flash of pink.

"There it is! Straight ahead!"

Billie jammed her foot on the accelerator even harder. Air whistled through gaps in the rubber seals around the windows and rattled weak bolts on the fenders. Chip imagined this was what it was like to dive-bomb in a Stuka with Heinrich Himmler as your co-pilot. He grabbed the panic bar above his head.

"Slow down! We'll catch up anyway!"

"What?" shouted Billie over the roar.

A massive force slammed into the right side of the truck and everything began to spin like an overloaded washing machine full of snuff cans, half-eaten Whoppers, empty boxes of roofing nails, and missing sockets from Craftsman ratchet sets. Chip watched the mixture of trash and dry California grass whirl as the truck rolled a number of times, tilted precariously to Chip's side, and fell back to the tires with a creak of suspension.

Chip let go of the panic bar and brushed fragments of safety glass from his arms.

"Maybe we should call Dean's father now."

Billie shook her head, a bloody scratch across one cheek and a Tootsie Roll wrapper in her blonde hair.

"You're just a kid," she said. "If your parents were worth half a spit, they kept you away from the scum of society like drug dealers, whores, and merchant bankers. You probably think like most hippies there's no such thing as an evil person, just evil actions. No bad people, just bad mistakes." Billie leaned closer. "You're about to find out how wrong you are. If you've got any brains left in that tiny skull you'll open the door and start running now."

"I think it's stuck," said Chip.

Billie punched the middle of the steering wheel and the truck let out a pitiful, dying bleat.

Tracklist:

Nightshift – The Commodores

Obsession – Animotion

Take On Me – A-ha
1985

Why Dean Hates Pool Parties

Frenchie Davis had the worst personality of any eighth grader––whiny, imperious, and full of quotes from People Magazine––but he was also rich and owned every game console. That meant you did everything in your power to be his friend.

Rich in Reagan-era southern Ohio meant a nice three-bedroom with a swimming pool, cars that were bought new and not from Uncle Joe, and enough money to take a vacation somewhere other than Myrtle Beach. Frenchie had all of that and more. Most importantly for a young Dean Cook, Frenchie received a weekly allowance of such large proportion that all boys in the eighth grade harbored fantasies that his family were fugitive mobsters or Russian spies. Frenchie strode into comic book shops and the video game sections of Sears like a Peer of the British Empire, blonde hair blowing back, spidery arms waving here and there to the boy-shaped minions clustering behind. Dean was a year older but frequently joined the pack. Frenchie had the personality of a six-year-old beauty queen but his shopping expeditions and weekend parties cleared away the boredom that frequently collected in the creeks and valleys along the Ohio River like thick morning fog. On some mornings as he walked through the mist to school, Dean wished that a squadron of bears would gallop down from the pine ridges and besiege his house or that space aliens would land and reveal his true identity as an interstellar explorer, the lost member of a sleeper cell from Proxima Centauri whose memories were locked in his DNA.

Frenchie had slept over at Dean's the night before. Since the high school sat in the valley only a few corn fields from his house, they walked through the frost-covered grass along the state highway.

"Tomorrow's your birthday, Dean-o," Frenchie shouted, as school buses ground gears and zoomed by only feet away. "Let's have the party at my place!"

"But my mom already––"

Frenchie turned red and threw his backpack across the asphalt, missing the tires of Bus #5 by inches. Dean thought that extremely fortunate, as the backpack contained four brand-new G.I. Joes still in the package, and Frenchie had promised him one of them.

"I don't care what your mom said or did already!" shouted Frenchie. "It's going to be ninety degrees tomorrow. How many of your friends have an in-ground pool with diving board and slide? Your birthdays are always depressing and strange, like a funeral where the dead are walking and talking to everyone."

"My birthdays aren't like a funeral!"

"Yes, they are. Your whole family sits around wringing their hands, waiting for something horrible like an earthquake or rat poison or the house to fall in. Everyone's relieved when it finally happens, and they can get busy rounding up the animals or moving to the Red Cross shelter."

"Fine, we'll have it at your place. Maybe I'll have better luck."

"All of your relatives can come over," said Frenchie. "It's not like I'm stealing you away from them. We're just changing the location. Also, I need the pool cleaned, so it would be great if you and Jerry Lewis can show up ahead of time."

"That's not his name."

"Whatever you say, Dean-o."

The change of locale for the party confused Dean's mother, but a phone call to Anais––Frenchie's mother––cleared everything up. Dean's mother, Billie, even coordinated the party menu with Anais and which dress she should wear. When his father got home from work he accepted the situation with an exhausted nod. He spent the evening tinkering with his old Indian motorcycle and driving the gravel road to the bottom of the hill and back. Because of his appearance and mannerisms and partly because his father hated the show, Dean always thought of him as a grown-up Fonz from Happy Days. His mother encouraged that illusion with her girlish tendencies and the ability to find brand-new saddle shoes and skirts with poodles, even though it was 1985.

"This ain't that bad," said Mike, as he hand-scrubbed the concrete around Frenchie's pool. "He'll probably invite some girls. Do you think he'll invite girls?"

Dean dropped his brush into the bucket of soapy water.

"Hope not."

"Frenchie does know a lot of girls," said Mike. "Gots the moneys, gots the honeys."

"Stop talking like Don Johnson. Frenchie's thirteen and the only reason the girls like him is because he looks like one. No muscles, no facial hair––no problem."

"And there it is," said Mike. "The sulfurous oil of jealousy beading on your skin."

Dean wiped his forehead. Heat boiled up from a nearby field of dried cornstalks and waved lines through the yellow Mail Pouch letters on a barn.

"I'm not jealous. Let's change the subject."

"Is it because of last year's birthday party? The nurse in the emergency room that made you pull down your shorts?"

"Don't bring that up again."

"Be proud that a woman has finally seen you naked. One that's not a blood relative."

A patio door squealed and Frenchie stepped outside with a grandiloquent wave of his arms.

"How's the work, friends?"

"Almost done," said Mike.

Frenchie shook his head. "Like my father says, almost only counts with lawn darts and small children. Don't forget, he's very particular about this pool. He qualified for the Olympics, after all."

"That was the year he fought Doctor Doom," said Mike. "Or was it the Red Skull? Probably Red Skull––now that I think of it, yes, Red Skull was the Nazi. To be clear, I'm not saying your father is old, I'm saying he's an old superhero."

Frenchie pouted. "Don't you dare make fun! You're lucky that I moved you onto the 'approved for pool' list. Father is very exacting and doesn't allow every scrounging teenager who walks out of the holler to swim in it."

"We know, Frenchie," said Dean. "Thanks, Frenchie."

"You're welcome. Now hurry up and scrub the slide before the guests show up. You don't want them to get meningitis or warts on their behinds, do you?"

Frenchie returned to the air-conditioned comfort of his house with a whoosh of glass-paneled door.

"Speaking of a wart on the behind, there goes one," said Mike. "I wish your parents would get a pool."

"My dad almost drowned when he was a kid. Put two and two together."

Mike scrubbed the concrete harder. "Your dad almost dies from everything. I think that's his superpower."

"Almost dying? Everyone still living has that power, you idiot."

"No. He gets into scrapes all the time. I've never heard anything like it. Remember the chainsaw and the bees? Then the next week rolling the tractor? And a week after that, rolling the tractor while holding a chainsaw and being chased by bees?"

"Could happen to anyone. If everyone's got a superpower, what's mine?"

Mike shrugged. "Invisibility. Only to women, though."

"That's funny. Maybe you should write that down. Then wad it up tight, throw it off a bridge, and jump after it."

THE BIRTHDAY PARTY sputtered to life and hummed along like a well-maintained John Deere pulling a Model 348 square baler. No planes fell from the sky, no sheriff appeared, and swarms of locusts were conspicuously absent. Dean's mother and father arrived. At first his father stood apart from everyone, hands awkwardly in his pockets, but quickly joined the other adults in conversation. His mother, Billie, spun poodle-skirt pirouettes among the legions of Dean's relatives. She seemed to have found happiness as a party organizer, thought Dean, while his father and Frenchie's talked over motorcycles or the Olympics or whatever near-death experience had occurred recently and what injuries were sustained.

His stomach rumbled like a truck full of West Virginia anthracite, but Dean meandered at the edge of the pool, avoiding the buffet table. Given the nasty events of his past thirteen birthdays, he fully expected most of the party guests to break out with explosive diarrhea or for Supertrain to derail and crash through the house, even though the nearest railroad tracks were a mile away. He relaxed in the shallow end of the pool while squadrons of boys backflipped and cannonballed into the water.

The sound of teenage screams and children's giggles competed with the raised voices of adults to create an unbearable stew of noise. Dean clutched his glasses in one hand and submerged in the chlorine-blue water. His ears filled with liquid, and in the midst of all the chaos, he felt at peace, like a lonely survivor of a torpedoed cruiser in the middle of the Pacific. A glow of hope filled his chest (or was it the need to breathe?) that this birthday would be different. He rose back to the noise of the surface, flicked beads of water from the lenses of his eyeglasses, and slid them on his nose. It was at this point that he saw her.

Surprise requires a confluence of events, what scientists call "a hyper-emotional lack of expectation." Dean was at that particular lack when he saw the new girl take off her top.

Since the dawn of human society we have known, even subconsciously, that true beauty must be real, natural, and without artifice. Most women will rate the viewing of one of these as the most beautiful in life: a mother holding an infant, a son leaning over his dying father's bed, or a billionaire on one knee with a diamond big enough to plow furrows. Given enough time and money, scientists will assert that male brains see the world in a different light. These scientists would propose that young Dean Cook had just experienced the third most touching sight for a man: Girl Taking Off Polo Shirt (Method #2 Cross-Arm).

If you bothered them again on their lunch break, these scientists would emphasize that Method #2 must be distinguished from Girl Taking Off Polo Shirt While Trying Not to Smear Her Makeup (Method #3 One Arm At A Time). The subject pulls one arm inside the shirt, then the other, before lifting the material over her head. The males in this study who viewed Method #3 quickly lost interest and returned to a race displayed on a nearby monitor, even though it was Sears Point and from last year.

Dean watched as the girl crossed arms and gripped the sides of her sea-green polo at the bottom hem. With a swift motion, she arched her back and pulled it over her chest and her wavy brown curls, exposing a yellow bikini top. She was tall, tanned, and could have been anywhere from fifteen to twenty.

Dean had little time to consider who she was, because the young lady quickly moved into the second most touching sight for a male: Removing A Denim Miniskirt (Method #1 Flexion). His heart jumped a rapid cha-cha of palpitations, the same phenomenon that a dozen male scientists noted during their exhaustive observations of models hired from the pages of Sports Illustrated.

The girl unfastened the top button of her denim skirt with both hands, unzipped, and bent forward as she stepped out one leg at a time, revealing a modest yellow bikini bottom.

The noise of splashing children around Dean disappeared. His jaw weakened and dropped. He couldn't feel his legs, although they were obviously still there and kept him from drowning in three feet of water.

The girl turned and smiled at Dean or someone behind him, then a broad, hairy chest blocked her from view. Dean looked up at the red face of a very angry and very muscular male.

He grabbed Dean's jaw in one large and calloused hand.

"What are you looking at, nosy penguin?"

"Nothing, sir!" said Dean, an ejaculation that was mostly unclear because his lips were being squeezed sideways like a coin purse.

"Are you calling my daughter nothing?"

"Mo shir! Mee's ... mery mice shir!"

The man squeezed Dean's jaw harder. "Nice? That's what you call a pound of ground beef. Are you calling my daughter ground beef?"

"Mo shir! Mery mootiful shir!"

The man leaned in close and Dean smelled malt liquor.

"You keep your disgusting hands off her," the man whispered. "If you rape her with your eyes again, I'll rip them out and use your skull as a bowling ball!"

"Mesh shir!"

The man let go of Dean and splashed to the edge of the pool.

Dean rubbed his jaw, then moved to the opposite end of the pool and climbed out. Mike was near the barbecue, chatting it up with Dean's mother.

"What's up, Dean?"

His mother smiled. "Having a nice party?"

"I need to talk to Mike for a second."

"Sure, dear. I'll check on the cake."

His mother walked away and Dean huddled with Mike.

"Why is your face red," asked Mike. "You're sunburned––that's your birthday catastrophe, dude!"

"See the girl in the yellow bikini? Her father just threatened to kill me."

Mike looked around the pool then sucked in his breath. "Dy-no-MITE!"

"Keep it down," said Dean. "He's going to kill us both!"

"That is one classy lady," said Mike. "Let me tell you, I would do some nasty things to her, nasty like a Penthouse letter read out loud in a Bolivian women's prison at the stroke of midnight."

"Shut up!"

"Who's that huge monster next to my future wife," said Mike. "It's like Andre the Giant and Hulk Hogan had a hairy love child. He's really red and angry, dude ... he's looking right at us and doing something with his hands ... is that sign language or something ... wish he'd slow down, I'm always bad at charades ... squeezing something ... now he's picking up a stick and breaking it. Do you think he means me? I'm pointing at my chest and he's shaking his head. He's pointing at you and smiling, dude."

"Time to go," said Dean.

"You can't leave your own birthday party."

"Watch me."

Dean grabbed his gym bag from the lawn and ran into the house. He shut the bathroom door behind him and turned the lock.

The thin plywood of the door rattled just as his swim trunks plopped wetly on the floor.

"Someone in here," he yelled.

The plywood shook like roofing tin in a hurricane. Dean made the wise choice to pull his wet trunks up as the framing cracked around the door and burst inside. The girl's huge father stood there, jaw clenched and the tendons on his neck standing out.

He pointed a finger. "Listen to me––I am Ludovico Ariosto. I don't need to know your name, and you only need to know mine. If you say anything or scream like a little baby penguin, I'll kill you with these hands, hands that were disqualified from the 1980 Ohio amateur weightlifting championships because of little baby penguin judges and their very specific rules on outfits. Now move."

"Move where?"

"Into the trees behind the house. Don't look at anything and don't say anything."

Dean hoped that someone would notice as the massive Ludovico prodded him across the backyard, but everyone had crowded together in a tight circle full of giggles and shouted questions. Probably Frenchie showing off his latest model airplane or something, thought Dean.

Inside the pine forest, Ludovico twisted Dean's arm behind his back.

"Hey!"

"Shut up and keep going," said the gruff voice behind him.

Dean went over possible scenarios. All the fighting moves he knew were from television, unfortunately. If he grabbed a fistful of dirt or pine needles from the ground he could perform Shatner #3: Throw Stuff in Eyes. He would just run at that point, because this guy was huge enough to shake off Shatner #2: Rabbit Punch Across Shoulders, or Shatner #1: Knife Hand To Neck.

One fact that might work in his favor was that the forest behind Frenchie's house was a state forest. Maybe he could escape and find a park ranger.

After five minutes of walking up a steep slope covered in fallen leaves of all the golden, red, and brown shades of autumn, Ludovico's strong hand pulled Dean to a stop.

"Take off your shorts."

"I'm not doing it," said Dean, finding a reservoir of nervous bravery. "You're sick."

"Do you think I'm a pervert, you stupid crazy mouse? A pervert would push you to the ground and do whatever he wanted. I'm bad, but not that bad."

Dean sighed and used one hand to disrobe (Removing Damp Swim Trunks With Shame, Method #2: Bending at Knees).

"Happy?"

"Put the shorts over your head," said Ludovico.

"The what?"

"Just do it. I don't have all day."

Dean picked up his swim trunks covered with brown pine needles and slipped it over his head, effectively blindfolding himself.

"Keep walking," said Ludovico, still holding Dean's arm behind his back.

Dean quickly lost all sense of direction. He walked for what felt like hours, but was probably only another thirty minutes, twisting and turning through the forest, over painfully dead branches and rocks, up and over the crest of ridges.

"My daughter is the most precious thing in the world to me," said Ludovico as he pushed Dean through the sharp brambles.

"I understand, sir."

"You understand nothing!" shouted Ludovico. "She's the first daughter in my family for seven generations! My wife had three boys before her. All the time chasing them through the house, listening to their yelling, breaking my toes on their guns and rocket launchers left on the floor. It makes me as sick as a dog. I see the families with their girls learning how to sew, playing nice with each other, wearing beautiful dresses. That is the family I want!"

"Yes, sir."

"So when disgusting little penguins like you swarm around my beautiful daughter with your mouths open, it makes me want to kill something. Usually, it is that person looking at my daughter. And here we are."

Dean smelled water and his bare feet squished in mud. The sunlight blinded him as Ludovico pulled the shorts off his head. The pair stood at the edge of a small pond surrounded by pine trees.

"You have one minute," said Ludovico. "Before I drown you like a little baby aardvark."

Dean held his hands over his naked crotch. "Why not just smack me around a bit and let me go? I've learned my lesson."

"Learned what lesson? My daughter will never forget how you raped her with your eyes. What's even more important, I will never forget it. Also, hitting leaves a mark."

"You'll probably still go to jail, you know that," said Dean, shivering.

Ludovico shrugged his broad and hairy shoulders. "Always a sixth time for everything. Fifty-nine, fifty-eight ..."

After a dozen steps, Dean found that covering his crotch slowed him down, so he let go and sprinted across a clearing and into a copse of red-leafed maples that eventually led to a deep ravine in the forest. He splashed through a brook and climbed slick rocks as the ravine ascended to a ridge. At the top Dean followed an old logging road along the top of the ridge for at least a mile, stopping every few minutes to catch his breath. He neither saw nor heard any sign of pursuit from Ludovico, and began to be more concerned about finding his way out of the state forest and back to civilization. Without any clothing he'd freeze during the night and decided the embarrassment of being found naked ranked lower than the embarrassment of being found naked and dead.

After following a logging road that descended in curves from the high ridge, Dean saw a cabin through the branches of the autumn trees. Built of rough-hewn logs with white material filling the chinks, the building was too small to hold more than one bedroom.

"Must be a hunter's cabin," whispered Dean to himself, instantly disturbed that he was starting to whisper to himself.

No vehicles were parked nearby, not even a 4-wheeler, although a ring of campfire stones lay in front of the cabin and chains for stringing up deer dangled from a nearby oak tree.

Dean looked in the windows and saw a pair of empty beds. He tapped one finger on the glass and listened. Nothing. He tapped louder. Still nothing.

The weather-beaten front door didn't budge, but Dean found a tiny window at the back of the cabin. Not wearing a scrap of clothing was an advantage as he squeezed through and tumbled into a small bathroom.

He opened the bathroom door with a creak. "Hello?"

Squirrel and raccoon skins covered the rough logs of the walls, and deer antlers hung from the low rafters. A clear plastic jug sat in one corner. Dean drank eagerly from it, then coughed and spit as the liquid burned his throat.

"That's either gasoline or the worst moonshine in the world," he said to himself.

Black footlockers sat at the end of each bed, secured by padlocks. The rest of the cabin was bare of even a scrap of fabric that Dean could use to cover himself, not even curtains that he could fashion lederhosen out of, Maria-von-Trapp-style, and he wasn't about to wear a dead squirrel.

In the bathroom he found a plunger with a wooden handle, and after much effort, managed to pry open the first trunk and bypass the lock. Inside lay piles of brightly patterned women's clothing.

The second trunk was full of odd-looking plastic bits and pieces, a few wigs, and a blonde, inflatable mannequin.

Dean held up a pink feather boa. "Who leaves this in the woods?"

He pawed through the clothing in the first trunk, searching for trousers, shirts, anything vaguely masculine, but unfortunately whoever owned these clothes had a taste for pink and frilly.

Dean rubbed his chin. "Which is more embarrassing––naked, or wearing this junk?"

The least feminine top he could find out of all the outrageous clothing was a white, long-sleeved blouse that passed for a pirate's shirt if you looked at it sideways in the dark. A navy blue miniskirt covered in white stars seemed the most masculine, reasoned Dean, because it resembled the blue field of the American flag. There were no socks, so to keep his legs warm he pulled on two pairs of navy blue tights. A pair of too-small but sensible black pumps protected his feet.

"American pirate," he said to the bathroom mirror, and admired himself from the left and right.

A heavy knock rattled the door of the cabin.

"Anyone home?" came Ludovico's deep voice.

Dean glanced at the tiny window in the bathroom. He could probably squeeze outside but that would make too much noise. No weapons in the cabin, so that left only one option.

"Just a minute," he said in a high-pitched falsetto.

Maybe he could crack the door and fool this mad Italian for a few seconds. Dean grabbed a blonde wig and a black bra from the second box and ran unsteadily in heels to the bathroom. After stuffing the bra with toilet paper and donning the blouse again, he pulled the blonde wig over his head. After hiding his glasses in a pocket and brushing the fake hair with his fingers in the mirror, something still didn't seem right.

"Girlfriend, you have got to do better," he said.

The bathroom drawer held a dozen tubes and tiny jars.

"Hello?" came Ludovico's voice from outside.

"In a second," yelled Dean in falsetto.

He dusted his face with beige powder to hide the scratches and covered his mouth with deep red lipstick.

Dean gave his best "bad-girl" pout at the mirror. "Go get 'em, tiger," he whispered.

He unlocked the cabin door and opened it a crack.

"I was just taking a nap. Can I help you?"

Ludovico's chest and legs were covered in bloody scratches and smeared with mud. His black hair was full of leaves and twigs.

"Sorry to bother you, miss," he said. "I was lost in the forest while camping. I am wondering ... do you have a phone?"

"No, I don't."

"In that case, do you know how I can get to Route 93?"

Dean giggled. "Just walk."

"I mean, what direction?"

Dean pointed with his chin. "That way."

"I have just come from there. I can see no houses."

"How about that way?"

Ludovico squinted at Dean suspiciously. "No, the lake is there. Come now, pretty lady, confess the truth! Something is not right with you. A girl like you all alone ... without a man to protect her?"

"Nothing wrong with that! Nothing at all."

"I see," said Ludovico craftily. "You were also on a camping trip and became lost. We are two green beans in a pod, as they say."

"Yes, that's true," said Dean. "I'm lost, too."

Ludovico forced open the door and looked Dean up and down. "In that case, let's have a bit of fun this evening."

"My father is very worried about me," said Dean rapidly. "He will be crazy with grief because his only daughter has wandered away from the campsite."

Ludovico sighed and looked away. "Ah, the luck. Well, let's search for the road together. As a father myself, I am honor-bound to protect you."

Dean followed the giant Italian through the state forest, hiding his face and speaking as little as possible. Spikes of pain shot through his feet from the tight pumps, and he decided to carry them in one hand and walk in his stocking-covered bare feet.

At last Ludovico seemed to know where they were going. As they broke out of the forest and walked over a soft green lawn, he grabbed Dean's wrist.

"Over here," said Ludovico. "Come with me."

Dean heard the murmur of a large group of people. Without his glasses he hadn't been able to see his surroundings very well, but now realized that the large Italian had been leading him back to the birthday party. Dean pulled and struggled, but Ludovico picked him up easily and carried him to the other side of the house where a huge gathering of Dean's relatives, friends, and girls stood around a birthday cake.

Ludovico stood in front of the gathering with Dean in his arms and yelled with boisterous exuberance:

"I found the birthday boy!"

Tracklist:

Cowboys and Indians – Pearl Harbor & the Explosions

Familiar Spirit – Allen Bruce Ray

I Got Stripes – Johnny Cash
6

The ambulance slowed and took an exit ramp.

"Good idea, Lin," said Dean. "After all that driving you need to stretch your legs."

"I was worried about the fuel situation," said Lin. "But now that you've brought it up, do you mind driving for a while?"

"Like gum on the seat of your best Sunday pants, that's a sticky situation, Lin. If we're going to make it to Charleston we won't have time to stop, and that means I'll need to save my driving energy for tonight. Unless, of course, one of our female stowaways has the ability and desire?"

Emerson shook her head. "I cannot, but during her youth Fanta drove a large tractor on cabbage farm."

"I don't think that helps, but thanks anyway."

The ambulance swayed and creaked as Lin pulled into a gas station and stopped beside the pumps. She filled the ambulance with diesel while Dean and the two ladies pushed through the glass door of "Tony Montana's Gulp 'n Go."

Like any number of refueling stops in the Sierra Nevadas, the service station was a log cabin filled with lacquered bric-a-brac and racks of miscellany that included flavors of Snapple long extinct from polite society, ten varieties of Combos, and locally-sourced, grass-fed fish jerky. A collection of Native American tomahawks, faded photographs, and eagle feathers lined the wall behind the cash register, and created a strange contrast with the nearby racks of cigarettes and cartons of smokeless tobacco. Apart from the hum of refrigeration compressors, the shop was as quiet as a tomb.

Fanta and Emerson scooped up crackling bags of food and essentials and broke the peaceful atmosphere. Dean walked to a rainbow array of Doritos and tried to decide what "extreme" tasted like. Rejecting the marketing blurbs that implied his manhood was non-existent if he ingested a different brand of corn chip, Dean grabbed the largest bag of Funyuns.

The two ladies piled armfuls of goods onto the counter. Dean balanced his bag on top and rang a tarnished bell beside the cash register. Ponderous steps vibrated the wooden floor.

A short and stocky Native American pushed through a beaded curtain. His black hair split down the middle like a crease from a cartoon bullet, and ended in two long braids. His red-and-white checked shirt could have been stolen from an Italian restaurant. A white patch over his chest pocket said Hi, I'm Tony, but the sour look on his face said You just interrupted "General Hospital" and it was getting really good.

"Hi, Tony," said Dean.

The short Native American frowned. "Hello."

He grabbed Dean's bag of chips and tapped the price into the cash register with a machine-gun staccato.

"You don't have a scanner?" asked Dean.

The attendant shook his head with a barely apparent jerk and continued to jab the prices into the register.

Dean's gaze wandered to the tomahawks and other artifacts on the wall. He pointed to a photograph of a smiling young man in a feathered headdress.

"Is that you in the picture?"

Tony grabbed a can of Squirt from the pile and shook his head.

"Charlie Snaps His Fingers. That's an odd name," said Dean. "Please don't think I'm being rude, of course. I'm one-sixteenth Cherokee, so I've the right to bring these things up. I'm the only one at the meetings who does."

Tony slammed down the can of Squirt with a bang and reached beneath the counter for matches and a red-and-white package of Swisher Sweets. With slow, easy fingers he opened the cellophane, pulled out a cigarillo, and lit a match on the counter. Only after he'd touched the flame to the end of the narrow cigar and taken a few deep puffs did his eyes come back to Dean. He began to speak slowly and surely, like a funeral director in need of Vitamin B.

"It is a long and sad story. Charlie was born a member of the Kickapoo tribe in Horton, Kansas. Even from birth everyone saw that he was a strong and special boy, especially when he broke the doctor's index finger like a twig. People say they had never heard a man scream like a woman before that day. When he was eight he could bend oak trees and run faster than a coyote with a fat chicken in its mouth. He won his first official race at twelve, and by sixteen had won the state championships in track and field. Singlehandedly he brought our baseball team to the nationals. He was the next Jim Thorpe, people said. Billy wasn't just an athlete, he was a mathlete and spoke four languages including FORTRAN. Most people were impressed, considering the tribe owned not a single computer. Everyone thought Charlie was the pinnacle of human possibility––the boy who could be anything he wanted. All manner of men from outside the reservation began to knock on his door: colleges, major league baseball, NASA, even Amway. To paraphrase Al Pacino, the world was his."

Tony picked up the can of Squirt and entered the price in the register.

"What happened?"

Tony tapped the end of the Swisher Sweet in an ashtray. "Charlie went to Harvard on a cricket scholarship. He might have become an international superstar, but nobody really knows, because nobody really knows what cricket is. His parents died in a tragic boating accident around the time Charlie graduated Harvard, and he disappeared. Some say he killed himself and his ghost wanders the Horton wheat fields at night, tossing a cricket ball in the air and singing 'Home on the Range.' Others ask why a ghost would sing that, even if it is the official state song of Kansas. Some people say Charlie changed his name, moved to Japan, and became MVP four years in a row playing for the Hiroshima Carp. Me? I think he wandered from Motel 6 to La Quinta to Quality Inn for years, until he finally rode a barge loaded with flour up the Ohio River and disappeared without a trace, as if Kichimanetowa himself had swallowed Charlie whole."

"These theories are very specific, Tony. Pipe dreams, or might I say, 'peace-pipe' dreams?"

The short Native American grimaced but said nothing, as if he'd stubbed a toe in front of a librarian. He went back to the register keys, hitting them hard enough to make pennies fly from the Marlboro tray on the counter. After he finished ringing up the pile of items, he ran his tongue over the outside of his teeth and stared at the glowing end of the cigarillo in his hand.

"Anything else you need, Mister Cherokee?"

"There is, actually. I have to drive tonight and need something to keep me fresh and alert. I realize that's a strange request in a convenience store along a major freeway, but as the kids say, 'Whoop, there it is.' "

Tony shook his head. "You're a strange cat, Cherokee. Just buy a can of Monster or 72-Hour Energy Swill."

"I'm allergic to all that stuff. Last time I drank Monster I woke up in Fresno behind a Kia dealership. I sold a convertible and three sedans before they kicked me out."

"Coffee?"

"Makes me homisuicidal. Not a good idea while driving."

"Soda?"

"Gives me gas."

Tony raised his index finger. "How about an old Indian home remedy? Freeze a pair of Little Debbie Swiss Rolls and put one inside each cheek, right against the gums."

"I only like the banana-flavored ones."

"In that case, there's only one thing for it."

Tony shuffled away through the beaded curtain and returned a moment later with a five-ounce bottle of fiery red liquid.

"This is my own special recipe," said Tony. "One swallow and you won't sleep for hours. Rub on the inside of your thighs for extra energy, but be careful. If the potion touches anything sensitive in the crotch area, you'll produce more noise than Sekumbah the Rooster."

Dean tilted the bottle in the glare of the overhead fluorescents. "This looks suspiciously like a bottle of Tapatio, but with a yellow Post-It note over the label and the words 'Tony's Red Indian Juice' in crayon."

"I'm still working on branding, and we are forced to repurpose old bottles. Don't worry––this is a natural herbal product. It's also green and carbon-neutral."

Dean twisted off the red plastic cap and sniffed the contents. "Even smells like Tapatio. Out of all the people on this planet, I know that smell."

"You open it, you bought it," said Tony. "$14.99 plus VAT."

CHIP TRIED TO RATTLE the door of his jail cell with both hands like he'd seen in movies, but the beige-painted bars neither moved nor made the slightest squeak.

"Calm down or you'll pull a muscle," said Billie, as she lay on the wooden bench inside the cell. "Then I'll have to listen to you moaning about that all day."

Chip rested his forehead against a cool metal bar.

"Why'd you have to punch the deputy in the face?"

"Good question." Billie spat a brown glob across the room. "Why did you––when faced with a single Barney Fife from a Podunk dip-in-the-road who was just trying to take a report––start freaking out with that story about how we're two lovebirds on our honeymoon? Where in the name of Garth Brooks did that come from?"

"I panicked. I thought he'd stop asking questions."

Billie shook her head. "You couldn't give away a can of Fresca in Death Valley."

"What's that mean?"

"It means you're dumb."

"Breaking his nose was a better option?"

"I thought we could outrun that jellybean patrol car," said Billie, with a despondent sniff. "My truck looks like a fresh cow pie, but she can go. Could go."

"Running from the police doesn't make it better. Especially without a windshield!"

"Me and the law, nothing makes it better."

Chip rubbed his cheeks with both hands and grabbed the cell door again.

"What a nightmare."

"If you think this is a nightmare or a dream or whatever, you've never spent time in a Juarez lockup," said Billie. "Don't get your little pink panties twisted in a knot––Fran's gonna be here in a few hours. That was my one phone call."

"Fran?"

"Dean's father. Name's Frank, but don't ever call him that, always use Fran. And this ain't funny like on TV. When I say don't ever call him that, it means don't ever call him that. He'll rip off your baby-making bits."

Chip thumped his forehead against the steel bars. "Fantastic. Wish I could call my mom. I just want to get the PPPP and go home."

"So you can play video games all day?"

"Yes, actually. That's my job."

"Find something else to do," said Billie. "A few years of that and you'll be fatter than a convention of pigs in a Hostess bakery."

"Hey! I take yoga."

A series of rapid-fire thumps came from the end of the corridor, and sounded like a cluster of M80s thrown into a pond. A muffled crash followed, then a desperate scream.

Chip tried to peer sideways through the bars. "What the Freaky Friday was that?"

"Beat all we can do about it," said Billie.

The noise had seemed to come from behind a heavy security door, out of sight down the corridor to the right. Chip heard a series of clicks, a squeal of metal, then footsteps. Step by slow, methodical step, hard soles slapped the bare concrete.

Black leather shoes appeared first, reflecting the yellow sodium light with a bright, expensive shine. Chip's gaze traveled up the tall pipes of tuxedo pants past a white shirt, black bow tie, and black tuxedo jacket to brilliant blue eyes, blonde flattop, and impassive, pale face. Behind this regal figure shuffled a mustachioed chauffeur in a uniform of sky-blue velvet.

Chip cleared his throat. "Are you Fran?"

Billie had a fit of coughing which required a few backslaps from Chip.

"Not Fran," she said at last.

"Okay, then," said Chip to the two men in the corridor. "How can we help you?"

The chauffeur sneered. "Small boy, you are locked in box and cannot help us. You should say, how can WE help you. It is basic English."

"Fine. Can YOU help us?"

The man in the tuxedo nodded and spoke with a Slavic accent. "Allow me to be introduced. I am Duke Nichego of Kamchatka––"

Billie raised her head. "Catcha-what?"

The chauffeur jumped forward. "Shut your face, small man! The Duke is speaking." He kicked the metal bars of the door and hissed in pain.

"I am Duke Nichego of Kamchatka," said the blue-eyed figure. "I am rich man come to the famous city of San Jose to be married, but my bride is now kidnapped."

"Girl thief!" screamed the chauffeur.

Nichego held up a pale hand. "If you have taken my beautiful Angelika or lie to my face about her location, I will release you from this prison only to scoop out your eyes with an egg spoon. If, on the other hand, you are not weasel-persons and can help me find her, I will release you from prison and probably not do that other thing with the spoon."

"Who's Angelika?" asked Chip.

"Shut up." Billie grabbed the cell bars. "Yeah, we can find her. Let us out."

"I don't believe you," said Nichego. "Vassily, the egg spoon."

"The what, sir?"

"Egg spoon, egg spoon, egg spoon!" shouted Nichego. "Ah, what's the use. Thirty times and you still can't remember."

Vassily took a small automatic from his jacket. "You mean the pistol, Duke Nichego? Should I aim for eyeball?"

Nichego closed his eyes and rubbed his face for a moment. "I am asking you two jail-weasels one more time––have you seen a girl in a red wedding dress? She is kidnapped by a pink van."

"I've never heard of this girl," said Chip. "But the pink vehicle is mine. It was kind of stolen––borrowed, if you like––from my house."

"That is good," said Nichego. "My Angelika is with the people in that pink monster. If you help me find it, I promise to let you out of this cell and not scoop your eyes or even shoot them."

Red-faced, Billie paced the tiny cell.

"I don't know," said Chip. "My mother––"

"Quiet," said Billie. "Duke Leggo-My-Eggo or whatever your name is, we'll help you find this girl. They're heading east on the highway, and we've got an electronic tracker."

"Very good," said Nichego.

He took a set of keys from his pocket and unlocked the cell door. Chip and Billie stepped out and were prodded along the corridor by the chauffeur and his pistol. Nichego pressed a buzzer, and the exit door squealed open.

Inside the sheriff's office, Chip expected a scene of gore and sprawled bodies, but not a paperclip or file folder looked out of place. Across the room, two deputies calmly chatted behind bulletproof glass.

"What was all that noise before?"

Nichego waved to the deputies, and they waved back. "Noise? Oh, that––I gave the American officers a bag of coins, enough to buy all the ice cream bars in the machine. Unfortunately, the machine became stubborn about giving ice cream and then somehow became smashed on the floor. Life is so stressful sometimes."

Tracklist:

Missing Cleveland – Scott Weiland

Major Tom (Voellig Losgeloest) – Peter Schilling

Why Does It Always Rain On Me? – Travis
7

The ambulance swayed through the curving mountain highway, lit by occasional flashes of sunset. Dean emptied another bottle of water into his mouth and sprayed it full-force from the passenger window.

"You knew it was Tapatio and still drank it," yelled Lin from the front.

"Of course, Lin," said Dean. "I'm not used to people lying to my face."

The fire in his mouth faded, doused by the water or because every nerve in his mouth had been annihilated. Dean climbed into the back and slumped in an office chair, hoping to gain a few minutes of sleep during the bouncing, high-speed journey to the east. Frantic whispers between Emerson and Fanta interrupted his plan.

"Perhaps you ladies should rest," said Dean. "Not to be presumptuous or anything, but it's getting dark."

Emerson smiled. "We are not sleepy."

Dean lifted a bag of Funyuns. "Hungry?"

"No thank you. In Kamchatka we call this kind of food ... how do you say in English? Waste from sewer."

"I see. Since you've declined my offer of a tasty treat, how can I help?"

"You and I have to marry."

"I thought we were beyond that. Didn't I say yes, at least tentatively? If you're worried about the Cuban situation, that was cleared up years ago. If it hadn't, I'd be like a Japanese fog. A bigamist. Big-a-mist? Never mind."

"We must marry quickly," said Emerson. "If Duke Nichego catches up to us––he will definitely catch up to us––there is a smaller chance he will commit murder."

"I agree with the implication that death is something to avoid."

"You will probably still be murdered. The Duke is like that."

"Ah."

"He is very good at catching people, killing people, and stealing socks," said Emerson. "These are his only hobbies."

"I see."

Emerson touched Dean's cheek with cool fingers.

"Do not be sad, Mr. Dean Cook. If we are caught, I promise we will die together, no matter what."

"I guess that's something. Dying alone is so much different from dying together."

"We will use this," said Emerson.

She held up a silver-plated, two-shot derringer. Dean used a finger to push the barrel away from his nose.

"I appreciate the romantic gesture and everything, but let's cross that bridge when we come to it."

Emerson pouted. "Can we bribe a marriage judge? They are easy to find in my country."

"Reno is on the way," shouted Lin from the cab. "We'll go through it tonight."

"And there you have it," said Dean somberly. "Out of all the crazy things that I expected to happen today, a shotgun marriage in Reno wasn't one of them. In level of oddity it ranks slightly above being tackled in the airport while dressed as Godzilla, and slightly below a pancake in the shape of Leonard Nimoy's face. Absolutely shocking."

Emerson's eyes glistened. "You don't wish to marry me?"

Fanta reached forward and slapped Dean in the face, making two people with tears in their eyes.

"That hurt, you big buffalo! Wait, don't translate that," said Dean, and held Emerson's hand. "Of course I'll marry you. As you know, authors in America have literally dozens of female fans. You're the most beautiful one of all, as it happens, and the only one to touch my heart or actually be in front of me now."

"I am not asking for real marriage," said Emerson. "Only paper marriage. There is colony of Kamchatkan people in West Virginia. If you take us there, we cancel marriage and you continue to be single playboy author."

"I've never heard of Russians in West Virginia, and I think someone would have said something. News travels fast in Appalachia."

"Do you know Hare Krishna? My people have colony on mountain next door. Every day they are fighting each other like cats and dogs in the rain. They came from Kamchatka to work at clock-radio factory, but when it shut down many people stayed on the mountain."

"Sounds a bit weird to me."

"It is not weird. It is honest people making clock radio!"

"Fine, fine. If this colony isn't too far from Charleston we'll take you there. Won't this duke find you in West Virginia?"

"He is picky bird and will not enter the state," said Emerson confidently. "He says many times on famous TV show Kamchatka Love Talent that West Virginia women are wide like truck and stretch socks to breaking point."

"That's exactly how I feel right now––microscopic fabric over an elephantine foot."

Emerson let go of his hand. "I don't understand. Are you disgusting sock thief like Duke Nichego?"

"No, dear soul. I'm just tired and stressed-out. Speaking of that, what about your parents? They have to be looking for you."

Emerson shook her head. "I am orphan found on piece of floating wood after storm. My parents are probably fisherman from Japan––this is why other children in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky call me squinty-eye yellow devil girl––but nobody knows. I am raised by Red Star Children's Home. Many times American couples come to home and try to buy me, but I kick and scream, and they go away."

"I'm sorry to hear that."

"I frightened a couple last week very bad," said Emerson. "I think I sent the woman to a nervous hospital."

"Last week? I thought you worked in a department store."

"Yes, of course I did. How else does orphanage increase revenue stream and provide yearly return on investment?"

"How old are you again?"

"Why do you ask? Are you disgusting child-pervert?"

"Of course not. But you have to be eighteen to get married, at least in Nevada."

Emerson and Fanta engaged in a bout of heated whispering. At last Emerson nodded and turned back to Dean.

"I am eighteen," she said in a matter-of-fact voice.

Fanta cracked her knuckles in a quite obvious fashion and stretched her arms, displaying substantial musculature that did not go unnoticed by Dean.

"Eighteen! Yes, of course," he said. "Lin? Perhaps it's time for me to drive."

"Are you sure?"

"Pull over as soon as possible. In fact, the next second or two would be extraordinarily satisfactory."

Unsecured objects and passengers flew through the air of the back compartment as the ambulance swerved to a stop. Lin jumped out of the driver's seat, sprinted to the side door, and swung it open, causing Dean to tumble out the door and onto the concrete shoulder.

"Not that fast," he groaned.

"You're covered in blood!"

Gobs of red liquid covered Dean's face and front of his shirt. Horrified, he stared at his hands, then raised them dramatically to the sky like in Platoon with Willem Dafoe, only not as good because he wasn't in Platoon or Willem Dafoe.

"Why? I've got so much left to give. I just need more time!"

Emerson waved a red bottle with a missing cap.

"It is ketchup, not blood."

Dean nodded. "Of course. I knew that."

He scrambled to his feet and took the bottle from Emerson in what he hoped was a nonchalant manner, then tossed said bottle into the dark mountains in another manner he hoped was considered also nonchalant.

"I hope you weren't hit by any condiment missiles," he said.

"I am good girl!" said Emerson. "How dare you say that!"

"Sorry, I meant a bottle of ketchup or mustard, not that other thing."

Emerson blushed and said nothing as she cleaned Dean's face with a handkerchief.

"Can I ride in front with you?" she asked.

"Only if you're ready for a crazy good time, little lady. Are you?"

"No."

Dean shrugged. "You can still ride in front."

He eased into the driver's seat and gripped the wheel. He remembered what his tai chi teacher had said about meditation, and inhaled a lungful of air.

"Are you feeling sick to stomach?" asked Emerson.

Dean let out the breath he'd been holding. "Me and cars ... it's not a good combination. Not like peanut butter and chocolate, or marshmallow and chocolate. Actually, anything and chocolate. I don't have good experiences with moving vehicles. Or chocolate."

"But everyone in America loves the car," said Emerson. "Route 66, Boss Mustang, Chevy Is a Rock, and Rider of Knights starring Comrade David Hasselovich."

"Luckily, I'm not everyone in America."

"Stop gabbing, Dean, and get a move on," yelled Lin from the back.

Dean put the ambulance into gear and jerked the wheel onto the freeway amidst blaring honks from passing cars.

"Are you afraid to drive?"

"Not in the technical sense of the word," said Dean. "It's just that there are too many negative memories and federal court cases associated with my family and cars. I've always avoided driving in general and especially on my birthday, but we should be fine. This isn't agricultural equipment or a van in the shape of a Tapatio bottle."

"Today's your birthday? Happy birthday!"

"Thank you, but it's never happy, pleasant, or even safe until it's over," said Dean. "My birthdays are always filled with the worst cataclysms and accidents of happenstance, if a man in the twenty-first century can use that phrase."

"Even so, I hope you have a happy one," said Emerson.

"You're very kind. Wait a moment––what time is it?"

"Eight-oh-three," said Emerson.

Dean twisted a knob on the radio. "Of course a girl named after a clock would know. We've only missed the beginning."

"The beginning of what?"

"You'll see."

The speakers in the cab popped loudly and Dean lowered the volume.

"––tragedy. The nation is mourning tonight as we learn of the passing––"

"That's not it," said Dean, and flipped around the dial.

"–––host of Space Questions and hero to millions of children around the world, suffered the unfortunate but all-too-common fate of celebrities in America––"

"Oh my God," said Dean.

An electric nervousness filled the voice of the radio announcer, the excitement of a man who knew with factual certainty that this was the high point of his career, but was also oblivious to the other factual certainty that this was the high point of his career.

"How many times have we heard the sad story," continued the announcer, "of a man shot in the back twelve times and falling from a Las Vegas balcony into a truck packed to the brim with frozen treats? Too many, far too many. For those who have repeatedly emailed our studio, no, the ice cream is no longer for sale. It was confiscated by the police, many of whom suffered indigestion and stomach cramps in the line of duty. Chief Detective Christopher Parsons made quite a scene while on scene by screaming, 'Do you seriously want these delicious frozen treats to go to waste?' "

"This is horrible," said Dean. "I thought my birthday couldn't get any worse."

"What's wrong?"

"My favorite actor, Nando Phoenix. He's done it all: TV, movies, books, all the way to Space Questions, the number one show on evening radio. Now he's dead."

"What is this Space Questions?"

"Does it even matter? The show is nothing without Nando! Sorry, I didn't mean that. It's hard to explain. You could say it's a quiz show in space."

"––brought one of Nando's oldest friends onto the show tonight. Not that he's old, I didn't mean that."

"Young at heart and old of brain," came a higher-pitched male voice through the speakers.

"Yes, quite right," said the interviewer. "Sergio Martinez, known to you in radio and TV land as Dr. Winthrop Braintree of Space Questions, joins us tonight on the broadcast. The final episode of the radio program follows this interview and was recorded only last week. Mr. Martinez, I won't ask how you are doing tonight because I know that, like all of us, you're in the depths of despair. Nando's sudden passing has been a shock to all of us."

"Well, Alan––"

"Charlie."

"Yes, of course. I never expected to wake up at three in the afternoon and find my closest friend dead and covered in Orange Creamsickle," said Martinez. "Unless I was the one who did it, of course. In that case it wouldn't have been a surprise, that thing that I did."

"Did what?"

"Nothing. Let's scrub and go again. Roll tape!"

"Mr. Martinez, this is a live broadcast," said the host.

"Of course. That was another joke. Just to make it clear, the thing I said about killing Nando was a joke, and that other thing was also a joke. I'm full of jokes this morning. Evening."

"Mr. Martinez, I don't believe humor at this early stage––"

"Is very inappropriate, but that's how I grieve. Yes, that's it. I've turned my grief into humor and I'm sorry. It was all a joke and quite inappropriate but you must forgive me because Nando was my dearest friend and I'm still dealing with the shock. Not as great a shock as diving headfirst into a truck of delicious, creamy treats, but still a shock. Sorry! That was another joke which I see now and was also inappropriate, Steven."

"Charlie."

"It's ironic that Nando was more of a chocolate Fudgesickle and Magnum fan, but ended up as an ice cream sandwich. Sorry! That was an improper thing to say, I see that now, but it's also true and I saw it with my own face. Eyes. I meant eyes."

Emerson sighed. "Can we listen to music? This is boring to death."

"My dear fake fiancée and future fake divorcée, it's only a short program that just happens to feature my favorite actor of all time on this entire planet who just died," said Dean. "Could I listen for a few minutes, please?"

"But I don't understand these people who are talking. Who is Martinez?"

"He's an actor," said Dean. "He and Nando Phoenix starred in a television show thirty years ago called Space Trails. Nando was the captain of a starship exploring the galaxy, and Martinez was his science officer. The show was canceled after only two seasons. Nando went on to star in other television shows, but Martinez struggled to find work. Five years ago they started this radio program called Space Questions, although there was always a strange tension between the two of them, probably because Nando was always in demand as an actor and Martinez wasn't."

"Still bored to death," said Emerson.

"This will only take a few minutes, I promise."

A passing eighteen-wheeler showered the windshield with mist. The shine of headlights on the water reminded Dean of the moving star-field in the opening of Space Trails. He felt a lump in his throat, possibly from melancholic nostalgia, but probably just indigestion from Tony's Red Indian Juice.

"––also inappropriate, I agree, Nelson, but as I mentioned before, that's how I grieve and don't take that away from me in this terrible moment. That would be cold of you, as cold as frozen stalagmites of orange and vanilla impaling your nostrils. I'm sorry!"

"This could go on forever," said the host under his breath. "For the twelfth time, my name is Charles Danforth Rice. Don't go anywhere, faithful listeners, because the final episode of Space Questions is coming up next."

"Sorry, Charlie."

"Shut up."

An orchestral fanfare vibrated the speakers.

"Space ...," intoned a deep voice. "Questions. The ongoing journey of Captain Sparx and the crew of the U.S.S. Partridge. Imprisoned in an alien broadcasting studio at the outer rim of the known universe, these brave men and women struggle to escape while at the same time maintain ratings among Rilluscan males in the 280-344 age bracket."

"Starring Nando Phoenix as Captain James L. Sparx, Thurston St. John-Smythe as Lord Deathclaw, Sergio Martinez as Dr. Winthrop Braintree, and Diedrich Bader as Interrogation Subject 312. Special guest this week: Famed British actor Nick Frost as Thg'thg'thg."

"Having failed to escape with disastrous results the previous evening, Captain Sparx lay on the floor of his cold, damp cell, and waited for the inevitable summons of Lord Deathclaw."

"The despair of this dripping, stinking corridor in the center of Asteroid 42 is broken by a quiet tapping sound. The enigmatic Dr. Braintree is using Morse code to communicate with his comrades, believing quite erroneously that an alien civilization capable of interstellar travel cannot understand a few plinks on metal."

"I know, Braintree," says Captain Sparx. "But I'm still angry at you."

"The pattern of metal taps continues."

"Next time reverse the polarity of the spoon before you hand it to me," says Sparx. "Dammit, Braintree! You almost blew my face off."

"Braintree's repeated, hammered apology is interrupted by the tramp of heavy boots."

"Good evening, Captain Sparx," hisses a slithery voice in a British upper-class accent. "I see your laser burns have healed."

"Come a little closer, treacherous fiend, and I'll show you," snarls Sparx.

"Not now, my dear. It's time for the latest episode!"

Applause and the theme tune boomed through the speakers. As the clapping faded, the slithery voice spoke again.

"Welcome, audience, to tonight's episode. Captain Sparx and Dr. Braintree face off against Interrogation Subject 312 and our newest captive, Thg'thg'thg."

Something burbled like a malfunctioning aquarium aerator.

"Save your questions for later, Thg'thg'thg, or I'll exterminate the last of your disgusting race, who just so happens to be your dear Auntie Melba."

The crowd applauded.

"First question: When Proxima 427 went supernova, how did the U.S.S. Partridge––"

A loud beep vibrated the speakers.

"Ejected our warp core into the sun," said Captain Sparx.

"Correct," said Lord Deathclaw. "That earns you the right to pick the next category."

" 'Ancient Earth Synth-Pop Bands' for five hundred," said Sparx.

A frantic bubbling filled the speakers.

"Shut up, Thg'thg'thg," said Deathclaw. "By the Gods, you're the most annoying creature on this plane of existence. The Creators were either on strike or visiting the Paris sewers when they designed your disgusting race. Now everyone, for five hundred points, here are the lyrics to a song of ancient Earth: Staring at my shoes, feeling so confused, shot down without a gun, victim of a hit and run, won't you––"

A horn tooted.

" 'Call Me,' " said a young man's voice. "The year was 1985 and the band Go West."

The audience applauded.

"Interrogation Subject 312 is correct, for once," said Lord Deathclaw. "The spiders I released into his cell last night have done wonders for his mental clarity."

A snide burble was followed by a high-pitched blast and the sound of sizzling fat.

"Now the Thg'thg'thg people really are extinct," said Deathclaw.

"There's still Aunt Melba," said Interrogation Suspect 312.

"Her? I lied––she's been dead for ages."

"For God's sake, man! You didn't have to kill him," said Captain Sparx. "You could have laser-castrated him like Braintree. Let him knit doilies or collect flowers the rest of his life."

"Buckets of fun and rose-colored glasses," whispered Dr. Braintree.

The speakers crackled.

"This is Charlie Rice with breaking news––a young girl has been kidnapped in California, right before her marriage to the richest man in Kamchatka. This strange tale becomes even stranger when you consider that I didn't know there was a place called Kamchatka until ten seconds ago."

"Take a left at Siberia, Charlie, and you're there," came the voice of Martinez.

"How is he still here? Security! Where's security?"

Dean shut off the radio. "Well, that's done it."

"What's wrong?" asked Emerson. "If we are stopped by American police forces, just pay them in cigarettes and whisky."

"Good plan but for two points: one, I don't have any cigarettes or whisky, and two, I don't have any cigarettes or whisky. We need a new ride or we're as flushed as a goldfish the day before vacation."

Tracklist:

Drivin' – Pearl Harbor & The Explosions

White Wedding – Billy Joel

Ila Nzour Nebra – Jalal Hamdaoui, Driver
8

From the back seat of the Town Car, Duke Nichego tossed a can of Squirt at the dashboard. The radio shut off with a bang, a method of operation certainly not recommended by Emerson, the manufacturer of many trusty electronic products including this one.

"Are you insane?" yelled Billie from the passenger seat. She flung the foaming can out the window.

"I am not insane," said Duke Nichego. "I am the opposite––'unsane'. How am I supposed to marry Angelika if the American security forces capture and slowly torture her to death in a bucket of water?"

"The police don't work that way in America."

"It's a good thing they don't. So barbaric and time-consuming. We slice the bottom of foot and insert grasshopper."

In Vassily's incapable hands, the car swerved through the tight curves of the Sierra Nevadas. Billie clasped a hand over her mouth and straight-armed the dashboard.

"Can we talk about something else?" she gasped.

Vassily giggled. "What is matter, small man? Do you feel terror at my driving car? I am first-place champion in last year's Kamchatkan Motor Speedway."

Duke Nichego leaned forward. "Other cars had sudden and unfortunate explosion at the same time."

"It's not that, you pair of goons," said Billie. "You both smell like peanuts."

Nichego shrugged. "What is wrong with peanut?"

"Number one," said Billie, "I'm allergic. Number two, I hate that disgusting nut. The massive military-industrial complex crams peanuts in everything from skin cream to breakfast cereal because of some hundred-year-old directive left over from the Spanish-American War, just like income tax from World War I. When I see a can of mixed nuts with any percentage of peanuts over ZERO, you better not be around because I'm going to break things, including that can, the dishes, and any glassware dangling from your startled little hands. I wish I could find whoever invented peanuts. I'd light him on fire and cover the body in a mountain of those yellow squirrel turds."

"God invented it," said Chip.

"Shut up."

"Vassily, roll down all windows," said Duke Nichego. "If she is sick, you will be the one cleaning up in aisle seven."

"Yes, sir."

A cool breeze and fragrance of pines filled the car.

"Also, note in schedule for us to take shower," said Nichego. "I want my guests to feel as comfortable as possible before they are violently murdered for not finding my dear bride, Angelika. Yes, murder looks more and more possible, every minute this strange boy-man is not finished with his magic wand."

Chip looked up from the mass of wires and green circuit boards on his lap. Smoke curled from a soldering gun in his hand and blinding light bobbed around the car's interior from a flashlight duct-taped to his head.

"Killing us won't get this done. I'm trying to connect integrated circuits in the back of a moving car! It's like delivering a baby on a roller coaster."

"That is not difficult," said Nichego. "Russian YouTube has many videos of small child born in coaster. Maybe Russian peoples are smarter than American."

"Okay, fine. Why don't you cram a half-dozen Commies into an ICBM and shoot them our way," said Chip. "You'll need that or the gleaming finger of God to fix this tracking device, if I get motion sickness."

Vassily laughed. "Russia is no longer Communist, you silly, and only three Siberian prisoners can fit inside ICBM."

"Don't care."

"I can raise your spirits," said Nichego. "Let's play Red Car, Blue Car."

"Still don't care."

"If we see red car, we stop them, steal socks, and shoot males to death. If we see blue car, we stop them, steal socks, and––"

"Shoot females to death, I get it."

"What kind of sick person are you? Driver of blue car has to wear underwear of Vassily on head. It's very funny. I show YouTube but connection horrible now, not even 3G."

"We'll never catch this Angela or whatever her name is if we do that," said Chip. "Although given what I've just said, I really need the car to stop moving."

Nichego slapped the back of the seat. "Vassily, halt at next fuel replenishment station. I will consume Little Debbie and make entertaining comments to fuel replenishment girls."

THE NEON COLOR-WHEEL of Reno sparkled through the windshield. Billboards floated by, postcards of heavenly promises: financial, marital, and gastronomical.

"Stop at the first one," said Emerson. "Five miles ahead."

"We need a new vehicle," said Dean, glancing into the side mirror. "Remember what the man said on the radio? It could be too late already."

"No, we have time. We can find a peasant and trade for his farm truck. I also have a small amount of rubles, if he is greedy."

"America doesn't have peasants."

"Really? Where do you buy watermelons? Who does government force to work in army and post office? How do you tell rich from poor people, that it is okay or not okay to throw tomatoes at them?"

"We don't throw things at people," said Dean. "The only way to tell if someone's rich is if he's out jogging."

"Peasants are not allowed to run on the street?"

"You'd think so, from the scarcity."

"That's the strangest thing I have heard––look over there!"

A billboard shone through the night and the rain, a blinding beacon of pink cherubs and yellow and blue letters that spelled "Tony's Wedding Parlor and All-Night Buffet."

Dean jerked the wheel and took the exit.

A vast throng of cars surrounded a white Tyrolean-style hut with a black, high-peaked roof. Like plain-faced maids of honor, several low buildings with flat roofs clustered behind the garish Alpine facade, and glowed in a wash of pink or blue light as the neon cherubs changed color.

Lin stirred from the mattress in the back. "Why are we stopping?"

"To change vehicles," said Dean. "Grab all the supplies."

"What? There's nothing wrong with this one."

Dean drove to the back of the parking lot and stopped between two large container trucks.

"Lin, it's useless––we're criminals now. The radio said we're the ones who kidnapped Emerson. There's an APB or bounty or something on our heads as I speak."

"I'll go to the police right now and straighten things out. You didn't kidnap anyone."

Dean turned in his seat and stared at Lin.

"We don't have time for any legal fiffery-faffery if we want to get to Charleston in time," he sputtered. "Every second counts, including this one. And that one. There's another one gone. My life––ridiculous and full of enough fiffery-faffery as it is––will be completely and utterly over if I'm arrested by the police and I can't give my speech in front of Robert Timmins at the National Motivational Speakers Conference! I'll have to work for El Pollo Loco again, or even worse––State Farm!"

"Calm down, I'm sure we can explain everything. The police have always been reasonable and understanding when I've talked to them in the past."

"It won't come to that, Lin, because we're going to march into Tony's Wedding Parlor with my Kamchatkan fiancée and march out a married couple into the car that you're going to hot-wire just like in Phoenix that one time."

Lin sighed. "I'll need a lookout."

"Emerson and I'll be busy, so that leaves you-know-who." He turned to Emerson in the front seat. "Can you tell Fanta to stay with Lin and do whatever she asks?"

Emerson nodded and spoke to Fanta. The large woman leered and smacked her palm with a weighty fist.

Dean left the pair at the ambulance, and led Emerson by the hand through the vehicle-maze of the parking lot as a cold rain fell.

"It seems many people want to be married tonight," said Emerson.

"I suppose so," said Dean. "I've driven through Reno before, but I'm not familiar with all the festivals. If we're lucky it's a Moonie wedding and we'll blend into the crowd."

"What are Moonies?"

Dean shrugged. "A suburban Hare Krishna."

Refrigerated air blasted his face as Dean held open the glass entrance door for Emerson.

The lobby inside was partitioned into three equal sections, and a long wooden counter ran the length of the room. The dissimilar themes gave Dean the impression of three markedly different rooms nailed together. The left section was entirely mahogany and walnut wood paneling. A vase of lilies sat on black marble. In the center, the wall and counter had been painted white. A pair of ceramic cupids faced each other, holding white roses. To the right, the orange walls held a neon martini glass and "24/7/365 Buffet!" sign. A cash register sat on a rainbow-colored Corian countertop.

A wooden door in the mahogany section opened and the murmur of a large crowd spilled into the lobby. A short Native American in a navy blue suit and bolo tie closed the door, quieting the noise. His black hair was parted in the middle and two braids hung down the front of his jacket.

He smiled at Dean and Emerson. "Funeral or wedding? Buffet is off tonight. Our cook had a sudden attack of winning the lottery and escaping to Mexico with his future ex-wife. If you're here for the funeral, it's a good one––Sheik Farouq Hassan Al-Nissan."

"Haven't we met before?" asked Dean. "You're Tony, right?"

"Who else? Sheik Farouq Hassan Al-Nissan?"

"No. You look familiar, that's all."

"All Indians look the same, is that what you're saying? Get out of here you round-eyed, racist bastard and take your Chinese girlfriend with you."

"I am from Kamchatka," said Emerson.

Tony pointed at Dean. "I've got three hundred people for Sheik Farouq Hassan Al-Nissan's funeral packed in a room rated for one-fifty. I don't have time for this."

"There's been a slight misunderstanding," said Dean. "I met another Tony at a gas station back in the mountains. That's where the confusion is coming from."

"In that case, never mind. That's my brother, Tony."

"Your parents gave you the same name?"

"All six of us," said Tony. "It was harder for the girls. Before this turns into Twenty Questions, how can I help you?"

"We want to marry," said Emerson.

"Now you're talking my language, sister." Tony ducked behind the central white counter and appeared with a form. "Full ceremony or express?"

"Express," said Dean.

Tony marked the form rapidly. "Fill this out and sign at the bottom. I also need driver's licenses and a hundred bucks."

Dean spread his hands. "I don't have one. A license, I mean."

"Who doesn't have a driver's license? You're not French, are you? By the holy crow of Sekumbah, I hate the French."

"Certainly not."

"What about the little lady?"

"She's ... not from around here."

"Passport?"

Emerson shook her head. "Duke Nichego stole this from me."

Tony rubbed his nose. "Birth certificate? Credit card? Giant Eagle loyalty program?"

"We might have a problem," said Dean.

Tony laughed a big, booming guffaw. "You've obviously never worked at a funeral parlor slash wedding chapel slash Chinese buffet. There's nothing an extra fifty bucks won't clear up." He leaned toward Emerson. "Just to be safe, this guy didn't kidnap you or anything? It's okay, you can tell me. I've got a shotgun right here."

"Yes, he did not kidnap. I want to marry him."

Tony nodded. He slapped a thick manila folder stuffed with official-looking documents onto the counter and thumbed through the pile.

"Let's see ... how do you feel about Terry Joe Bukowski?"

Dean shrugged. "Never heard of him. Sounds like a serial killer, but I'm not one to judge. I once dated a girl who was legally named 'Flaps McDoodle.' "

"Don't be so thick, guy––that's going to be your name on the marriage certificate. For an extra fee, of course."

"What name? Flaps McDoodle?"

"Don't be absurd. Terry Joe Bukowski."

"Is all of this above-board and legal?"

"As legal as turkey bacon," said Tony. "All birth certificates of deceased individuals."

"I suppose it's okay, then."

Tony held up three ivory pages. "Now for the lovely lady. Edna Marie Brown? Violet Dawn Francis? Destiny Klara Schicklgruber?"

"I like Destiny," said Emerson.

"Good. Let me just change '1937' to '1987' and Bob's your uncle."

Tony scribbled down a few details and handed both certificates to Emerson.

"Now it's time for me to utter what is in my opinion the sweetest and most romantic phrase of the marriage ceremony: hand over the cash, you lovebirds."

Dean emptied his wallet and barely came up with the required one hundred and fifty dollars.

"Do you have a ring?"

Dean looked sheepish. "We left in quite a hurry."

"I've got something!" Emerson pulled a pair of gold hoops from her ears. "Use these."

"Excellent," said Tony. "Let's begin. Do you, Terry Joe Bukowski, take this woman, Destiny Klara Schicklgruber, to be your lawfully wedded wife?"

Unclear about what to do with his hands, Dean raised his right palm as if he were in front of a judge. "I do."

"And do you, Destiny, take this man to be your lawfully wedded husband?"

"I do."

Tony slid one of the hoop earrings onto Emerson's ring finger and the other across Dean's pinky.

"By the power vested in me by the Church of the Kickapoo Nation, I declare you man and wife. Weesakechak bless you, now kiss the bride. Chop chop!"

"I haven't brushed my teeth in a while," said Dean. "And I had Funyuns––"

Emerson slid a cool hand behind his neck and pulled Dean's head down. She mashed her lips firmly against his and Dean inhaled the musk of her skin, a smell suspiciously like turkey jerky. When Emerson pulled away, Dean tasted a rose-flavored waxiness on his lips.

"Thank you," Emerson whispered, her pupils wide.

Dean saw flecks of gold in her brown irises, a charming detail he hadn't noticed before. He felt strangely dizzy, as if he had stood up too quickly and all the blood had rushed from his head. The next thing he knew, Emerson's brown eyes had been replaced by the blank white of the ceiling.

The hot-air balloon of Tony's face floated above Dean, and sounded just as hollow. "Are you okay, mister?"

"You're welcome," Dean said weakly.

Tony shook his head. "I've never seen a man faint like that. You're lucky the girl caught you because head trauma isn't pretty. I've seen it. Believe me when I say midget kickboxing is not as entertaining as it sounds."

With Emerson and Tony's help, Dean got to his feet.

"I'm fine," he said. "It's been lovely eyes for all of us. Sorry, I mean 'a long day.' A long day for all of us."

Tony shrugged and handed Dean a certificate with an intricate blue border.

"Well, it's either that, or you're allergic to girls," he said. "Congratulations on your nuptials. Now, if you'd like to save some time and money, I offer a fifty-percent discount on pre-ordered annulments, including buffet."

"I'm more likely to need funeral services before a divorce," said Dean soberly.

"I also do those. With the same pre-order discount and buffet, of course."

Emerson held Dean around the waist with both arms. "Don't think about such things, husband. We've just been married! This is the start of your good luck."

Flashing red and blue lights streamed through the windows.

"Code red!" screamed Tony.

The stocky Native American grabbed a box from behind the counter and ran through the door to the buffet, papers flying behind him like a contrail. The door locked with an ominous click.

Dean rattled the white, cupid-covered door behind the wedding counter but it refused to budge. He grabbed Emerson's hand and sprinted to the last door on the left, the serene entrance covered in dark wood paneling, and pushed it open.

The teal carpet in the next room held rows upon rows of chairs split by a narrow aisle. Men and women filled every chair and lined the walls, all wearing white robes and a variety of head-coverings: the men, headscarves, and the women, veils.

On a raised platform at the far end of the room stood a lace-covered coffin and an elderly, white-bearded man behind a wooden podium. He couldn't have been a priest, thought Dean, unless the Catholic Church had recently adopted white robes and red-checked headscarves.

As Dean pulled Emerson into the room and shut the doors, the old man looked up and halted mid-sentence. Three hundred pairs of eyes swiveled in their seats and stared at the two interlopers.

Dean cleared his throat.

"I'm ... ah ... paying my respects to Sheik Al-Nissan."

After a breeze of confused whispers, many of the eyes turned away. Dean's relief was short-lived, however, as the old man behind the podium waved for him to come forward.

Dean pointed at his chest. The old man nodded and increased the frequency of hand waving, as if he could speed up the process with faster and faster gestures. A group of swarthy young men with serious mustache growth stood up and pointed to the front.

Emerson covered her face with her red wedding veil and held Dean's hand as they walked past the unending rows of mourners.

As they approached, the old man smiled and bowed cordially. A young lady left a seat in the front row and motioned for Emerson to sit.

The old man bent his head close to Dean and whispered, "What is your name?"

"Dean Cook."

The old man nodded eagerly. "Ah yes! Sheik Al-Nissan was a big fan."

He leaned into the podium microphone.

"Dear brothers and sisters, today is a very sad and grievous day, but a happy day because one of Al-Nissan's favorite persons has appeared to give his respects. His work gave my cousin much solace in his final days of sickness, especially his album Harmful If Swallowed. Let us welcome Brother Dane Cook, the famous stand-up comedian, come to Reno all the way from Hollywood!"

The room broke into rowdy cheers and applause. Not a few of the congregation jumped out of their seats in excitement.

Dean stood behind the microphone and smiled as the ovation continued. He gripped the wooden podium with sweaty palms, furiously trying to think of a way out of this situation. If he bolted for the fire exit at the back of the room, he just might be able to escape. He looked at his nervous bride in the front row and wondered if she would forgive him.

"Yes, indeed," stammered Dean. "I just flew in from Hollywood, and boy are my arms tired!"

A few mourners clapped politely but most looked puzzled.

"The good thing about flying by myself is I don't have to worry about bombs or terrorists, unless of course, I was one," said Dean. "Not that there's anything wrong with that. My, uh, my best friend is a terrorist."

Angry murmurs spread through the crowd and a few young men at the back stood up with clenched fists. Next to Dean, the old man raised an eyebrow.

Dean wiped sweat from his forehead.

"I mean, I could be one. You don't have to dress like a terrorist to be one. The 9-11 terrorists didn't 'look' like terrorists––if they'd tried to get on the planes wearing robes and turbans, that would have been a dead giveaway."

The crowd roared with anger. The old man put an arm on Dean's shoulder and waved the angry men and women to silence.

He whispered in Dean's ear, "Please change the subject."

"Sorry," said Dean. "Sorry, folks. I'm just a comedian. A rich, wealthy comedian. I've got a house so full of gold that it's hard to find a place to sit, but sometimes words fly out of my mouth and I have no idea where they came from. Obviously from my mouth, but that's not the point. The point is they're like word bombs. Sorry, I didn't mean to say "bomb"––it's a very sensitive word among your people. That reminds me of a joke: what do you call a chainsaw in Saudi Arabia? Involuntary circumcision device. I see from the looks on a few of your faces that you didn't get the joke. That's probably because you don't have chainsaws or circumcision in Saudi Arabia."

The old man calmed the shouts of the angry crowd.

"Have some respect," he yelled.

Dean nodded vigorously. "Exactly! After all, I was born in Arabia, Ohio."

"No, I mean you," said the old man.

"Sorry," said Dean. He bowed his head and exhaled. "I'll start again. This is a sad time of grief for all of us, me especially. A great man has passed from the earth, Sheik ..."

"Farouq," whispered the old man.

"... Farouq ..."

"Hassan Al-Nissan."

"Sheik Farouq Hassan Al-Nissan," said Dean gravely. "A man who brought love and caring into the lives of many people. Obviously from the large number here today––"

"They came for the buffet," whispered the old man.

"Who spread his wealth among all those he knew in life. A great man, Sheik Al-Nissan. He wrote me a letter last year––"

"He was blind," whispered the old man.

"Left a voice mail––"

"He could not speak," said the old man.

Dean cleared his throat. "I received a message from Sheik Al-Nissan. Let's not get bogged down with the details of how that happened, but it did happen. As I read the message, I was touched by the works he'd achieved, the remarkable nature of his life, and his travels."

"Hated flying," whispered the old man. "And other people."

"Shut up," said Dean. "When I heard he'd passed, I absolutely had to come in person and give my respects. I canceled a stadium show in Houston and flew to Reno immediately. Tonight is also a double tragedy for me because I learned of the death of Nando Phoenix, a great actor that other actors aspire to be. He tragically fell from a balcony into an ice cream truck and died. In turn, as if the ice cream suddenly became sentient and could sense his passing, it too began to perish."

The doors at the back crashed open and flashing red-and-blue strobes lit the room. A dozen police officers pushed through the crowd at the back.

Dean made eye contact with Emerson and she pointed to the door behind the coffin. If they ran for the exit now, however, the police would be on them in seconds. Dean still had the attention of the crowd and all the powers of a fully-trained inspirational life coach in his arsenal. Guessing that only one thing would save his and Emerson's skins, he leaned into the microphone.

"Before I leave," he said, "I have to ask everyone a question, one that I asked Sheik Al-Nissan: 'Why are people from the Middle East so angry all the time?' 'That's easy,' said Sheik Al-Nissan. 'It's because we never have any fun. Have you tried snorkeling in a burkha? Getting your robe caught in a bicycle chain? We're not allowed to relax like you. A white family can ski all winter at Tahoe, but if a Saudi man says "snowboarding is the bomb" he's packed in a crate and flown to Cuba!' "

The old man pushed Dean away as the mourners jumped out of their seats and transformed into a hysterical, screaming mob. They filled the aisle, throwing shoes, seat cushions, and spare change at Dean, and blocked the police from moving forward.

Dean grabbed the microphone. "Also, the buffet is closed!"

Emerson leaped up to the podium. Pelted in a rain of hymnal books and plastic flowers, she and Dean sprinted for the fire exit.

In the alley behind the funeral parlor, rain fell in a steady torrent and rippled the water of muddy potholes. Dean pushed a green dumpster in front of the fire exit.

Emerson pulled the stem of a plastic rose from her veil.

"What do we do now?" she asked.

"We could trade clothing to confuse the police, but the more I think about it, there's no way I could fit into that tiny outfit," said Dean. "Also, I have five o'clock shadow."

A sea green 1966 Chevrolet Impala roared down the alley and slid to a stop, water spraying from the tires.

"Get in," said Lin, from the driver's seat.

Dean and Emerson piled into the back. The car plowed through curtains of white rain and disappeared into the dark Nevada night.

Tracklist:

Russian Dance (Trepak) – Christmas At The Devil's House

God Save The Queen – The Sex Pistols

Surfin' Bird – The Ramones
9

Duke Nichego slapped the seat with a rolled copy of In Style magazine.

"But the most important thing about socks is the freshness," he said. "There's nothing more frustrating than catching sight of a beautiful girl, following her to an apartment, then having my men come back with something that's been under the bed for six months. Even worse, if they bring back socks of the girl's fat old mother."

Billie shifted in the front seat. "How on earth would you know the difference?"

"Like a father knows his children," said the driver, Vassily. "Duke Nichego is an amazing man."

"It is very simple once you have done it as long as I," said Nichego. "Young women take baths very often and also leave trace of nail polish on account of hastily preparing for weekend date. Old lady sock smells like dead German soldier dropped in sewer for a week then used by Russian soldier as latrine."

"What an elegant description," said Chip, as he watched waveforms on the screen of a small, wire-covered laptop.

"I'll give you my socks if you let us go," said Billie. "I guarantee they're sweaty."

Vassily laughed. "Duke Nichego does not enjoy socks of men."

"Toss that pistol out the window and I'll show you a man," said Billie.

"Wait! I've got something," said Chip. "The signal's changed. They stopped moving ... correlating with GPS ... location of PPPP is twelve miles east of our position, near the freeway."

"Finally, this horrible night will be over," said Billie.

Vassily wagged a finger. "What is horrible about today? We broke you from prison without even asking."

"What's horrible is your stench. It's enough to force a maggot into a midlife crisis, you bloated gas bag of rotting turnips."

The Town Car roared down the mountain toward Reno, the raindrops flashing white as they crossed the headlights.

Chip pointed through the window. "Take the next exit."

A blinding hurricane of red-and-blue whirled from a parking lot filled with cars, police cars, fire engines, people, and more police cars. A white wedding chapel slash funeral parlor slash twenty-four-hour buffet stood at the eye of the storm. Smoke poured from one end of the building, and firefighters directed long streams of water into the black clouds.

"We're too late," moaned Nichego. "The American security forces have beaten us with a punch."

"If we are lucky, they have only started the torture," said Vassily, "They will certainly not have completed the paperwork to ship Angelika to a maid cafe in Japan."

"So many Americans with guns," said Nichego. "I cannot pay everyone!"

Billie slapped the dashboard and pointed through the window.

"There's the ambulance," she said. "Other side of the parking lot with all the bright lights. Bunch of cops with assault rifles around it."

Duke Nichego squirmed on the leather of the back seat. "This is bad time for me to say this, but before I bribe American officials, I must visit toilet."

"I see a Chevron down the street," said Chip.

"Drop me off and drive away quickly," said Nichego. "We must avoid the video cameras of the fuel replenishment station."

At the gas station he jumped out, and Vassily drove the Town Car a block away. He backed into a dark alley and shut off the engine. Rain dotted the windshield. Black smoke and a smell like burning rubber floated from the nearby wedding chapel.

"I don't think we should park this close to the fire," said Chip.

Vassily snorted. "You sound like expert on teaching me to eat eggs. In my small lifetime I have burned a dozen houses of politician, journalist, and bad cook. This is perfect position when Duke Nichego is finished with toilet explosion. You should count goats in your head or something; the Duke will take long time."

He pulled the automatic pistol from inside his jacket and admired the finish in the light. In the passenger seat beside him, Billie leaned back for a nap.

As quietly as possible, Chip reached down and switched on the solder gun at his feet. He kept an eye on Vassily as the metal tool heated up. The wipers slowly cleaned the rain splatters from his view of the gas station.

A car zipped past the opening of the alley, as bright and red as a smear of nail polish.

"That car didn't have its lights on," said Chip.

Vassily shrugged. "Maybe driver is save fuel."

"Oh, please," said Billie. "Tell us, Comrade Peanut-Breath, more stories about how the people in your fly-blown part of the world have to cram horse manure and straw into your carburetors just to make it to the market so they can buy more horse manure and straw for the drive back to their stupid village next to the world's biggest nuclear landfill!"

Vassily looked at her with a puzzled expression. "When did you visit Kamchatka?"

"I'll visit that festering sore in the ground the same day I deliver your rotting head to your parent's doorstep and set it on fire, that's when."

Vassily shook his head. "It is difficult. My parents live in special camp for happy education of people who do not appreciate the collection of socks. They do not have doorstep, or even door."

"Just kill us and get this over with," said Billie.

Chip shifted in his seat. "What? Leave me out of this."

"Duke Nichego does not like when I shoot pistol in car," said Vassily. "There is horrible smell for many weeks. Also, this is rental and I lose deposit."

The Chevron exploded in a tornado-roar of white and orange that rocked the Town Car. Blackened corn chips and Squirt cans cracked the windshield and thumped on the roof.

Chip jabbed the soldering gun into Vassily's cheek and the velvet-suited chauffeur screamed like a politician under budget cuts. Billie grabbed the pistol and smashed him across the nose, knocking Vassily unconscious. She leaned across to open the driver's-side door, shoved Vassily's limp body into the alley, and turned the ignition. The car rumbled to life.

Chip jumped in the front seat. "What about the Duke?"

"You think he survived that? First we get away from this place, then we figure out what to do about Dean and your ambulance."

THE TOILET UPON WHICH Duke Nichego had been relaxing was fortunately manufactured by a worker in Freiburg who cared about his job that particular day, otherwise the Duke's part in this tale would have ended prematurely. The individuals who had laid the concrete-block walls and constructed the rest of the small bathroom, however, did not care much for their profession––one aspired to be a paddle-boarding instructor and the other wrote paranormal teen romances––so the building collapsed.

Collapse it did and utterly, in a flaming cloud of blackened corn chips and fizzy drinks, but not before the force of the explosion propelled Duke Nichego up and away from the flames and smoke, gripping the sides of his sturdy German toilet in abject fear.

Images flashed through his mind: his first bank robbery, his mother kicking him out of the house at twelve because of his first bank robbery, and the first time he touched a SPANX knee-high trouser sock.

The Duke-plus-toilet arced through the air for a quarter mile and landed in a pile of discarded tumbleweeds. He rolled pants-less and underwear-less through the rough grit and weeds. Lightheaded and nauseous, like a child after his first shot of vodka, the Duke remained on his face in the dirt, swooning in and out of consciousness, surrounded by the rags of his clothing.

Sirens moaned in the distance, and footsteps approached with a slow and steady crunch. Perhaps it was a lone security official––easy enough to bribe, mused the Duke through a fog of pain.

A hand grabbed his shoulder and rolled Duke Nichego onto his back. Expecting an American grown fat on strawberry-flavored lard pastries, the Duke was shocked to see an elegant older woman. Tall, brunette, and gorgeous, she wore a white mini-trench coat over her short red dress and a white headscarf, like a seasoned Princess Grace in the Sahara. Duke Nichego estimated her age to be somewhere between forty and fifty. With understated makeup, carefully chosen gold earrings and necklace, and a European taste in clothing, the Duke also estimated her wealth to be somewhere between massive and extremely massive.

"Bozhe moi," he whispered.

"Certainly," said the lady, in an uncharacteristically deep timbre.

She grabbed what was left of Nichego's collar and lifted him easily into the air.

Nichego attempted to remain pleasant in spite of, or perhaps because of, the fact that his toes dangled a foot from the ground.

"You're very strong," he said politely.

"Thank you, dear."

Her strangely deep voice and personally-observed evidence of the woman's powerful arms tickled a few brain cells inside Nichego's rattled skull. Even so, in his weakened state he could not help the natural instinct of a man in close proximity to the cleavage of an attractive woman to glance down her top.

"How rude," said the elegant stranger.

She rammed a manicured fist into Duke Nichego's midsection and he flew six feet over the dirt and tumbleweeds of the abandoned lot. The lady walked up to his crumpled body and kicked the Duke across the jaw with a quite expensive and quite red three-inch pump.

"Want to try that again, you naked piece of filth?"

"Please ..."

The woman waved red-lacquered nails at the growing mushroom cloud of the former Chevron station.

"Beautiful sight, isn't it, but not the same second time around. Gas station explosions, I mean. At least we know what that huge red button labeled 'Do Not Touch' was for, don't we?"

A high-pitched giggle erupted from the strange woman. Nichego reached for his wallet––a silly gesture because his trousers and underwear were missing.

"I have money to pay you! It's definitely somewhere around here. Wait! I can write a check!"

"Listen, Ivan or Vlad or whoever you are, cash is the last thing I want, and the next-to-last thing I want is to cash a check. All that waiting in line gives me the chills. Now, before I shave off your nipples, tell me what you did with Billie and Dean."

"But who are you?"

The lady in white sighed. "Talk about stupid questions ... I'm Dean's father."

Tracklist:

Tonight, Tonight, Tonight – Genesis

The Lady In Red – Chris DeBurgh

The Way It Is – Bruce Hornsby and The Range
1988

Why Frank Cook Wears Pantyhose a.k.a. The First Gas Station Explosion

Dean's sophomore year of high school followed a pattern of behavior that alien scientists would later describe as Das Ausschalten von Jugendlichen, or "hiding from teenagers." This was made complicated by the fact that he was a teenager and required to attend school with other teenagers. Also, Dean was sort of a dork.

Not that it was entirely his fault. He aspired to fit in completely, to wear the same frosted jeans and Lacoste shirts as the coolest kids in school. These unfortunately were too expensive so he had to make do with third-tier JCPenney brands and tennis shoes that made an unfortunate clicking noise when he walked. It may not have been Member's Only, but it was fine, sturdy apparel that allowed him to weather the verbal slings and arrows of other students.

Frequently these arrows took the form of insults like "four eyes," "farm boy," or "cow chaser." Only the first was baldly inaccurate because obviously, humans can't have four eyes. Since the pool party fiasco of two years previous, epithets such as "pretty girl," "nice legs," and "lady-boy" had fallen out of use by Dean's peers, apart from most of the seventh-grade boys. He could have continued to ignore the entirety of those insults if his eyeglass prescription hadn't changed halfway through sophomore year.

Like a man staring at a sword dangling above his head, Dean had known it was coming for some time. For two years he had avoided the eye doctor. The fact that he was one of the better students and always sat at the front of the class helped to camouflage his accelerating myopia. But when Dean was away on a Scout camping trip, a postcard from Dr. Hammersmith breached his careful strategy of reading all the mail. His mother promptly made an appointment.

To say that he was shocked at the size of the new glasses is an understatement. Dean experienced the first intense despair of his life––the same helpless agony of a mother upon being told her child was switched at birth, that her favorite husband is abandoning a six-figure actuarial job to join a gypsy circus, or that the Browns are leaving Cleveland.

These were more like the glass bottoms of Coke bottles forced upon prisoners of war than any product you would voluntarily wear. The lenses were so thick they vaulted from the edges like the Apennines. Dean knew if he wore these glasses he had as much chance as appearing cool to his friends, or even girls, as the Apennines had of moving to Barbados.

He suffered through it, however, avoiding contact with people and using his old glasses as much as possible. This cost Dean five traffic collisions, a plethora of bruises, and a B in Health.

Sophomore year ended and summer arrived. Warm, sleepy, and full of potential as always, summer was considered the second-best season in Ohio. The summer months also brought relief and redemption, because his mother bought Dean contact lenses.

Freshly coiffed in a manly crew cut, he was a changed sixteen-year-old and began to jog through the pastures and lift weights. This made all the difference to image-obsessed teens when school began in August, and Dean carried this newfound confidence on his back like a golden fleece. It was a six-week period of happiness that lasted all the way to his birthday.

"I'm not having a birthday," he said at the dinner table.

His father choked on a medallion of Swiss steak until Billie ran from the kitchen and pounded on his back.

"Don't say that," rasped his father.

"What? It's not written anywhere that I'm required to have a birthday party."

His father shook his head and gulped down a glass of water.

"It's not that, you dork," said Dean's younger sister. "You said the 'b-word' and you know it."

"None of these crazy superstitions and things to do or not do on my birthday have worked before," said Dean. "I'm going to be seventeen and I don't want any gifts, visitors, parties, or even cake."

His mother stared at him, horrified. "No birthday cake?!!"

"Son, we don't live in Red China," said his father. "A birthday cake means America, and freedom. Are you telling me you don't believe in freedom?"

His mother touched Dean's forehead. "Definitely a fever."

"I don't have a fever, mom, and I don't want a birthday. Not now and not anymore. Why did you cut your hair so short?"

"Don't fuss over me. It's easier to wash."

"Things we don't want to do have a habit of catching up to us," said his father. "Faster than things we want to do. Excuse me."

Billie waited until he'd closed the garage door, then leaned with both hands on the kitchen table and sighed like Abraham over Isaac.

"Your father has enough on his plate right now. He doesn't need you trying something new on your birthday of all days."

"I could swear he was wearing pink nail polish," said Dean. "Am I just imagining things?"

"You're always doing that," said his sister. "Dad's been in the garage painting something."

"I'll stay in my room this birthday and lock the door," said Dean.

"We tried that when you were ten," said his mother. "How well did that turn out?"

"I don't care. I don't want a birthday at all."

Dean's sister giggled. "You're all forgetting that homecoming is on Dean's birthday and he's got the hots for Brenda. Dean and Brenda sitting in a tree––"

"Shut up!"

Despite the un-American lack of cake, his parents eventually saw the light and cancelled all preparations for Dean's birthday including the hired security and stand-by ambulance.

THURSDAY, the day before the dance, Mike came up to Dean's locker. This wasn't difficult nor required much investment of time because his locker was next to Dean's.

"I need a favor," said Mike.

"You can't borrow Lady Jaye," said Dean. "She still has burns from your fireworks-slash-rocket experiment, and I have to pretend she was part of a G.I. Joe fireworks-slash-rocket experiment."

"Not about that stuff. Are we still working for your dad today?"

"Sure."

"I'll tell you then."

A slim girl with long black hair pushed through the crowded hallway, two female friends in her wake. Dean waved at her. "Hey, Brenda! What's happening?"

"She didn't hear you," said Mike. "Or maybe she did."

"Thanks for the support, friend."

After school, they walked to Dean's house and changed into work clothes. Carrying a chainsaw and two axes, the pair trudged over the yellow stubble of hayfields to the cow pasture, grasshoppers buzzing away with each step. They climbed the gentle hillside to a wide patch of spiky, Adam-and-Eve trees. Having come into close personal contact with the two-inch thorns that covered the branches of these trees, Dean thought other names to be more appropriate, such "Satan's Shrub" or "Beelzebub's Bush."

The teens rested in the shade of the devilish trees and gazed at the scattered stumps and piles of gray branches. Down in the valley lay the orange brick buildings of the high school. The tiny figures practicing on the football field reminded Dean of Mike's question and pulled the conversation away from the latest X-men comics.

"What was that super-secret thing you wanted from me?"

"It's Naomi."

"I could have guessed. Her parents found out?"

"No, but they're on to me. I want to dance with her at homecoming, but she's grounded."

"Again?"

"Yeah. They're letting her come to the dance, though, and that's where you come into the picture."

"You want me to kidnap her and drive to Kentucky? No matter how many times you say it, Kentucky isn't the Neutral Zone."

"No, I want you to be an average-looking, feeble-minded distraction."

"Thanks."

Mike sighed. "Since you won that math award, all the parents in the school think you're some kind of super genius. Look at me––Naomi's parents won't let me get within three feet of her. I'm the Cobra Commander in every parent's nightmare."

"I don't think they know about Cobra."

"And even better, Naomi's parents go to your church, so they're won't murder you for dancing with her."

"What are you talking about? She's fourteen! They'd stab Tom Cruise in the face if he squinted sideways at the girl!"

"It's not going reach the face-stabbing phase or any phase involving edged weapons," said Mike. "I'll spread some rumors that the two of you are a couple the day of homecoming. You sit next to her and dance once or twice. Her parents will be so overjoyed she's dating you instead of me, that they won't care if I hang around and dance with Naomi a few times. They won't be there anyway, and the next day you break up. By the time her parents find out––which they won't until the next day––you're out of the picture."

"And six feet under. What about her brother, John?"

Mike nodded slowly. "He's definitely a massive guy––I guess football does that to you. I'll spike his drink or something. Do steroids cancel out a sedative? How does that work exactly?"

Dean looked down at the crushed crabgrass littered with leaves and fragments of trees. He picked up a two-inch thorn and rolled it between his thumb and forefinger.

"I still don't understand why you're doing this to yourself," he said. "What difference is one homecoming dance? Break up with her and get on with your life. A life with fewer angry relatives and broken bones."

Mike slapped at a horsefly on his arm. "I'd do that in a second if Naomi wasn't the perfect girl. She reads comics, loves to watch really bad movies, and plays basketball. If I was programming a robot girl from the future, those would be my top three choices!"

"She's not a robot girl from the future. She's fourteen."

"Nobody's perfect," said Mike. "We can't control who we fall in love with."

"Parents and the justice system tend to disagree. Speaking of that, Casanova, what's Brenda going to say when you spread rumors about me dating an eighth-grader? She'll think I'm a disgusting creep, that's what, and laugh in my face if I say hello. I won't even get close enough to ask her out."

"I'm not a monster. You can dance with other girls," said Mike. "As the actual disgusting creep in this whole drama, leave that part of it to me."

"Sounds like I'm leaving everything to you, including my reputation, future happiness, and quality of not being beaten to death. What do I get out of it?"

"I'll put in a good word with Brenda's sister."

"Now I remember." Dean jabbed a finger at Mike. "You gave her mono!"

"I didn't! It was just that we had the flu at the same time and were incredibly tired all the time. At the same time."

"Yeah, right."

"Uh ... what else? You can set my B-25 on fire."

"The three-foot model? The B-25 Mitchell with Doolittle Raid stickers?"

"Yeah."

"All right. That plus twenty bucks," said Dean.

"Right. That plus twenty bucks."

AUTUMN WAS ALWAYS the best season in southern Ohio. The trees on the rolling hills changed from verdant green to melancholy shades of orange and brown. The afternoons were bright, warm, and full of summer's last breath. The excitement of football games on crisp evenings mixed with the chill of morning frost and the knowledge that winter approached, bringing with it boredom and not much to do inside.

If autumn was the best season, homecoming was the best dance. In contrast to spring prom that bankrupted young hearts and pocket books with its intense social pressure, all teenagers of a certain age looked forward to homecoming with an excitable nervousness. A life full of strange experiences and frighteningly new milestones lay ahead, and for a teenager, the homecoming dance was a milestone the size of Pike's Peak. Mainly, though, the dance was another opportunity to meet the opposite sex and hopefully not screw up like the last time.

Although it was Dean's birthday, school passed calmly and without incident. When no planes fell on his head during band practice or trucks full of fertilizer crashed through the school, Dean began to forget that it was his annual day of doom. Brenda even smiled at him when he greeted her in the hallway. After school he wasn't poisoned or forced to wear female clothing. That evening the football team didn't contract dysentery in the first half of the game, and Dean's performance during the marching band's halftime show was acceptable, perhaps even good in the eyes of most adults that were paying attention on account of having to be there.

The homecoming king and queen were crowned at halftime. Nothing shocking there––popular seniors Shawn Williams and Debbie Lippmann––but as Dean stood with the rest of band on the sidelines, he saw the junior high king and queen walking up the fifty-yard line and his stomach burned faster than a plastic B-25 loaded with M-80s and fistfuls of sparklers and covered in gasoline. Resplendent in a satin and taffeta gown of neon fuchsia, Naomi walked with a blonde, rail-thin kid Dean didn't recognize. Amidst unintelligible barks from the P.A. system, the previous year's winner placed a silver tiara on Naomi's head, crowning her the junior high homecoming queen.

Dean might have fainted for a few seconds. It was hard to tell because the band members packed together so tightly. It was more likely that he traveled into the future a short moment until a helpful soul, probably a percussionist, dumped a cup of ice down the back of his uniform jacket.

Dean fumed and sweated until the third-quarter break, then pushed through the crowd to find Mike standing in line for the snack bar.

He tapped on the tall boy's shoulder. "Did you see what I just saw?"

"Yeah, it's awesome," said Mike. "Chili dogs are half-price!"

"No, mucus breath! Naomi's the junior queen!"

"Keep your voice down," hissed Mike.

"I have the right to shout if it's my last day on earth!"

Mike pulled Dean around to the side of the snack bar. "Listen, it's a wrinkle in our soup but there's no reason to get excited."

"No reason? To get excited? If she's the junior queen, her parents will be at the dance. They're probably here right now!"

"It doesn't matter," said Mike. "What are they going to do in front of everyone? Beat you senseless? Strip you naked? Or strip you naked and beat you senseless? Calm down, because absolutely nothing's going to happen, and it's all proceeding according to my plan. Naomi and I staged a little fight in front of her locker today. All her friends think she's dating you now."

"I haven't said a word to her!"

Mike put a hand across his chest and bowed. "I wrote a love letter and it just so happens to have been read by all the eighth-grade girls."

"That's even better. Now I don't even have a chance with fourteen-year-olds."

"Don't be silly," said Mike. "It doesn't matter anyway, because Brenda likes you."

"Really?"

"Yeah, really. Trust me."

Dean took a deep breath. "Wow. That's ... wow. I guess we'll go ahead with the plan."

"That's the spirit!"

The game finished in the usual manner for the Hidden Valley Pirates: utter and ignominious defeat. The opposing team reached a score of three figures, and it seemed as if they weren't even trying at that point. The game over, every band member, football player, and cheerleader rushed to lockers and various practice rooms to prepare for the dance.

Dean changed into black slacks, collared shirt and tie, and the central focus of his outfit: a gray acrylic sweater covered in abstract black triangles. The style was in fashion and made quite the statement, which was This is 1988, I couldn't find anything else to wear. His bag and trumpet stayed in the equipment room with the property of other band members going to the dance.

Dean walked through hallways lined with photos of past graduating classes of Hidden Valley High. These massive placards went all the way back to the hallowed days of 1961, when the high school had opened. The halls were packed with present-day teenagers waiting for the dance to begin, many of whom chatted below photos of their mothers and fathers immortalized in black-and-white.

Teenagers clustered together defensively, the boys in dark pants with sharp creases, starched shirts with skinny ties or bolos, and pullover sweaters. Girls wore short dresses in solid neon colors with puffed-out flounces and layers of ruffles. Hose and pointy shoes were a requirement of fashion, if not the weather. The lucky or determined boys who had learned to speak to the opposite sex without falling on their faces or looking stupid now stood with a date and her friends and began to realize they were at a dance, where face-falling and stupid-looking were dangerous possibilities. Plans for escape were formed and discarded in the minds of a few boys, oblivious to the fact that the girls were ahead of them in this department, having planned every contingency and conversational topic weeks before in their diaries.

Dean hadn't planned anything. His mother had always said to be yourself, but Dean knew he wouldn't get far talking about Simon Belmont or whether Scarlett was hotter than the Baroness.

He wondered if he should look for Brenda or wait until the dance started, when the voice of Frenchie Davis shot out from a pack of girls in teased-out hair and swishy satin dresses.

"Dean-o! What's going on?"

To keep from talking about the Naomi situation, Dean had stayed away from Frenchie all day. He didn't like lying to Frenchie. Somehow he always found out.

Dressed to the nines as always, the diminutive boy wore a white jacket over his black button-down shirt and slacks. His sleeves were pushed up Miami-Vice style, but with the blonde, feathered hair Dean thought he looked more like Luke Skywalker's tiny twin than Don Johnson.

Frenchie pulled Dean into a sacred circle of flowery smells and Wrigley's chewing gum.

"I heard you and Naomi are a pair. Is that true?"

Dean rubbed the back of his neck. "Yeah, sure."

"Really? If you needed a girlfriend, Dean, why didn't you ask me for help? I may have the body of a superhero and the mind of a genius, but I've got the heart of a matchmaker."

"I didn't plan anything. It just happened."

"But with an eighth grader? You know about her parents, right?"

"Listen, Frenchie, I gotta go."

"If you're looking for Naomi, I know exactly where she is."

Frenchie led Dean through the crowd like Moses parting a sea of hair spray to where Naomi stood quietly with the very blonde and very skinny junior high king. Dean tried, but still couldn't remember his name.

"Beat it, Dubrowski," said Frenchie.

"What?" stammered the boy. "I'm supposed to escort Naomi––"

"You'll be escorting flights of angels to heaven when I get through with you," said Frenchie, as he poked Dubrowski in the chest of his rayon jacket.

"I don't understand."

Frenchie sighed. "You still owe me that favor, remember?"

"Yeah, Frenchie, but––"

"No 'buts.' Just do the moonwalk out of here. I'll show you how."

Frenchie winked at Dean and disappeared with Dubrowski. The double wooden doors to the gym swung open and "Lady in Red" flowed through the air. The crowd of perfumed teenagers pushed forward.

Dean held out his arm to Naomi. "Shall we?"

She nodded and slipped a white-gloved hand through the crook of his arm. They moved toward the packed gymnasium, but a strong hand clamped on Dean's shoulder and pulled him back.

"Where are you two going?" asked Mr. Jenkins, the deep-voiced seventh-grade history teacher.

"Inside," said Naomi.

Dean began to sweat under his sweater. He wondered if the teachers knew what was going on.

"No, no, and definitely no," said Mr. Jenkins. "The junior king and queen are part of the processional. Don't enter before the senior king and queen, because you'll have to go out and come back in again, and then who looks stupid? Me, because I'm in charge."

Dean cleared his throat. "I'm not––"

"Kids these days ... do I have to draw you a picture? In crayon? Just go to the other door and wait."

"Yes, Mr. Jenkins," said Naomi.

They struggled through the crowd to where the homecoming king and queen stood in front of another entrance to the gym, laughing at some private joke. Shawn and Debbie only glanced at Dean and Naomi and continued to whisper to each other.

Dean sighed and covered his eyes with his fingers. "I shouldn't be here. If there's any place in the world I should be at this moment, it's not here."

Naomi pulled his hands down. "Thanks for doing this, Dean. I know you'd rather be at home watching TV or reading comic books."

Dean nodded. "I'm much cooler than you think, and I'd be doing something completely different, which would be ... sorry, throat's a bit dry ... something like repairing my motorcycle. That's right––it's broken because I hit a turtle and almost died. But of course, I didn't die since I'm talking to you and I'm good at motorcycles."

Naomi laughed, and Dean's chest tingled like he'd just won the Olympics and had been awarded the all-around gold by Nancy Reagan.

"You're a funny guy," said Naomi. "I know you don't have a bike."

"Shhh. It'll be our secret."

"Speaking of secrets––"

Smelling of lavender and Fruit Stripe, Naomi kissed him on the cheek.

"Thank you," she said.

"You're welcome."

Dean felt his face heating up. He became very conscious of the laser-beam eyeballs of King and Queen Popular.

"Oh, no," said Naomi in mock horror. "I didn't activate your superpower, did I? You know, like how anger brings out the Hulk. Please don't turn into a green-skinned wrestler and level the entire school! I was looking forward to the dance and stuff."

"I've done some incredibly embarrassing things, but since you asked I'll try not to destroy the dance," said Dean. "This one time."

"Did you ever wonder what would happen if Bruce Banner has to pee really, really bad, right, but he stubs his toe in the doorway? Like the worst toe-smash you've ever had, one that would make Mother Teresa curse like a sailor. Does he change into the Hulk and immediately blow the walls apart with a torrent of urine like a stream from a fire hose? Or does the Hulk have the decency to run outside before he explodes?"

Dean laughed. "I don't think 'decency' and the Hulk go together. In reality he'd be jumping around like a naked, gamma-powered monkey, blowing apart buildings with any and all of his bodily functions. It's a good question, though, like asking what happens when Superman sneezes."

"He can't sneeze. He doesn't get sick."

"If he has a nose, he has to sneeze. Also, a man who rockets through the atmosphere can't avoid getting the occasional june bug up his nostrils."

Naomi nodded and stared into Dean's eyes. He turned away after the long and uncomfortable space of a nanosecond.

"There's something on your face, maybe an eyelash," said Naomi.

She reached up but Dean jerked away, a hand over his right eye.

"Don't touch it!"

"Why not?"

Dean blinked. The vision from his right eye had become extremely blurred, like a chalk painting in the rain. "My contact just fell out!"

He patted his face and sweater frantically, then dropped to his knees and scanned the waxed floor.

Naomi bent down. "I don't see it."

"That's the point of contacts! You can't let them fall out because you can't see them when they fall out!"

The music coming from the gym changed to "(I've Had) The Time of My Life," and Mr. Jenkins grabbed both door handles.

"Ready, kings and queens? No close dancing. Remember the old saying, 'grinding away is not okay.' "

Dean held up his hand. "Wait!"

Mr. Jenkins swung open the doors and the air filled with music. A disco ball hung from a high rafter and spun waves of light over the crepe-covered walls and polished basketball court. Scores of pink and white balloons dotted the waxed floor. The visiting team bleachers had been pushed back to make room for refreshments and tables. Teens waved or popped white-hot camera flashes from the wooden bleachers on the opposite side.

Shawn and Debbie, the senior king and queen, walked out stiffly. They posed for photos inside a lattice covered with pink flowers.

Still desperately searching on his hands and knees, Dean wondered if he'd swallowed his contact. The split vision of clear and blurry started to give him a massive headache.

"Your turn, kids," shouted Mr. Jenkins, over the music.

In a quite unladylike manner, Naomi used both arms to pull Dean to his feet.

"Dean! We have to go."

"But I can't see!"

Naomi stuck out a white-gloved elbow. "Grab on."

Dean was not a Communist or from the planet Zooberon, and knew that a gentleman should never allow a lady to lead him into a formal dance. However, he realized that this rule was from an age that lacked contact lenses, teenage peer pressure, and Christopher Cross.

Naomi held her satin-covered arm like a 'V' and Dean slipped his arm through. As straight and dignified as possible, he strolled with her into the gym, keeping his right eye open for depth perception, but closing it frequently because of the dizzying, out-of-focus blurriness. The unintended impression he gave the entire crowd was of a young man with a bee in his eye.

Mrs. Shafer, the homecoming coordinator, ninth-grade English teacher, and official photographer, held up her hand before Dean and Naomi had made it to the flower-covered lattice.

"That's not Dubrowski," she said to the trailing Mr. Jenkins.

"It's not? You're right, it's Cook! What the devil are you doing, Cook?"

"I honestly don't know, sir."

"Good God, man, stop winking at me like that. Switch arms with the lady, you fool. Where's Dubrowski?"

"I honestly don't know, sir."

"Horse pills and broken records," said Jenkins. "Nobody knows nothing."

"That's a double negative," said Mrs. Shafer.

"I know what it is, Marianne. Don't you start with me!"

Naomi raised her hand. "Steve had an emergency and went home."

"That's a fine jar of jam on the sidewalk," said Jenkins. "Take the blasted photo and we'll fix it later. Put Dubrowski's name in the yearbook, nobody reads the claptrap anyway."

"But––"

"Do it, Marianne!"

With a defiant glare Mrs. Shafer led them to the flowered lattice. She snapped photos, giving the pair instructions to turn this way and that. Dean followed them as best he could, but couldn't keep his eye open for too long. As a result, Mrs. Shafer had them trade sides so that Dean's twitching eye was hidden from the camera.

"Do you have a sunburn or something, Cook?" she asked. "Your face is very red."

When they finished, the cheers of the crowd drowned out the music. This wasn't for Naomi and Dean, but because the wait was over and everyone could dance now. A tsunami of teens surged onto the balloon-covered gym floor while Dean escorted Naomi to the bleachers, in the opposite direction of the human tide.

"We're supposed to be a couple," she said. "Don't you want to dance?"

"I guess one dance won't hurt, but I need to find my other contact," said Dean.

He held Naomi's right hand awkwardly and slid his other hand behind her back. A respectable distance must be maintained while dancing with your best friend's girlfriend, he said to himself while he danced closer to a beautiful girl than any teenage boy had a right to, and tried to think of baseball. As they swayed among the other couples, his good eye caught a glance of the furious face of Naomi's brother John. This created less of a need to think of baseball.

After the song ended, he led Naomi to a seat on the wooden bleachers near her friends and scrambled out to the hallway.

A pair of spit-shined shoes interrupted his close inspection of the hallway floor. Dean followed sharp-creased trousers up to the mask of fury that was John's face. Two massive paw-like hands pulled Dean to his feet.

"Stay away from my sister, you disgusting pervert," John snarled.

"I didn't do anything!"

"Shut up! And stop winking at me! Everyone knows what you're thinking and it's disgusting!"

"But I lost a contact."

"Really? Stop winking or I'll take the other one out with my fist."

He dropped Dean into a heap and walked away.

Dean trudged away from the gym, a tactical retreat and walk home on his mind. He paused at the door of the band room and heard the slap-slap-slap of men's dress shoes on the waxed floor of the corridor. He looked back to see Mike running toward him down the long hallway, the weighted ends of his bolo tie hitting both shoulders as it whipped left and right.

"Wait up," he yelled.

Dean spread his arms and shook his head in disbelief.

"Where have you been? John almost murdered me under the Class of 1972!"

"Looking for you, that's where," said Mike, out of breath. "You have to stay with Naomi and let me dance with her."

"No B-25 is worth getting punched in the face," said Dean. "Maybe a life-sized one with real guns, but not a model."

"Why are you winking at me? That's really weird, dude. Okay, we'll go back into the dance, you cuddle up with Brenda for one song––she's dying to see you, by the way––then come and sit with Naomi."

"Fine, fine," said Dean. "Apart from the fact that my parents are going to bury me alive for losing a contact, I have to wear those stupid Coke-bottle glasses, because this headache is massive."

"Glasses are even better! Nobody gets punched wearing those."

"I don't want to find out," said Dean.

He found his trumpet case in the equipment room and took out the dreaded instrument of ocular embarrassment. The eye doctor must have had something against Dean in a previous life, because in addition to the obscene thickness, he'd given the lenses a bronze tint, making Dean look like a near-sighted mafia don.

He rested them on the bridge of his nose and immediately became dizzy. The contact in his left eye combined with the eyeglass lenses in a kaleidoscope of twisting shapes and refractive error.

"I can't wear these either."

"Take out your other contact," said Mike.

"And put it where, a cup of punch? It'll dry out and I've already lost two of them."

"Okay, genius––either take out that contact or I'll burn your house down. Girls don't wait forever."

Dean used his thumbs to pop out the heavy lens on the right side of the glasses. He placed them back on his nose and grinned at Mike.

"Now who's the genius?"

Mike shook his head. "You're the strangest person I know. Come on, Cyclops."

They clip-clopped through the waxed hallways like iron-shod horses and pushed into the gym as a Bruce Hornsby song was ending.

Brenda finished the dance on the arm of a skinny blonde boy in a suit. Dean spotted her and wove through the teenagers heading back to the bleachers. "Tonight, Tonight, Tonight" started up and others resumed their dancing.

Dean tapped the blonde kid on the shoulder. "Beat it, Dubrowski."

"Not you again," said Dubrowski. He turned and did a classic double take at Dean's strange, half-glassed appearance. "Oooookay. I'll see you later, Brenda."

He slunk away, and Dean executed the maneuver he'd been practicing for months in front of a mirror. He placed a hand on his chest and bowed.

"May I have this dance?"

Brenda stared at him, stock-still, the chewing gum in her open mouth in serious danger of tumbling out.

Taking the lack of a negative as a positive, Dean held Brenda's right hand and pressed the small of her back with the other as they began to move with the crowd to Genesis.

Brenda swallowed her gum. At the end of her brief choking spell, Dean felt pressure to start a conversation.

"Nice dress," he said. "It really makes your eyes pop. What would you call that color? Teal or aquamarine?"

"Dean Cook––are you for real?"

"I'm ... uh ... really here, if that's what're asking. I mean, what's real, anyway? The floor? Taxes? We're all probably just eyelash mites in a giant alien overlord's mascara, when it comes down to it."

"Okay ... number one, your glasses are broken, and number two, you're dating Naomi."

"I am not!" Dean looked around at the staring couples and lowered his voice. "I'm not."

Brenda tossed her long black hair like a pony twitching its tail. "I read your note," she said. "It's obvious you really like her."

"Didn't your sister tell you? Mike was supposed to––"

"Don't mention that sleaze bag. Yes, he gave my sister mono and yes, I got it from a slice of her half-eaten cheesecake. How was I supposed to know? Did I deserve two weeks of mono for wanting more delicious, chocolate-covered cheesecake? Show me a girl who doesn't want more cheesecake and I'll show you a boy dressed as a girl!"

"Sure, but––"

"I wouldn't believe a thing he said to me even if he said it to my face. And you, by the way, shouldn't be dating eighth graders. Okay, so you're kind of a mess, but maybe if you got rid of those glasses and stayed away from bright lights, you'd almost look like Tom Cruise."

Dean's face tingled. "Really?"

"Sure. You would have been just my type, if Steve hadn't asked me out two minutes ago."

"Who?"

"The junior homecoming king, Steve Dubrowski. He's smart, too, and a 'mathlete,' whatever that is. Do they go to state? He wants me to wear his Chess Club jacket."

Dean sighed. "Chess team jacket."

"Excuse me, but I go to the mall like, every day, and it's called Chess Club."

"Sure, Brenda," said Dean, with slumped shoulders. "But my SAT is higher than his. And you know he's too young to drive."

"I guess so, but at least he doesn't wear glasses. Wow, do I need another stick of gum!"

The song ended right then, and the pair broke up. Dean lost her in the crowd but didn't care too much as he walked with bowed head toward the exit, intending to escape a second time or at least ram his face into something hard until his face or the something gave way.

"Dean! Up here!"

Naomi waved at him from high on the wooden bleachers. The next song had a fast tempo, and Dean decided to at least keep his word to Mike if nothing else. He wouldn't get pummeled for sitting next to a girl.

He blazed a trail up the bleachers past teens holding hands and trying to sit as close to each other as possible under the hawk-eyed chaperones, and plopped down next to Naomi.

"What's wrong? You look like you need a hug," said Naomi.

She slid an arm around his side and squeezed. Dean smelled her lavender perfume again and felt the weight of her head on his shoulder.

"We shouldn't be sitting this close," he said.

"Why not?"

"Your brother said he'd kill me."

"That's impossible! Bobby's in the hospital."

Dean shook his head. "John."

"Oh, right," said Naomi. "That sounds like John."

"Why is Bobby in the hospital?"

"John."

Dean groaned. "These are supposed to be the best years of my life. Turns out they might be the last years, too."

Naomi giggled, and that made Dean feel better. He liked making her happy enough to laugh.

"You're so dramatic," she said. "Sure, he might punch you in the face or snap a few fingers, but he's not going to kill you."

"I feel so much better."

"Now my dad, he might kill you. He's done it before," said Naomi.

"Who?"

"My dad!"

"No, I mean who did he kill?"

Naomi pointed at the gym entrance. "My dad!"

Dean followed the line of Naomi's primary digit to a massive figure in plaid shirt and jeans. He towered over the swirling crowd of teenagers like a redwood in a forest of pines, and coincidentally, with skin just as bark-like. A faded red trucker's cap with the Massey-Ferguson logo squashed his bristly black hair, and his beard would have put to shame any Confederate re-enactor of Pickett's Charge. The rumor mill claimed that he raised tobacco and steers, but Dean could never think of the man as anything other than a very angry lumberjack. One whose astoundingly pretty daughter Dean was now being hugged and leaned upon.

"I should go," he blurted.

"He'll see you," said Naomi. "Quick! Let's dance with everyone. You can sneak out the other door."

Luckily, the music changed to a slow song and almost everyone stood up to pack the gym floor. Naomi held Dean's hand and helped him navigate down the bleachers and into the middle of the crowd. She pulled Dean's arms behind her back and they swayed together, much closer this time.

Dean kept his head down. This brought him close to Naomi's neck, and he decided this was an appropriate moment to review in his mind last year's major league record for stolen bases.

"You're a sweet guy," whispered Naomi in his ear.

"Rickey Henderson! I mean ... don't do that, it tickles."

"Mike would never do this for his friends," said Naomi.

"Whisper in my ear? I certainly hope not."

"No, silly! Pretend to date a girl for your friend. I think Mike's too selfish for that. Maybe I should date someone like you."

"You mean, actually date someone you're pretending to date? I'd do that in a flash, if Mike ends up in the hospital next to Bobby. With all that pain medication, he won't know flip from flap."

Naomi giggled and squeezed Dean, pressing her body tightly against him. She yelped and jumped back, hands over her chest.

"You pinched my boob!"

"No I didn't! It's the pins!"

"What?"

"I use pins to hold down my tie."

"But you're wearing a sweater!"

Her brother John pushed through the giggling crowd of teens, the red mist of deadly murder in his eyes. Dean considered his options, weighed the pros and cons of a very public and humiliating beating, and decided to run for it.

And run for it he did. The most ardent Nazi watching through his telescope from a base on the Moon would have said Dean lacked talent and even the most basic skills, but would see that the boy had enough practice in dodge ball and foot pursuit to escape quite a few angry boys and the occasional angry girl who would inevitably get on their bikes and catch him anyway.

In this scenario there were no bikes, however, and Dean weaved, jinked, and flat-out "booked it" through the crowds on the dance floor and into the empty corridors of Hidden Valley High.

He waited in a pitch-black girl's bathroom for what seemed like hours but was probably only five minutes, then crept back through dim hallways lined with silently frowning beige lockers.

From this end of the rectangular school building, the only way out was through the main entrance in the lobby, past cases full of football trophies and parents waiting for the dance to end. Rather than sleeping in the girl's bathroom all night for the second time in his life, Dean decided to try and sneak through the parental gauntlet.

He found an old jacket in his locker. Holding it over his head like a celebrity dodging the paparazzi, he navigated halfway through the parent-packed lobby and suddenly froze.

Before the stainless steel and glass entrance doors stood Naomi's murderous lumberjack father, chatting with a pair of adults that Dean had never met before but who were strangely familiar.

Both looked mid-thirties in age. The man was the shorter of the pair and wore a dark gray blazer that looked suspiciously like one in Dean's closet. He was pale, slight of build, and had a cropped, spiky haircut. Although not as tall as Naomi's father, the woman towered over the blonde-haired man. Her brown hair cascaded in feathered waves across the shoulders of her scarlet jacket. A matching miniskirt and high heels were complemented by black stockings with that line up the back of the leg.

The tall woman laughed. The pair seemed to be in the middle of a conversation with Naomi's lumberjack father.

"Of course not! The pills just take the edge off."

Since he was a teenage boy in a body flooded with a massive amount of hormones, Dean admired those smooth, shapely legs for a few seconds. An enormous hand curled around the back of his neck and pulled him forward.

"Here he is," boomed Naomi's father. "The man of the hour himself."

He pulled Dean close to the strange couple. Dean wished for nuclear Armageddon at this particular moment, although he doubted the sight of mushroom clouds would shock a murderous lumberjack for more than a few minutes. Perhaps the couple were Federal drug agents in disguise and would save him from the extreme beating that was only seconds away.

"Hello, son," said the tall woman.

If Dean's heart knew what was going on and cared enough to stop squishing blood through his body, it probably would have stopped squishing blood through his body. Dean's face had more leisure time and replicated the same wide-eyed, Juicy-Fruit-tumbling expression as Brenda had earlier.

"Don't look so shocked, dear," said the spiky-haired man.

"Mom? Dad?"

The huge, leathery hand of Naomi's father patted Dean on the shoulder, but the large man said nothing apart from grinning widely.

"We wanted to tell you for a long time," said Frank Cook, a father Dean had known for many years not to wear a dress and makeup, but who was now wearing a dress and makeup. "It was hard to find the right time."

"I'm sure it is," said the lumberjack in a solemn tone. "Very hard."

"Tell me you came from a party," said Dean. "Or forgot this isn't Halloween. If you tell me you're really, really drunk right now that would also clear things up."

His mother shook her head. "I'm sorry you had to find out this way, Dean."

"Had to? You didn't have to switch clothes and walk into my homecoming dance!"

"It's not just switching clothes, it's a lifestyle," said his father. "Remember that episode of Real People a few years ago, where the husband and wife decided to swap gender roles? They wore clothing of the opposite sex to the grocery store, to their jobs, even at home. Both that and your experience at the pool party a few years ago really convinced me. Your mother and I talked about it for a long time and finally decided that yes, this is who we really are. We're choosing what to wear, who to be, and sticking to our dreams."

Naomi's father cackled. "That dress is sticking to your legs pretty good, Frank!"

Dean's father pulled at the hem of his skirt. "That's strange. I used a dryer sheet."

"This isn't happening," mumbled Dean. "I must be lying at the side of the road somewhere with brain damage."

"It was a hard decision, son, and we know you might think we're crazy," said Dean's father. He tossed his brown curls dramatically. "But tell me who's crazy? The man who conforms to the silly rules of society, or the man who stands up for freedom?"

"The man who's not wearing a dress," said Dean.

Someone grabbed the back of his sweater.

"Got him!"

Dean dropped to his knees and squirmed out of the sweater and John's grasp. He bolted through the steel doors of the school's main entrance, almost knocking over a pair of necking tenth graders, and sprinted toward his car.

He didn't have a clue where he'd go and simply wanted to be anywhere but this humiliating place that contained his father and mother in drag and people that wanted to murder him.

Dean's car was a Ford Country Squire of 1977 vintage, a maroon station wagon with peeling wood stickers on all sides that should have been considered more of a "land barge" or "tugboat with wheels" than a normal vehicle, but Dean had the keys. That made it the best car in the world at the moment.

He revved the old V-8 and swerved out of the parking lot, John and his father hot on his tail in their Chevy pickup and his parents behind them in a blue K-Car.

Dean took the country roads too fast. Only a mile away and inside a ninety-degree curve in the small town of Relief, Ohio, he lost control and crashed straight through the twin gasoline pumps of Delawder's Pizza Gulp. Fountains of fuel erupted from broken supply lines in the concrete.

Covered in glass and gas, Dean squeezed out from a window of the station wagon and ran up the highway. John and his father, along with Dean's parents, stopped their cars and gawked as the flat-roofed cover over the fuel pumps swayed, then pancaked onto the gushing pumps and station wagon.

Dean's father sighed. "Well, at least it didn't––"

The station exploded.

Tracklist:

Dreams – The Cranberries

Our Lips Are Sealed – The Go-Go's

True – Spandau Ballet
11

Dean paused in the glare of stage lights and a sea of faces.

"That's my key point. Yes, all of you are quitters, through and through, but it's not enough to think, to feel deep down in your heart, that you are the truest example of any quitter that has ever existed in human history. No, that's not quite enough. You're also the most worthless smear of protoplasm that has ever lived since protoplasm smeared a disgusting trail out of the ocean billions of years ago, and if that protoplasmic Adam could see you now, he'd loft a gob of protoplasmic spit at your face.

"There's no organism squatting below you on the ziggurat of life. You can't look down and blame an aardvark for all of your problems, because even a disgusting creature like that is standing on your shoulders. When––and only when––you understand this concept can you shrug off the aardvark and climb up. And climb it you will, over the furry shoulders of raccoons, dung beetles, and senators until you've become a thinking, goal-oriented human being. An organism that achieves goals and lives free of mankind's prejudice, consumer angst, and vast selection of streaming videos."

Dean spread his arms. "A goal is not simply the place a football wants to be, it's the place YOU want to be. Think of your goal as that beautiful girl at the homecoming dance years ago, the one who got away, the girl you desperately wanted to kiss but were too shy. Perhaps the ladies and effeminate men in the audience can imagine a huge bar of Toblerone tempting you from the cupboard. Maybe that's not a good example––if you eat it, bikini season is definitely over, and you might as well stay indoors all summer. That goes for the men as well, because 'Fatty,' 'Hairy,' and 'Speedo' should never be used in the same sentence."

"Back to my point. That girl you're dancing with is your goal: a new job, losing fifty pounds, or setting fire to the home of a publishing executive. You can't be shy with this girl. Grab hold of her with both arms, dance like a man who's never danced in public before, and kiss that girl full on the lips––no tongue, please, this is high school––because you will achieve absolutely nothing in life by standing back and watching life go by. Unless, of course, that was your goal in the first place. Am I right?"

Dean pumped his fist and the crowd jumped to their feet, cheering and clapping like mad. Rapturous members of the audience threw bouquets of roses onto the stage.

A sour-faced old lady in the front row who refused to applaud was the only fly in Dean's ointment. He watched the old woman struggle out of her seat and limp forward. She banged her wooden cane repeatedly on the stage until the vast auditorium fell silent.

The old woman turned her wrinkled face up to Dean and shouted, "You're naked!"

Dean looked down at his body, as bereft of clothing as an infant torpedo, armed and in the tube.

The crowd roared with laughter and began to chant, "You're naked! You're naked! You're naked!"

Dean gasped and jerked awake.

Painfully bright sunshine illuminated the teal green interior of the old Chevy Impala. The car, in fact, seemed to be a time capsule of cracked vinyl that smelled of dried ketchup and baby wipes. Tan mountains and a pale, featureless desert passed the windows at high speed, the wind whistling faintly from gaps in the weather stripping. Lin sat in the driver's seat, her hands spread wide on the large, chrome-plated steering wheel. Next to her in the passenger seat slumbered the round hillock of Fanta, drooling happily against the window.

Something heavy stirred on Dean's thigh, and Emerson murmured. She had stretched full-length on the long bench seat with her head in Dean's lap. Her dark braids had come undone a bit, and her chest rose and fell in a slow, peaceful pattern. Dean certainly did not want to wake the young woman, but the gentle movement and warmth of her proximity was dangerously distracting for a man in his position. He sighed and gazed out the window at a pair of distant mountains.

"Sticky wicket," he whispered.

Lin turned in the driver's seat. "What was that?"

"Nothing," said Dean, trying not to move.

"I thought I heard 'sticky whip it' and before that, 'I'm naked.' "

"Definitely not!"

"It's none of my business what you two are doing back there, but I need a break. The three of you have slept through the entire state of Nevada."

"Of course, Lin," said Dean. "Currently I am not indisposed, which I suppose means I'm at your disposal."

On Dean's lap, Emerson yawned. She opened her eyes halfway and smiled.

"Good morning, husband."

Dean cleared his throat. "Hello, wife."

"You were very good and brave last night."

"For what?"

"Silly! For saving me from the American security forces."

Dean shrugged. "I was saving myself, too."

Emerson sat up and kissed him on the cheek. "You are always saying these kind of jokes, but I know you are a good person. This is how we know you are a good person in Kamchatka, when you do not betray your friends to the security forces."

"I would never do that," said Dean.

He watched her undo her braids and comb her hair with a small brush taken from somewhere in the volumes of sheer scarlet material that made up her wedding dress. The long, practiced strokes of her arm made him think of a piston in a secret underground factory where beauty was weaponized to control all mankind.

The motivational speech that he'd given in his dream was still fresh in his mind. Dean took a deep breath and slid over the vinyl seat to Emerson.

"Can I ... um ... can I tell you something?"

"Of course, husband."

Dean slid his arm behind her. "I like you," he said.

"I'm happy you like me."

Dean smiled. "No. I mean, I really like you. I LIKE like you."

Emerson considered this for a second, then leaned close, a serious expression on her face. "I am HAPPY happy you like me."

Dean was nanoseconds from a full-on, mouth-to-mouth kiss when the car swerved, and he tumbled across the seat.

"Sorry," yelled Lin. "That was the rest stop."

Dean straightened his collar and sighed. "No problem. You've been a real trooper, Lin, driving without sleep and what-not."

All four took a few minutes at the rest stop to stretch their legs, wash up, and flap their clothes in a futile effort to remove the smell of Funyuns. Dean settled himself behind the chrome-plated wheel, and Emerson slid across the green vinyl to the middle of the bench seat. Dean was very aware of the fact that Emerson's hip and thigh were touching his.

"Very nice," he said. "These old cars with no center console are very cozy."

Emerson smiled and rested her head on his shoulder.

Dean turned the key in the dash and the Impala clattered to life. He pulled it onto the interstate and settled in for a long drive.

Lin yawned from the back seat.

"Excuse me," she said. "Don't worry about the cops. I switched the plates last night."

"How very industrious, Lin. If we make it out of this desert alive I'll apply to get you a raise."

"Apply? You're the one who pays my salary."

"I still have to follow procedure, Lin. Without procedure, even a squirrel can't find his nuts in the winter."

"Thanks, Dean, but I'll be happy just to make it home."

The car whisked along at the speed limit. Emerson brushed and rebraided the rest of her hair, then turned the rearview mirror and applied a bit of mascara, eye shadow, and lipstick from a tiny black box. Dean watched her with interest.

"Where do you keep all of those things?"

Emerson pouted. "That's a girl secret."

"So you DO have a magic purse in your dress!"

"It is not magic purse, just a purse."

Emerson touched the chrome-plastic buttons of the ancient AM radio in the dash. She twisted the dial, and a small orange pyramid moved behind the amplitude numbers.

"I don't think you'll pick up any stations," said Dean. "We're in the middle of nowhere, and that radio was around to transmit the moon landing."

"I can make it work. This is everyday radio in Kamchatka."

"Still, I don't think it was made by your company."

Emerson reached under the dashboard with both arms. She fiddled around for a long moment. At last, static hissed through the speakers.

"Bravo," said Dean.

Emerson turned the dial through a few stations.

"... but on the heels of that tragic news comes an even more tragic development," said the female newsreader. "The body of Nando Phoenix, famous for his role as Captain James L. Sparx, disappeared from the Clark County morgue last night where it was awaiting autopsy. Sergio Martinez––the only witness to the fatal plunge of Mr. Phoenix from a Las Vegas hotel balcony into an ice cream truck––has also disappeared. Authorities have removed boxes of ice cream from the apartment Martinez rented in Henderson but are not disclosing any leads at the moment. We attempted to contact Diedrich Bader, an alleged co-star of Phoenix and Martinez, but were unsuccessful because it was kind of late and we had to get up early. Also, who's Diedrich Bader?"

Dean shook his head in disgust. "The way this country's going, you can't even feel safe if you're dead. We should all pack up and move to Australia."

"There it is not safe also," said Emerson. "If you are not murdered by the kangaroos, poison snake, or spider, the dingoes will eat your babies."

"How about Russia?"

"If you are not murdered by the border guards, KGB, or angry bears, the postal service will eat your babies."

"I can't tell if you're joking or not."

Emerson giggled. "Of course I am! KGB is now FSB."

For hours the desert scenery barely changed, and the Utah state line came and went.

Lin slapped the back of the seat. "Great gobs of turkey fat!"

Dean corrected his swerve and moved the car back onto the highway. "Lin! What's wrong?"

"I left my phone at the rest stop!"

A HUNDRED MILES TO THE WEST, a black Town Car pulled into the rest stop in question, followed closely by a furiously red late-model Corvette.

A muscular man in a polo shirt and blonde crew-cut lifted the Corvette's parking brake and turned to the elegant older woman in the passenger seat.

"I don't like this, Fran. Not one bit."

Frank Cook pulled down the sunshade and checked his makeup in the mirror. He decided that it would be safer to go light on the eyeliner if they were going to be out in the desert much longer. Too much makeup in this sunshine, and a girl looked very trashy, very fast.

"You never like anything," he said. "But I suppose that's one quality I like about you, Steve Dubrowski. That, and your palatial Los Altos estate, of course. You're the kind of guy who sees a beautiful, sunny day and wants everyone to do pushups and hit punching bags."

"There's nothing beautiful about driving through Nevada."

Frank smiled. "Of course there is. Now be a dear son-in-law and check the parking lot. I need to see why Billie has stopped."

Billie leaned against a fender of the Town Car, a cigarette dangling from her lips and both hands jammed in the front pockets of her blue jeans like a bored James Dean with two ovaries too many.

Chip waved a journal bound in black leather in front of Billie's cigarette.

"The whole book's like that," he said. "Listen to this one: September 14. Location: Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, Sector 3C. Blonde waitress behind counter of Burger Chef, estimated height 170 cm, very trim and ... hmm, can't read that word. Left Vassily with two hundred rubles and instructions to follow girl after work. After three hours, Vassily returned with two socks, no rubles, and a black eye. Socks are low-ankle version of medium weight, white cotton. Fragrance is very earthy, with notes of chocolate and sweat. Overall grade: seven."

"How in the name of Gus McCrae do you know how to speak Russian?"

"I can't. I just know how to read it. There was this massively multiplayer online game that was released only in Russia, so I––"

Billie held up a hand. "Let me stop you right there. It's for your own good."

"I'm just answering your question."

"Why don't you drop that book and get back on the detector thing, okay?"

Chip pulled a laptop out of the back of the Town Car, along with a pair of telescoping antennae that formed a shiny metal 'V.'

Frank approached along the sidewalk with a tap-tap of high heels. "Find anything?"

Chip pointed to a building that held restrooms and vending machines. "I'm getting a signal from over there."

"Good work," said Frank. "Billie, can you check the men's bathroom? I'll take the girl's."

"Scream if you see a mouse."

"You'll hear the sound of gunfire in that case, not screams."

Chip stared as the pair walked toward the building. He shook his head and sighed.

Frank pushed through the second stall in the women's restroom and spotted a rectangular phone on the toilet-paper dispenser. He covered the phone with a tissue and carried it outside.

"I found it!"

The door of the men's room opened with a slam and Billie ran up. "Found what?"

"A phone."

"It looks like my mom's," said Chip.

Billie turned and kicked over a trash can, spilling fast-food containers and banana peels everywhere. An elderly couple stared for a moment and hurried back to their car.

"Calm down, dear," said Frank.

Chip laid the antennae on the trunk. "Give me Dean's number, and I'll try to recalibrate the gear to track his phone."

Frank brushed a lock of brown hair from his eyes. "If the silly boy hasn't lost it. We should also check on those two miscreants in the trunk. If they run out of water, that's going to be a particular mess this particular individual isn't cleaning up."

Billie spat onto the sidewalk and pulled a can of snuff from her back pocket. "Why do you care if these 'particular individuals' live or die? They were on the brink of murdering Chip and me yesterday."

"I know, but it's so much fun," said Frank. "I've always wanted to drive around with people in a car trunk. It's so exciting!"

"Of course it is," said Chip dryly. "But the difference between the death penalty for kidnapping and a misdemeanor for rowdy fun is the Utah state line. Let's drop them off in a bad part of Salt Lake City."

Billie snorted. "You watch too much TV. There's no bad part of Salt Lake."

"What I mean is, we cover them in malt liquor and leave them at the Greyhound station," said Chip. "Nobody'll believe anything they say."

"You're such a smart boy! I'm glad you came along," said Frank. He reached out for a hug, but Chip backed away, his arms straight out.

"Let's keep this professional, okay? I'm not crazy like the rest of you people. I just want to get my mom back home, safe and sound."

Frank laughed. "Who's crazy? We want the same thing for Dean."

Steve Dubrowski walked up from the parking lot.

"I didn't see anyone out there or hiding in the cars," he said.

"All right," said Fran. "I'm calling a group meeting! Group meeting everyone."

Billie kicked the trash can again, knocking it across the sidewalk. "Just spit it out, Fran!"

"Steve's car is faster, so he'll go ahead and search for Dean. Whoever follows in the Town Car needs to stop for supplies."

Steve raised a hand. "Including sunscreen. Also, is there time for us to get in a workout? I think all of us could benefit from some stretches and a little sparring. Maybe a run? Only a couple miles, nothing crazy."

"Unless you want someone else to drive your car, Steve, I think it's out of the question."

"Someone else driving my car is definitely out of the question."

"I call shotgun in the Corvette!" yelled Chip.

Frank smiled at Chip and held out a white-gloved hand. "How about 'Rock, Paper, Shotgun?' "

AS THEY APPROACHED Salt Lake City Dean saw more and more signs for the Great Salt Lake. Finally it appeared north of the interstate––a vast body of water that reflected the sky.

"You know what? We're making good time, and I've always wanted to see it," said Dean, and took the next exit ramp.

Emerson squinted at him. "See what?"

"The Great Salt Lake."

"What's so great about it?"

Dean smiled. "'Great' means the lake's very big, not that it wrote a Tony-award-winning play."

"Who is this Tony?"

"It's full of sea monkeys," Lin murmured sleepily from the back seat.

"Tony is full of sea monkeys?"

Dean patted Emerson's leg. "Don't worry about it."

He drove the car through the meandering curves of a park surrounding the lake, and stopped in a gravel lot with a collection of other vehicles.

Stern gray mountains ringed the lake. Apart from the tiny ripples made by a few swimmers, the water was as flat and smooth as a windowpane.

Dean opened the door of the Impala and stood up, stretching his arms to the sky. He offered his hand to Emerson and she slid out of the car.

"Let's go swimming," he said.

Emerson waved at the silk of her red wedding dress. "But I'm wearing this!"

"Aren't you wearing anything under it?"

Emerson pulled the edge of her veil over her chest. "Not even my husband should ask that question!"

Lin's sleepy voice came from the back seat of the car.

"Let the poor girl wear your shirt, Dean."

"Yes, of course." Dean began to undo the buttons. "It's made of thick material. You won't have to worry."

Emerson took the shirt and called to Fanta in Russian. The sea-green Impala's suspension squealed as the round woman climbed out of the back and followed Emerson to a nearby changing hut.

Dean left his clothes on the trunk of the car. Wearing only his boxer shorts, he squished and slipped through the mud to the lake.

The green and brown water was far from clear. Blue bottle flies rode on patches of floating muck like stranded sailors, and tiny shrimp the size of question marks wriggled below the surface. Dean sank down and stared across water that seemed to stretch for miles without a ripple.

A squeal came from the shore, and Dean turned to see Emerson standing knee-deep in the lake. Her black braids were pinned behind her head and she wore Dean's shirt buttoned up to her neck.

"There are things!"

She pointed at the water between her pale legs.

"It's fine," said Dean. "Trust me."

He splashed up to Emerson and led her by the hand deeper into the cool saltwater.

"Are they going to hurt us?" she asked.

"No, they're just tiny shrimp. Come in deeper. The lake is full of salt, so it's easy to float and swim."

"But my hair will be soaked!"

Dean smiled. "You've got such a cute look on your face."

With prodding from Dean, Emerson waded deeper into the water. She held tightly to his hand, and they floated on their backs across the gentle surface of the lake. Dean watched a pair of tiny clouds float across the pale sky high above, and felt drowsy. He wondered if anyone had ever fallen asleep on the lake and drowned. That wouldn't be a bad way to go, he thought.

"Tell me your dreams," said Emerson, in a quiet voice.

"Usually I'm naked and in front of many people. So many people."

Emerson giggled. "I'm sorry. I don't mean what is in your head when you sleep. I mean your dream, what you want in life."

"I just want to be happy, that's it."

"Every person wants that. What does your happy look like?"

Dean said nothing for a long moment as he floated on his back and watched the sky.

"I've always wanted to live in a tiny house with a huge green lawn, on a hill overlooking the Ohio. I'd come home from work, kiss my beautiful wife, play with my children on the lawn, and later, when the nightjars are buzzing and the lightning bugs are blinking, I'd sit and watch the river go by."

"Why the river? America is a big country. Why not a house on the beach or in the mountains?"

"Mountains are too cold, and a house near the ocean is like living in a washing machine. The river is best. It's always there, always pushing along, summer or winter, covered in rain or filled with ice. This probably seems silly like every other metaphor people try to apply to life, but it reminds me of the slow passing of time and the inevitability of everything going away. Even though it gives me that feeling, a feeling that seems very melancholy, I'm not at all sad. I'm just happy to watch the river go by."

"That's a good dream."

"How about you, the recently appointed Mrs. Dean Cook? What do you need to be happy?"

Emerson sighed and splashed her feet. "I am not a complicated girl. In the orphanage I dreamed of having parents. Later I dreamed of having a job anywhere but the sock department. After the Duke forced me into engagement and also to clean the buildings of his sock collection, I dreamed of running away. If there is anything I want now, it is to feel safe with a man who loves me."

Dean thought over this last phrase. "Do you have someone like that?"

Emerson said nothing for a long moment.

"There is someone ... a boy who lives in West Virginia. With other people from Kamchatka, the village I have spoke to you about. He is nice boy. We have sent many text messages to each other."

Dean sighed. "Lovely."

"But even more than this," said Emerson hurriedly. "I wish to have Louis Vuitton handbag and travel around the world."

"I don't believe it."

"What? It is very good product."

"If you cared about handbags and money you would have married the Duke."

Emerson smiled. "Maybe you are right. But if I am safe with someone who loves me, the travel and handbag will be a cherry on the icing."

Tracklist:

Learning To Fly – Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers

Run-Around – Blues Traveler

The Joker – Steve Miller Band
12

After a much-needed but perhaps too-long break, they splashed to the shore. Emerson held Dean's hand to keep from slipping on the caramel-colored mud. The dress shirt clinging to her body had become soaked with water and therefore transparent. Dean distracted himself by trying to remember the list of vice presidents backwards.

"That was fun, wasn't it," he asked, keeping his eyes high and tight.

"Yes, it was," said Emerson. "Oh, look at that pretty car!"

Dean followed her finger to a red Corvette driving along the lakeshore road. He pulled Emerson over the muddy bank at a run.

"Quick! That's my father!"

They sprinted across the grass to the parking lot.

"I need to change clothes," said Emerson. "Maybe it's not even him."

Dean shook his head and helped her into the car. He slid into the driver's seat, turned the key in the ignition, and the Impala roared to life.

"Believe me, I can tell that red Corvette from miles away," he said. "Where Steve Dubrowski is, my father isn't far behind."

Lin and Fanta continued to slumber peacefully in the rear seat as Dean spun gravel out of the parking lot and toward the interstate.

"I'm confused," said Emerson. "If it's your father, why are we driving away? Maybe he can help us."

Dean laughed. "It's hard to explain without meeting him in person. Let's just say that meeting him will cause more problems that it'll solve."

Tires squealed behind them as they zoomed up the highway on-ramp. Emerson glanced in the rear mirror.

"If that's your father, he really wants to talk to you."

The red Corvette filled the entire mirror. Emerson saw a blonde man in the driver's seat and a woman in a white coat.

"Your father is very blonde and good-looking."

"He'd be pleased to hear that," said Dean. "I didn't know he'd dyed his hair, though."

Lin rose up from the back seat. "What's going on?"

"Thank the gods you're awake! Fran's caught up to us," said Dean.

"Keep your foot on the gas," shouted Lin. "Highway speeds, Dean! Highway speeds!"

She pushed Dean to the right and squirmed over the front seat to take the wheel. Under Lin's expert control, the old Impala accelerated and the red line of the odometer pushed closer to triple digits. The windows rattled and the engine roared into high gear.

"Buckle up!" shouted Lin.

The sports car swerved into the lane beside them. Through the window, Dean saw his father waving frantically at them. He wore a very stylish scarf over his hair and a white jacket, both of which would have been very attractive on an older woman who didn't just happen to be his father in drag.

The Corvette was Steve Dubrowski's, so he was driving, of course. He looked as fit and perfect as always. Steve shook his head in an emphatic negative to repeated requests and pointed fingers from Dean's father. It was a stroke of luck, thought Dean, that Steve wasn't driving his H2, Ferrari, or any of the dozens of cars he owned that were less precious to him than the Corvette, because he'd have sideswiped them in a flash.

Dean cupped his hand over Lin's ear. "You can't outrun a Corvette!"

"I don't have to," she yelled. "Hold on!"

She stood on the brake pedal with all the weight in her trim-Asian-lady-who-works-out-on-an-elliptical legs. The Corvette shot by like a rocket while the Impala skidded across the rumble strip and stopped on the shoulder.

Dean looked down at Lin's arm across his chest, an arm that kept him from flying through the windshield. For her part, Emerson had wisely buckled her seat belt.

Lin pointed forward. "Look."

A hundred feet down the road, the tan car of a state trooper pulled out from behind a billboard for "Tony's Helicopter Tours" and flashed red-and-blue behind the Corvette.

Dean shook his head. "How did you know?"

Lin pulled back onto the interstate. "Woman's intuition. Also, I saw his bumper."

Something groaned, guttural and desperate like a wounded buffalo. Dean peered into the back and saw Fanta down in the footwell, wedged between the front and back seats.

"We might have a problem," he said.

Emerson exchanged a few words in Russian with the large woman. "She says her neck and back are painful."

Dean opened the glove compartment. "I think there's some Tylenol here."

"Neck pain is serious," said Lin. "We should stop at a hospital."

"There's no time for that!"

"First of all," said Lin, "we have to get off the freeway, because Daddy and Corvette Boy will be back on the road in fifteen minutes. And second, you had time to splash in the lake with your new girlfriend, but you can't spare a minute for this poor woman with spinal injuries?"

"She's not my girlfriend, she's my wife!"

"Speaking of that, we left so quickly that your 'wife' is shivering wet. She needs to dry off and change."

Dean sighed. "Lin, why are you always right about everything?"

Salt Lake City spread before them, an oasis of shopping centers and cathedrals in the desert. Lin took an exit marked with a blue-and-white hospital sign, and shortly pulled into the parking lot of the four-story "Merciful Sisters of Saint Patrick."

With help of a pair of nurses and accompanied by a storm of pitiful bleating from Fanta, they extracted the large woman from the back of the Impala and deposited her in a hospital wheelchair.

Inside the emergency department, Lin translated for the nurses. When Emerson left to change into her wedding dress, Dean realized he was still in his boxer shorts. He sheepishly trotted out of the hospital, but saw a Corvette cruising the parking lot like a cherry-red shark in a school of mackerel.

Dean burst into the hospital room where a nurse had just fitted a protective brace around Fanta's neck.

"Sir, put on some clothes," said the nurse. "It's embarrassing."

"I don't have time. My father's here!"

"Let's go," said Lin.

She pulled Fanta off the hospital bed as the nurse stared in disbelief.

"You can't leave yet. She hasn't been seen by a doctor!"

"Explain it to my father," said Dean. "He'll be the one in the miniskirt."

Emerson walked out of a restroom in her red wedding dress. Dean grabbed the bewildered girl and all four ran full-tilt through a maze of hospital corridors.

He stopped to catch his breath in front of an exit covered in red warnings. An electronic siren was bolted to the door handle.

"Why are we running?" asked Emerson.

"My father," Dean gasped.

Lin trotted up, pulling the neck-braced and sweaty Fanta behind her. "What are you waiting for? Open the door."

"It's a fire exit. The alarm will go off."

"So? Everybody running out will stop your father from running in."

"Right. Exactly what I was thinking, Lin."

Dean punched the glass of a nearby alarm and pulled down the white lever. A mechanical clanging filled the hallway, and when Dean pushed open the fire exit, an electronic siren began to squeal.

He and Emerson ran hand-in-hand through a loading dock and across a grassy field. Beyond a chain-link fence lay hangars and the runway for a small community airport.

Dean squeezed under part of the fence, covering himself with dirt in the process, and held up the metal links so the other three could crawl through. With the hospital alarms and the sirens of approaching fire engines providing a distant soundtrack, they ran toward a white hangar labeled "Tony's Sightseeing Tours."

The spacious hangar was empty, apart from a helicopter with an old, glass-bubble cockpit and a huge twin-engine plane painted olive green with twin tail rudders.

Dean gasped and stepped backwards, mashing Fanta's foot. The large woman yelled in pain and despite her injuries, shoved him back into the hangar.

"Sorry! That's a B-25 Mitchell. An old bomber from World War II."

Lin frowned. "So?"

"Do you know how many of these are left? This is the same plane that probably bombed your people, Lin."

"My people? I was born in San Jose!"

"The B-25 Mitchell flew in the famous Doolittle Raid, when the U.S. bombed Tokyo from aircraft carriers only five months after Pearl Harbor. It was widely used in the Pacific as a medium bomber and for strafing. If you look at the nose you can tell it's a B-25G variant, which carried heavy machine guns for ground attack."

"I don't see any guns," said Lin.

"Of course not, they were probably removed to save weight." Dean raised his voice. "Hello? Anyone here?"

Lin grabbed his arm. "What are you doing?"

"I need to get to Charleston. There's no reason I can't pay a private pilot to fly there."

"One reason: Unless you've found a magical hiding spot in those boxer shorts, your wallet and phone are still in the car. And look at that pile of junk you call a bomber! I bet it hasn't flown since Roosevelt!"

"You'd lose that bet," boomed a voice from across the hangar.

A short Native American in twin black braids and a red flight suit walked around the tail of the plane.

"This year, Soaring Dove has spent more time in the sky than any of you have spent watching the sunset, teaching a child to craft a leather belt, or stalking a deer through the forest. Think on that and tell me who's a pile of junk."

"Soaring Dove?"

"That's her name, lady. This plane right here? The one I'm pointing at? The one I'm standing under and now pointing at? The one with the white dove painted on the nose?"

"Yes, we see," said Dean. "It's just an odd name for a bomber."

"It's a better name than Farty the Jedi or Honky-Donkey or anything you white people come up with."

"I'm not white," said Lin.

The Native American spread his arms. "Thank you for this special Kodak moment, ladies and gentlemen, and please show yourselves out. Tours are cancelled today and for the rest of the week."

"I've seen your face somewhere," said Dean.

"Probably on a billboard."

"No, not there. Are you Tony?"

"Who else would I be? Why is everyone looking at me like that? I'm not the one in boxer shorts."

"It's just ... you look exactly like your brothers," said Dean.

"Of course I do," said Tony. "My parents prayed night and day to the sky spirits, hoping against hope that a baby with handsome good looks would be given to them. They aspired for a child with the beauty of George Raft or Alan Ladd, but due to the strange magic of the white man's fertility drugs, received six identical twins, each one with a face like Jackie Mason. That's life, or as the French say––that's life."

"You have to admit it's a shock," said Dean. "Meeting three of you in two days."

Tony sighed. "I don't have to admit anything, other than I've got a plane to load and a long flight after that. Sightseeing tours are canceled, as I said, so if you could please show yourselves out, I'd appreciate it."

"But we need your help!"

Tony clapped his hands together and laughed. "What is it now? Missed your flight to the Bahamas? Faked your own death and on the run from an ex-Marine ex-wife? Or accused of a crime you didn't commit by a secret government agency?"

"It's not that complicated," said Dean. "This young woman and I were just married to escape a murderous Kamchatkan mafia boss who collects women's socks, my cross-dressing father and mother want to throw me a birthday party that will inevitably be a complete disaster, and if I don't speak at a conference in two days for the motivational speaking industry in Charleston, West Virginia, I'll never work in the motivational speaking industry again."

Tony raised an eyebrow. "Didn't see that coming."

"Can you help us get to Charleston?"

"Try JetBlue. I hear it's a great airline."

Tony spun on his heel and walked back to the old bomber.

"That's too bad," yelled Lin. "You're gonna break up two newlyweds that your brother just married yesterday!"

"Congratulations," Tony yelled over his shoulder. "Most of them don't last ninety minutes! Hope you pre-ordered the divorce."

"We can pay you," shouted Dean. "Half now and half when we reach Charleston."

Tony stopped and turned slowly, a frown below his hooded eyes.

"How much?"

"My personal assistant has an American Express Platinum card with a ten-thousand-dollar maximum. We'll give you half now and half in Charleston."

"I'm only going as far as Cincinnati."

"That's close enough, I guess."

Tony walked up and shook Dean's hand. "You got a deal, mister. Show me the money, or as we say in the Kickapoo tribe, 'Show me the moanaaaay!'"

Dean heard Lin rummage around in her purse. After a strange metallic snip, she dropped half of a silver credit card in Tony's outstretched hand.

"What's this?"

"The first half of your payment," said Lin. "Like we agreed."

"Are you from the Moon? I can't use this!"

Dean spread his arms. "Do we look German? To answer your second question, yes, of course you can use it, with a bit of plastic cement and the other half we'll give you in Cincinnati."

"You'll just cancel the card when we get there!"

Dean bowed. "You have my word as a fellow Native American––one-sixteenth Cherokee, San Jose Lodge 462."

"This is unbelievable," said Tony. "All right, fine. Here we come to the next fly in the sunscreen. I need everyone to help me pack the rest of the cocaine––I mean, baking powder––into the aircraft, so we can leave pronto. Aaaand ... only two of you can go."

"That's impossible," said Dean. "Why not all of us?"

"If you must know, Cherokee, it's because I can't fight off more than two people at once. These hands are deadly but not that deadly. Another serious concern is that you might lose your marbles and get 'sky sickness.' It's a condition that affects the white people when they have not flown above the clouds and seen the deepest blue of the sky spirits. Many round-eyes will jump through the windows to join the spirits, or even chew through galvanized steel doors. It has happened before, sadly."

Lin held up a hand. "Hello? I'm still not white."

"More importantly," said Tony, "The plane is packed to the brim with three tons of extremely valuable Columbian baking powder which absolutely has to go with me no matter how much you pay. Two passengers are all I can fit."

"Why does baking powder have to be flown by plane to Cincinnati?" asked Lin.

"The people of Ohio are very large and eat bread for every meal," said Tony. "They wear clothes made of bread and live in strange houses built of bread that didn't pass quality control."

"I really don't think that's true," said Dean. "Anyway, you could just ship it by truck."

Tony shook his head. "This is the finest Columbian baking powder, and so strong that it is, sadly, illegal. I, of course, am just a transporter and don't use the stuff. I know it must arrive fresh and with as little interference by the baking powder inspectors as possible. Soaring Dove will fly under their radar, so to speak. Also, literally."

Dean rubbed his chin. "Smuggling baking powder into Ohio ... it sounds dangerous."

"It's a living. Which two of you are going?"

Dean looked at his small traveling party: Lin, black hair in a bun and always prepared like an Eagle Scout, Fanta in a neck brace, flushed and sweaty from the escape, and Emerson, lovely in her scarlet wedding dress even though her hair was wet and probably crawling with Sea Monkeys. Dean thought back to the swim in the Great Salt Lake and her remark about a boy in West Virginia. Somehow he felt rejected.

Dean pointed at Lin. "I think that––"

"––you and the girl should go, of course." Lin pressed the other half of her credit card in his hand. "Take her and fly east. I've got another card. Fanta and I'll rent a car or something and meet up with you in West Virginia. It doesn't matter if we're late."

"But, Lin––"

"Don't worry, we can handle ourselves. I'm wearing my big-girl panties and so is Fanta. Especially Fanta. You have to speak at this conference, no matter what."

Dean hugged her. "Thank you, Lin. Remember to keep your receipts––I'm not made of money and expense forms have to be filled out properly."

All four sweated and strained to load the old B-25 bomber with heavy bricks of baking powder wrapped in black plastic and duct tape. Tony gave Dean a flight suit to wear over his boxers. The scarlet jumpsuit had "Tony" stitched above a chest pocket and "Tony's Sightseeing Tours" on the back.

As they taxied out of the hangar and onto the runway, Dean and Emerson waved at the tiny figure of Lin and the almost-tiny figure of Fanta. Dean realized that one of these people had helped him through almost every problem in his life during the last ten years, and he didn't know when he would see her again. The other could break him and any other man in half, but who's to say this Russian female bear wasn't as scared of Dean inside as he was of her? Any neutral observer, he thought. The twin-engine bomber roared into the wide Utah sky, and Dean felt something moist in his eyes, but it was probably just allergies. He hoped it wasn't sky sickness.

When the olive-green plane reached a stable cruising altitude Dean unbuckled his seat harness, intending to have a wander around the old bomber, but Emerson grabbed his hand with a look of such pitiful fear that he immediately sat down and put his arm around the pale-faced girl.

They wore the headsets Tony had given them which muffled some of the noise. Even so, the air whistling past the fuselage and the loud drone of the twin engines made conversation impossible, so Dean and Emerson passed the hours by writing messages to each other with a pencil and notepad Dean had found under a seat. Having exhausted various games of Hangman (which Dean won handily), Russian Hangman (which Dean lost handily), and Battleship, they moved into a relaxing pattern of drawing pictures and having the other person guess what it was. Dean had a talent for drawing women as long as they wore glasses and nothing else. He took quite a bit of time on a full-body sketch of Emerson, even though her beautiful brown eyes and the bridge of her perfect nose had never felt the weight of prescription lenses. Upon seeing the drawing, Emerson turned red and smiled.

At last they ran out of things to say and women to draw. Emerson rested her head on Dean's arm somewhere over Colorado, and the heavy drone of the engines lulled both to sleep.

Tracklist:

Losing My Religion – R.E.M.

Salsa Cubano – Mambo Companeros

Son de Baloy - Afro-Cuban All-Stars
1991

Dean's First Flight a.k.a. the Cuban Wife

He'd had an afternoon class and long drive across the state of Ohio, so Dean slept late the next morning. Saturdays at home were made for that. The bed in his room might have been old and lumpy, but it was a familiar old and lumpy.

After a shower and review of his college-issued planner, Dean's stomach threw kicks and punches in a furious hunger tantrum. As he walked down the stairs to the first floor, he heard a conversational murmur coming from the kitchen. It became incredibly important to determine whether these were Jehovah's Witnesses or even worse, girls of his age bracket, so Dean crouched in the shadows and waited.

"I think it's great you've stayed together through thick and thin," said Frenchie. "What's it been, Mrs. Cook––twenty years?"

"Twenty-one," said Dean's mother. "What do you mean, through thick and thin?"

After a pause, Dean heard a chair squeak. "The whole cross-dressing thing. It was your personal decision––I'm not judging."

"Of course not, you little turnip. If I thought you were I'd break your teeth out with a hammer. This one, as a matter of fact."

"Uh, right," said Frenchie. "What I meant was, it must be hard with all the pressure and negativity from everyone."

"Not really," said Billie. "I take drugs."

Something smashed delicately.

"Sorry! I'm so sorry," said Frenchie.

Billie groaned. "Clean it up, then. I never liked that cup anyway. It was so beautiful that it made all the other cups look like trash."

Frenchie laughed. "Ironic that it's the one in the trash now."

"What did you say?"

"Nothing. I'll pay to replace it, I promise."

"Don't be such a girl. I was joking about the cup."

"What was this about the ... ah ... drugs?"

"I'm not talking about smack or pot," said Billie. "I mean testosterone and male hormone supplements. Frank dumps them in my coffee and thinks he's putting one over on me. For a while, yeah, but when the muscles and hair started to show, I got suspicious. I turned over one or two tables, maybe had a few fistfights in the hair salon, and put two and two together."

"When did you find out?"

"Two years ago."

"And you're still with Frank?"

"You mean because of the drugs? Hell, I love the stuff. I haven't told him because what would be the point? He takes his girly pills, and I let him think I don't know about mine."

Dean stepped into the kitchen. "Morning, Mom. Hello, Frenchie."

"Hey, Dean. How's college life? Did you finally get one? A life, that is."

"No," said Dean. "I finally changed my major, though."

Billie chopped fresh broccoli at the counter. "Your father still won't come out of the garage."

"I'd think he'd understand how hard it is to know what to do with the rest of your life," said Dean. "But that's just me, a silly kid who doesn't like wearing makeup."

"Maybe I should be going," said Frenchie.

Billie cracked the knife on the cutting board. "You're upsetting your guest, Dean. Try to be pleasant."

"Sorry, Frenchie."

"No problem. I honestly have to be going, Mrs. Cook. The reason why I came over is, I wanted to apologize to Dean for Labor Day. I'm sorry––the girls told me they were exchange students."

"From Greenland? Have you ever heard of that? Anyone could have seen they were hookers. Sorry, Mom––I meant adult entertainers."

Billie snorted. "Phil Donahue is an adult entertainer. Hookers are hookers."

"In any case," said Frenchie. "I know that I paid for the cleanup and new carpets but I still don't feel that was enough, given the number of deputies that tromped through the house threatening everyone's life and delicate property. My family has a house in Key West, and I'd like Dean to come down with me for a weekend."

"Your twentieth birthday is coming up, and that would be a great present," said Billie. "Make your mother proud and bring back a sun-tanned Florida girl. Something in a size four."

"Wow! Thanks, Frenchie. I don't know what to say."

" 'Yes' would be a start," said Frenchie.

"Yes," said Dean.

HE KNOCKED ON the door to the garage.

"Come in," murmured his father.

The interior of the garage was a study of dissimilar themes. A dust-covered 1947 Indian Chief motorcycle stood in one half, surrounded by workbenches and walls loaded with tools. Cardboard boxes and racks of women's clothing packed the other side. Frank Cook sat at a lighted dressing table, surrounded by the racks of clothing like a Parisian madame after fashion week.

Dean's father looked up from a copy of People Magazine, his face covered in a brilliant substance that for all the world looked like cake frosting. He wore a blue kimono, and his hair was pinned up and filled with old-style heated curlers, the plastic nubby ones with metal inside and a base station.

"Oh. It's you," he said, and turned the magazine pages with a furious snap.

"Dad, I'm sorry I didn't tell you earlier."

"What? That you gave up your dream of being a doctor? That's not really worth mentioning."

"I couldn't pass the classes! Chemistry, biology, you name it, and I'm horrible at it," said Dean.

"That's not an excuse. You could have hired tutors."

"I did, and nothing worked."

Frank dropped the magazine on the dressing table with a sigh and stood up. "So you're a communications major now? How can a person earn a living with that?"

Dean shrugged. "By communicating."

"Somehow Steve Dubrowski isn't having problems, and he's a freshman in an even harder program––electrical engineering. He's also started a computer repair business out of his dorm room. You could do that, too, if you were motivated."

"Dad, I'm not Steve Dubrowski. I'll never be him."

Frank sighed and abandoned the magazine on his dressing table with a careless plop. He stood up and gave Dean a wide-armed hug. "Sorry for acting like that, son. I can be very dramatic when it comes to handling news. Or change. Ouch! Speaking of that, watch the implants. They're still painful."

"Sorry, Dad."

"You'll be in my shoes someday, when you have kids," said Frank. "Every girl becomes her mother and every boy his father. Or is it the other way around?"

"Dad, I'm never, ever wearing a dress again, if that's where you're going."

"I didn't say a word! But son, it really is a shame. You've got my hair and your mother's legs and could really pull it off."

FRENCHIE HAD A SUDDEN ATTACK of shin splints the following week and gave Mike his ticket. Dean was happy to have his best friend along for the trip, but still didn't know what a shin splint was, and nobody could tell him.

He swayed through the aisle of the cruising 737 and dropped into the seat next to a young man in a stubbly black crew cut and Ocean Pacific t-shirt.

"You took forever that time," said Mike. "People are starting to look cross-eyed and stuff, like you're a secret agent or teenage detective. 'Dean Cook and the Mystery of the In-Flight Toilet.' "

Dean groaned and leaned his head against the folding tray. "Everything's trying to come out from both ends."

"Disgusting! I'd keep that information private, if I were you. Sharing is definitely not caring in this case."

"I'd twist your neck off if I didn't need to go back to the toilet. You're the one who told me to donate blood!"

"Sure, it's all my fault," said Mike. "I'm the guy who needed to know his blood type just in case there was a crash on his first plane ride."

"I can't stand it ... if my intestines come out, I'm wrapping them around your neck."

"It was probably the airline food. I told you not to eat it."

"You had some!"

"I've got a stomach of iron to go along with my heart of gold. Don't worry, pale and sweaty friend. Think of all the skinny Florida girls in bikinis and you'll feel better."

"I couldn't feel worse," said Dean.

He left for the toilet and returned a moment later.

"That was quick," said Mike.

Dean spread his arms. "There's some weirdo in front of the bathroom. He told me to sit back down."

"Flight attendant is what we call them. Possibly a very masculine one in pants?"

"But he wasn't wearing a uniform. Look, here he comes."

A man in a tan corduroy blazer and fierce black mustache moved up the aisle, followed by three dark-haired men and a woman. All five stared at the other passengers with quick, serious eyes.

"He's not even using the bathroom," said Mike.

Dean half-turned in his seat and watched the group walk up the aisle. The man in the blazer stopped beside his seat.

"You there," he said with a thick accent.

Dean glanced left and right. "Um ... yeah?"

The man pointed a finger with a badly trimmed nail at Dean's nose. "Stay in seat and stop being trouble."

"Okay, sure."

The man nodded, and continued with the other four toward the front of the plane.

Dean rubbed his face. "What is he, some kind of undercover air police? I didn't use that much toilet paper. Okay, maybe I did."

"Bam! You got busted by the T.P. Gestapo," said Mike. "Enjoy your time in the T.P. gulag––you only get one square per day. I'd trade mine for drugs."

"You would, wouldn't you? I'd save mine for a rainy day."

Mike grinned. "When it rains, it pours."

A scream came from the front of the plane, along with smacks, grunts, and a clatter of metal. Dean couldn't see anything, because people in front of him stood up, just like that thing that happens at kindergarten graduations.

"That could have been you," said Mike. "Good thing you got a warning instead."

Dean rubbed sweat from his forehead. "I really, really have to go to the bathroom."

"Do it, big man. Just don't scream like a girl when they tackle you."

The audio system crackled and the voice of corduroy-blazer man spoke in accented English.

"Ladies and gentlemen, please remain calm. Sit down and stay in your seats. We are in control now. Do everything we say and nobody will be hurt, apart from those who have already been hurt. They have been hurt, we can all agree that is a fact, but that hurt is now in the past. Let us move on with a relationship that does not involve hurt."

Mike shook his head. "Sounds like they're really serious. Toilet paper must cost a mint these days."

"Boiling oil is about to burst out of my bowels," said Dean. "Can you stop with the jokes?"

"Yes, I should be more helpful. I'll make a diaper out of the SkyMall catalog. Better yet, I'll hold the vomit bag and you can squat over it."

Dean leaned back and groaned. "I should have stayed at home."

"Maybe we can bribe these guys. They work for the government after all."

Mike waved at a mustachioed man. The grim-faced figure pulled a gun from his jacket and approached through the aisle.

"Excuse me," said Mike.

He waved a twenty-dollar bill. When the gunman grabbed it, Mike leaned forward with a hand cupped beside his mouth, as if national secrets were about to be confided.

"My friend really has to go to the bathroom," he whispered.

The gunman sneered. "Give me your wallet. Your friend's, too."

"As long as you promise to give it back," said Mike. "It's where I keep all my money."

In the gunman's breath Dean smelled rotten meat and tomatoes. "Of course," said the gunman. "All little princesses will get their little princess wallets back when we land in little princess island."

Dean handed over his wallet and wandered down the aisle toward the bathroom. The gunman followed and gave him a helpful shove every now and then. He even held the folding door open, but when Dean tried to close it the gunman squeezed inside.

"No, little man," said the gunman. "You are not tricking me by coming in here alone. I must watch you for safety."

"Really? I swear I won't use it that much. You can trust me."

The gunman closed the folding door. "Do not argue. I will beat you senseless."

Dean would have gulped or sighed or expressed his discomfort in a dramatic way, but his bowels were barely holding back the burning lava. He pulled down his pants and sat on the toilet a nanosecond before the proverbial molten rock burst out in a flatulent explosion to rival Mount Pinatubo. This in turn brought a volcanic explosion of curses from the gunman, who twisted and turned in an attempt to find the door handle, his rear squishing against Dean's head. He burst into the aisle and scrambled away on his hands and knees, an act of pure survival which unfortunately exposed Dean and the toxic atmosphere of the toilet to a dozen passengers before he could close the door.

The rest of the flight took longer than Dean expected. To be fair, his sense of time was skewed by constant pain in his midsection, threats from the undercover toilet police, and repeated visits to the tiny bathroom.

"I thought Miami would have more buildings," said Mike, as palm trees sped by the plane's tiny window.

"Urgh," replied Dean, his cheek on the folding tray.

The wheels bounced once, and the aircraft touched down. White, tin-roofed buildings grew like mushrooms in the overgrown, waist-high grass and wide fields of leafy palms.

"Ladies and gentlepeoples," said Corduroy Jacket's voice. "Welcome to Cuba."

Mike slapped his armrest hard. "That bastard Frenchie! He said nothing about a connecting flight!"

THE PASSENGERS WERE ESCORTED from the plane and into rusty white buses by brusque soldiers in olive green who broke every rule of gun safety. The heat and humidity were unbearable, but even worse were the unkind comments from the driver. Dean had taken Spanish in high school, after a disturbing incident his first day in French class that involved the pretty and vivacious teacher and a dozen éclairs that Dean had honestly not known were well past the expiration date.

The bus bounced through potholes for what seemed like hours, and Dean was forced to use the pocket of his thankfully waterproof jacket as a urinal.

The convoy approached a collection of large buildings covered in green-painted tin sheeting and stopped at last. An officer in a high-peaked cap and gold braid stepped inside. He walked slowly through the aisle, scanning the passengers like a housewife in the frozen meat section the day before Thanksgiving. The officer pinned a gold star to the clothing of various young men and women. When he passed through the aisle where Dean and Mike sat, only Mike received a star. Oblivious to the world, Dean had curled up on the floor with his jacket as a blanket.

"I'm not wearing this," whispered a nearby blonde woman to her companion. "It's probably a star of rape or slavery or something."

She pulled the gold symbol from her blouse and slapped it on Dean's shoulder. Only seconds later another group of very cross soldiers came through the bus and roughly pulled all gold-starred passengers outside.

The soldiers herded the young people through a maze of chain-link fences lined with a horde of cheering, brown Cuban people. Mike put an arm around Dean and helped him stumble through the maze and onto the carefully watered grass of a soccer field. A vast, murmuring crowd filled all four sides of the stands. As the passengers filed onto the field, the hum of voices grew louder and vibrated the air like a transformer about to explode.

Soldiers with assault rifles lined the perimeter of the field, grim of face and straight of posture. A row of men in white trousers and women in white dresses with red sashes faced Mike and Dean and the other gold-starred passengers.

"Stand up straight," said Mike. "You don't want to look like a hunchback if we're going to be shot."

"I don't want to be shot," groaned Dean.

A man in a gray suit climbed to a podium behind the line of white-clad men and women. He raised his arms, and the soldiers fired their rifles into the blue sky. This silenced the crowd in a matter of nanoseconds.

"Sons and daughters of Cuba," he intoned in Spanish. "From the Great Oppressor to the north we receive a gift in the shape of a jet aircraft filled with people and leather purses and bags of tiny pretzels. Those, by the way, are the only things you should eat on an airplane. The pretzels, not the purses."

The crowd applauded.

"Today we have a fantastic set of entertainments and it's all because of me, your dear leader. First, a wedding, where the healthiest of the northern oppressors are welcomed into our dear family like fuzzy little kittens. The others are not of childbearing age and will be sent home, like old cats that are only good for making glue, casserole, or glue casserole. After the wedding follows the traditional Cuban marriage games. The girl and boy who win these games will be awarded a flat in Havana and jobs at the sparkling jewel of our socialist utopia: Women's Underwear Factory No. 2. Last but not least on the day's program is music. Coming to us straight from Branson is the traveling production of Seven Brides for Seven Brothers starring Bruce Campbell and Queen Latifah!"

The crowd exploded into joyous screams, throwing hats and undergarments onto the field until the soldiers fired off another salvo.

"In a line before me, you see the most eligible young men and women from Tobacco Farm 643, Swisher Sweets Division. They are the cream of the crop in appearance, intelligence, and scholarship of the works of Karl Marx and Richard Simmons, but are the worst at becoming married in time to avoid this type of public humiliation."

"Across from them stand the most eligible passengers from the northern oppressor's aircraft. Many look spotty and nervous, but with enough contemplation of socialist principles and time in the tobacco fields, they will be identical to any son and daughter of the revolution!"

Cheers of the crowd were silenced by rifle shots.

"The marriage games will now commence," said the speaker. "Young workers of Tobacco Farm 643, you have sixty seconds to choose a partner for the rest of your life." The speaker looked at his watch. "On my mark ... wait a second ... too late, it's going around again. Anyone have gum? Not too long now ... and GO!"

The line of white-clad workers sprinted toward Mike and Dean like cheetahs or puma or some other animal you can imagine that is really hungry and eats meat and thinks you are meat.

They thundered forward, kicking and pushing each other in eagerness to pick the best-looking and tallest of the passengers. Next to Dean, a stocky brunette tackled Mike and sat on his chest, slapping away the hands of several other girls. Even in the midst of his painful bowel sickness, Dean thought it was like being a human Beanie Baby on Cuban Black Friday. Unfortunately for Dean, he seemed to be the Beanie Baby nobody wanted. He lay on the grass in a fetal position; pale, nauseous, and completely unmolested by the arm-twisting, jaw-punching women who were hell-bent on getting a nice marriage partner.

A calloused, warm hand touched his arm.

"I claim this one," said a girl in Spanish. "He is sickly, but that is almost cute in a dead-chipmunk kind of way."

A weight pushed on his legs and Dean looked into the brown eyes of a young woman. The corners of her mouth were turned up in a mischievous smile. Her skin was tanned a light bronze, as if she had spent too much time outside, and her black hair was twisted into a pair of tight braids.

"Hola," said Dean. "Qué pasa?"

"This one speaks," said the girl in Spanish. "Wow, the other chicks overlooked a real gem! He's the best of all."

"Thank you," said Dean. "I'm happy to fire your crotch."

"What?"

"I mean ... you're a powerful woman."

"Thanks, I guess," said the girl.

A volley of rifles boomed. She helped Dean to his feet and slid her arm behind his waist.

"Now that your partner for life has been chosen," said the speaker, "we will begin."

An older man in a green suit stepped up to the podium and murmured in the speaker's ear.

"What is it, Antonio? Don't whisper, just tell me. I know there are two boys left over. Of course they have to marry each other, Antonio. This isn't some backwater island of banana mashing we are living in. They'll be forced to love each other, despite their differences and previous sexual preference, which was probably forced on them by society in the first place. Don't look at me like that! Un momento, ladies and gentlemen."

Mike nudged Dean with an elbow. "What just happened? I can't understand anything these people are saying."

"We're getting married to these girls," whispered Dean.

"Sweet," said Mike, a huge grin on his face. "I didn't even have to buy dinner and a movie."

Dean covered his mouth. "Urgh ... Don't talk about food."

"You do not look so well," said the girl with two braids. "Drink this."

She handed Dean a small white bottle.

"Qué es esto?" asked Dean.

The girl laughed. "You speak Spanish so funny, like a little pig. It is medicine for stomach. See? We are both alike in this problem."

Dean took a few gulps of cherry-flavored liquid from the bottle and immediately felt better.

Shots cracked the air and the stadium became quiet.

"Now that the boy problem has been settled," said the speaker, "we will continue with the marriage ceremony. All twenty couples, hold hands please. You begin a new chapter in your lives, one that I hope will contain more little babies for the socialist utopia of Cuba. Do not shirk your duty. Remember that if a woman is not pregnant, it is because she is a bad person, or a man in disguise. In the name of the glorious People's Republic of Cuba, I declare you husbands and wives. Not collectively husbands and wives––that would be madness––but one husband to one wife only."

The crowd cheered, and the girl who'd claimed him kissed Dean on the cheek.

"And now for the marriage games," said the speaker. "As I mentioned before and you should not have forgotten, the winners will receive prime underwear factory jobs and a freshly disinfected apartment. The first event will be Salsa Cubana!"

The speaker clapped his hands. A throng of soldiers slapped paper numbers on the backs of the newlyweds, and a guitar and drum rhythm began to play through the stadium speakers. The couples spread out on the field and began to dance.

"Party time," said the tanned girl.

She faced Dean and held both of his hands while twisting her hips and moving her feet to the music.

"I don't know how to do this," said Dean.

"It is easy for the man," said the girl. "Like real life, just stand there and let the woman do all the work."

Dean followed as best he could, but the steps were strange and the girl quick with her movements.

"I don't even know who you are," he said. "My name's Dean."

"Marta," said the girl. "Dance harder!"

After an exhausting ten minutes, the music came to a stop.

"Judges, mark your scores," said the speaker. "By judges, I mean people hand-picked or related to me. Now, for the second event, one meant to reflect the normal progression of romantic life. After the first dance comes ... The First Date!"

A dozen rusted Chevy vans that looked as if they had been used in a 1977 kidnapping and abandoned since then drove onto the field, one for each couple. Marta pulled Dean toward the nearest one and climbed into the back. Soldiers slammed the rear doors shut.

Dean spread his hands. "What now?"

Marta lay on the floor of the van and pushed her feet against the inside wall. "Get down here and do it with me."

"I don't know you that well," said Dean. "Can't we just talk?"

"No, you silly goat––we have to jiggle the van!"

Dean lay next to her and pressed his shoes against the opposite wall. They alternated kicks and rocked the van back and forth like a tower of Jell–O.

"We're going to win," Marta shouted over the creak of the van's suspension. "I am the strongest and smartest of all the girls at Tobacco Farm No. 643."

After five minutes someone banged on the side of the van. Marta helped Dean climb out of the back, since his legs now had as much strength left as the previously mentioned tower of Jell-O and wobbled just as much.

"Event number three," said the speaker. "A tradition in the socialist paradise of Cuba where everything is plentiful––The Eating Contest!"

Soldiers double-timed across the field with long tables and boxes of food. The couples were separated: men on one side of the tables, women on the other. A soldier slammed down a plate of steaming hot dogs with buns in front of Marta and a bowl of oysters before Dean.

Dean wiped his sweating forehead. "If you thought I was sick before, wait until those oysters slide down my gullet. I almost threw up, just saying that."

"Don't worry," said Marta. "I will eat everything. I have only chewed on tobacco stems for three days."

A rifle shot echoed through the stadium and the contest began. Marta's hands and mouth flashed into action. She had stuffed six hot dogs and the bowl of oysters into her mouth in only a few minutes, while the plates of the other couples were still half-full.

"See? We will definitely be the winning couple," she said. Unfortunately, her mouth was full of oysters, so what erupted was, "Smesh mog meesh squish klip kloo."

Dean covered his eyes. "Please don't do that."

The next two events were baby-related. First, the young women had to lay on their backs, knees spread, and throw a ten-pound infant doll as far as possible to the husband. Next, the couple were given a pair of the heavy dolls and a twenty-pound sack of flour and had to struggle through a maze of gravel, barbed wire, and seven-foot high walls. The announcer claimed this was a simulation of parenting skills, but Dean felt this was inaccurate unless you were a parent trying to escape from Sobibor.

Mike and his partner seemed to be doing very well in the competition, but Marta repeatedly claimed that she and Dean would be the winners.

"Only one more event until the Cuban premiere of Seven Brides for Seven Brothers," said the gray-suited speaker, and the crowd erupted in frantic cheers. "Calm yourselves, socialist comrades!"

After a volley of shots he continued. "As the years of married life go on, many couples become bored and only a stint at a nudist colony or other strange practices will rekindle the fire of that first kiss and feel-up session. For this competition, the husbands and wives will strip and exchange clothing!"

Marta touched Dean's shoulder. "You suddenly look very white, my dearest. Do you need medicine again?"

"I can't do this," said Dean. "I just can't."

"Why not?"

"Very bad memories. Let's just say it's happened before, and leave it at that."

Marta grabbed the front of his shirt, tears in her eyes. "If you don't wear my clothes we'll lose!"

"In front of everyone?"

"You should not be ashamed. You are not the one with entire villages of relatives watching her. If your underwear is not clean, I do not care."

"It's clean, I just––"

A shot rang out and two dozen newlyweds sprang into action. Marta reached down and with one swift motion pulled her dress over her head, revealing a plain white bra and panties. As Dean fumbled with the buttons of his shirt, she removed her shoes and undergarments. Stark naked, she helped him with his trousers.

"I don't think I can even fit in your clothes," he whispered.

"It doesn't matter! Just wear it."

Dean turned away from the nearby soldier who had the lens of a video camera literally shoved into Dean's face. With Marta's help, he pulled on her constricting and extremely tight underwear. He had barely squeezed his head through the neck of Marta's dress when a shot went off and the crowd cheered. In the middle of the line of half-dressed newlyweds, Mike and his new bride were jumping up and down, Mike looking ridiculous in the girl's white outfit and red sash.

"Ah, well," said Marta, stepping out of Dean's trousers, "It is very hard to practice these types of things."

After swapping back into their original clothes, the couples lined up again in the middle of the field.

"Now that the scores have been added together," said the gray-suited speaker, "I present to you the winner of the marriage games: couple number eight!"

Mike's Cuban wife screamed and hugged him. They linked arms and waved madly at the crowd.

"Now go away you lovebirds, so we can start the show," said the speaker.

As the couples walked off the field, Dean found Mike and shook his hand.

"Congratulations, buddy."

Mike shrugged. "Did we win? I guess we did. It's hard to tell what's going on, since I don't speak any Cuban. Yudith seems very happy. At least I think her name is Yudith. It's probably not 'Crackie Smackdoodle,' which is what I thought it was at first. Can you ask her?"

Dean caught up to Marta. The young woman trudged across the soccer field, her shoulders slumped and eyes on the ground.

"I'm sorry we lost," he said. "It was all my fault."

"No, it is fine," said Marta. "As my father always says, if life brings you an airplane full of American husbands, you have to make American-husband lemonade."

They were given front-row seats for the musical and Dean enjoyed it immensely, clapping madly at the end of every number. This was the first time he'd sat in the front row of any group of humans, apart from every class in school. Queen Latifah's bored expression and tired, floppy gestures, however, made Dean wish that she cared just a little bit more about the source material. After the performance and a celebratory banquet, the entire group of newlyweds were herded onto a bus for transport back to Tobacco Farm No. 643, Swisher Sweets Division.

"I guess this is it," said Mike, at the door of the bus. "We're not going with you. They're taking us to that new apartment in Havana."

"It's newly disinfected, not new," said Dean. "You'll see the difference."

"Don't spit in my Cheerios, dude. I've had more fun today that I can remember, and Yudith Crackie née Smackdoodle is a beautiful girl."

"You're not seriously thinking of staying, are you? The embassy is going to ransom us or whatever they do with hijacked Americans. Although, if those marriage games were televised, it might be better to stay."

"I'm definitely staying," said Mike. "What kind of stupid life did I have back in Ohio, going to college to be a physical therapist? At home I'm just another white guy––here I'm a superhero, the toy every girl wants for Christmas. So many toys, and so many girls. Sorry, friend, but I won't go back. I can't go back."

A soldier pushed them apart and hustled Dean onto the bus. Marta looked up with a smile as he sat on the cracked vinyl next to her.

"I half-expected you to run away from me."

"Me? I wouldn't do that," said Dean. "Unless, of course, I was planning to do that, which I'm not. I'm not really good at anything, especially things involving escape. I couldn't even get out of taking a shower after gym class."

"You're a funny person, that is what you are good at. I think we will have fun together."

Dean nodded. "If you say so. I don't know if I can work in a tobacco factory the rest of my life."

"Rest of life is not so bad," said Marta. "In Cuba, our lives are very short."

Dean laughed and poked her in the shoulder. "Now who's the funny one?"

"It's the truth!"

The engine of the bus rumbled and the vehicle began to follow the other buses along the broken asphalt. Dean watched the lights flash across the crowds walking beside the road.

"I've been thinking about that guy in the gray suit," he said.

"El Presidente."

"I think that would be a great thing to do with my life."

"Of course it seems amazing," said Marta. "But there are many stresses and daily challenges when you are the leader of a great country like Cuba. These problems have given our Dear Leader a terrible sleeping disorder of the nerves. It is said he cannot relax at night unless his bed has five women."

"I don't mean becoming the president of Cuba. I mean speaking in front of so many people, with all of them hanging on your every word."

Marta nodded. "As El Presidente says, we must hang on his words or hang from the coconut trees."

"If I could share all the crazy things that have happened to me, maybe I can help people change their lives," said Dean. "Avoid mistakes by listening to mine. Avoid tragedy by understanding mine."

Marta nodded sleepily and squeezed closer to Dean, her head resting on his shoulder. She dozed off during the long, bouncing drive, while Dean stared out the window, his mind going over the glittering prospect of factory work and nicotine-stained fingers.

Night had fallen by the time the bus arrived at a two-story apartment building, and Dean followed Marta up the stairs to a sparsely furnished room with attached shower and bath. A bed covered in a blue-patterned quilt stood in the corner.

As swiftly as before, Marta stripped off every article of clothing and slid under the quilt.

Dean looked around the room. "I ... um, where should I sleep?"

"With me, silly goat."

"But you're naked."

"I always sleep like that. Should I change just because we are married?"

Dean removed his shoes and trousers, but kept on his t-shirt and boxer shorts. He slid under the quilt cautiously, as if Marta were a block of plutonium instead of an attractive young woman bereft of clothing.

"Once again you're a silly goat," she said with a pout. "I've already seen you naked."

"I always sleep like this," said Dean. "Should I change just because we're married?"

Marta pointed her chin at the ceiling and laughed boisterously. She put her arms around Dean's neck and kissed him hard on the mouth.

Dean woke in the small hours of the morning. A white square of moonlight from the window framed the pillow and glowed over Marta's long, undone hair. Dean's arm lay across the soft skin of her abdomen, and he had no desire to move it. He watched Marta's peaceful, sleeping face for a long time.

A girl screamed somewhere in the building and boots stampeded in the corridor. The door splintered apart and lights blinded Dean and the now-awake Marta.

"Are you American?" asked a gruff voice in English.

"Yes, of course," said Dean. "What's this about?"

"We've got another Baby Bear," whispered the bright light to someone else. "Let's go, buddy. Cavalry's here."

"I'm not going anywhere," said Dean.

"Baby Bear is stubborn, repeat, Baby Bear is stubborn," whispered the voice. Dean's eyes had adjusted, and he saw a man in a helmet and goggles, dressed completely in black. He held an assault rifle with flashlight attachment.

Dean raised his voice. "I said I don't want to go."

"Copy that, giving him porridge," whispered the black-clad figure.

He stepped into the room and sprayed a sharp-smelling gas in Dean's face. Marta screamed, and the world spun into a numb whirlpool of blackness.

Dean woke hours or minutes later in the red-lit interior of a large aircraft. Engine noise and the roar of air friction vibrated everything including the steel floor, the fuselage, and the fillings in Dean's teeth. The young Americans who'd been part of the marriage games surrounded Dean. Some slept, covered with blankets, while others slumped against the curved walls of the fuselage, eyes glazed like smackheads after the first of the month.

His legs tingling and still mostly numb, Dean struggled to his feet. He followed the sound of male voices to the front of the plane, where a dozen soldiers in sleek black uniforms with olive green American flags on the shoulders joked and chatted. One tanned soldier with a shaved head finally noticed Dean, and raised his voice over the drone of the plane's engines.

"Sit down, son. You've had a rough night."

"That wasn't very nice of you," shouted Dean. "Breaking into my room on my wedding night!"

"My apologies. We'll leave you in Cuba next time. By the way, we're still searching for a guy called Mike Shafer. Do you have any idea where they took him?"

Dean ran his tongue over his front teeth. "You can stop looking. Mike was shot dead right in front of me."

"Too bad," said the soldier. "Also, dude, pick up the clue phone, because you're completely naked."

Tracklist:

Knockin' On Heaven's Door – Bryan Ferry

Begin the Beguine – Artie Shaw & His Orchestra

Lone Red-Tailed Hawk – Allen Bruce Ray
14

Duke Konstantin Nichego dreamed. The images that passed through his slumbering mind were shocking and indecent, the furthest from anything found in a normal and healthy psyche, unless, of course, the person reading this is also a power-mad Russian mafia boss with a fetish for women's hosiery, in which case the dreams were perfectly acceptable. He dreamed of being a slim foot of size seven (women's), of being washed, powdered, and manicured, of sliding into the thick cotton of an athletic sock, ready for a jog through the park, a sweaty yoga session, or a lazy morning spent trying on silk stockings and watching HSN.

It was not meant to be, however, because the dream girl stubbed her silly toe on a doorjamb. Duke Nichego gasped, suddenly awake and his head throbbing in pain.

Everything was as pitch black as the inside of the Devil's underpants and a soft material pressed on his face and body. Given the subject of his recent dream, this confused the Duke more than a little. He would have fallen asleep again if not for the pain coming from a large bump on the back of his head.

The Duke flailed his arms and struck hard, unyielding surfaces on all sides. He began to panic, imagining that he'd been buried alive. The fearsome mob boss kicked, cursed, and screamed at the top of his voice.

After long effort that produced only bruises and a ringing in his ears, the Duke gave up. Tears rolled from his eyes, something that should happen to a grown man only at the end of Star Trek II, or when he's been told that Pauley Shore is still alive.

"Please, God," he whispered. "I promise to be a good person! I'll give all my money to widows and orphans! I'll go to church and live a simple life, maybe as an insurance salesman or manager for a local progressive-rock band!"

A voice spoke faintly in the dark, as if filtered through the unknowable thickness of Satan's unmentionables.

"No more socks."

Nichego gritted his teeth and kicked against the sides of his coffin, redoubling his efforts. He quickly exhausted what little strength was left.

"Very well, Mister God," he said. "I'll return the socks I stole from women. If they are in prison it'll be easy. Not so much if they are hiding or somehow drive boat to Alaska."

Covered in the strange shroud and surrounded on all sides by silent walls, he felt and heard the beating of his heart.

"What else, Mister God?"

"Give your driver a raise of twenty-thousand rubles and a house and Diner's Club."

Metal squealed and the cloth was pulled from Nichego's face.

"That is good joke, yes?" said Vassily.

Nichego squinted against the bright light. "It is such good joke I will use it for your tombstone. Possibly today."

Vassily pulled white nylon material off Nichego and helped him out of a sturdy wooden crate.

"This is parachute cloth," said Nichego. "I was in Soviet Air Force––I know parachute cloth."

"You are correct, as always," said Vassily. He waved at the inside of a wide hangar lined with boxes and machine tools. The building was empty of aircraft apart from an old helicopter, upon which "Tony's Sightseeing Tours" had been painted in flamboyant, cursive script.

Nichego pointed to an open box identical to the one he'd just escaped, also filled with white parachute cloth.

"How did you get out?"

Vassily shrugged. "They made mistake and forgot to lock my box. From his speech, the man-lady in the white coat was in a hurry."

"Dean's father?"

Vassily nodded. "I heard them talking. It is possible they flew airplane to Cincinnati, Ohio, but hearing is difficult when locked in box and wrapped in parachute."

Nichego touched the bump on the back of his head. "We must leave in airplane, too, because I have score to settle with this older man-lady. Also with tiny gnome who is Dean's mother, nerd-boy Chip, and one other person."

"Who is that?"

Nichego sneered. "Dean Cook."

A HEAVY JOLT woke Dean from his sleep. He watched concrete runway and extremely green farmland pass the bomber's window at high speed.

Dean climbed through the access tunnel to the cockpit.

"Why are we landing?"

"Because Soaring Dove needs to eat," said Tony.

"What does that even mean?"

Tony tapped a dial on the instrument panel. "We need to refuel, that's what it means."

The Native American pilot navigated the large bomber through the taxiway and stopped away from the scattered airport buildings near a large cylinder marked "Rob's Airport Services." The propellers of the twin engines sputtered and slowed to a stop.

Dean helped Emerson climb from the bottom hatch of the plane and stretched his arms and legs. Tony had left the plane like a scalded cat, and now had his arm inside a service panel of the starboard engine.

"Where are we?" asked Emerson.

"Kearney, Nebraska," said Tony. "Just filling up the tanks. We should make it to Ohio around dark."

Dean looked up at the wing and frowned. "Flying at night is okay?"

"Perfectly fine. I prefer to fly IFR."

"The what?"

"Indian Flight Rules," said Tony, and pulled his grease-stained arm out of the engine. "There's no reason to stand around like a couple of deer on the highway. Why don't you walk to the canteen and get me a sandwich?"

"Where is it?"

"It's the olive green Quonset hut. You know what a Quonset hut is, don't you?" Tony pointed down the tarmac. "The green building that looks like half an oil drum in the ground. Right there. No, not there––use the eyes Wisaka gave you, man!"

"I see it."

"Good. Just don't take too long. I think we're being followed."

"What? People get followed in dark alleys and Walmart parking lots, not in the sky. You can just look back and there's the other plane."

Tony shook his head. "The sky is a living thing, full of other living things. You are only one-sixteenth Cherokee, Dean Cook, and certainly not a pilot. You cannot sense the balance of energy. Clouds tell me what weather is ahead and flocks of birds show where the airstream is strong. By the smell of the air I know what mixture to set my fuel, and the sun shows me the way to travel."

"Really?"

"Yes, really," said Tony. "Also, I heard them on the radio."

THE TARMAC SHIMMERED in the noonday sun. A breeze picked up earth from a plowed field and spun dust devils across the runway. Dean wiped grit from his eyes, as he and Emerson walked across the airport to the rounded buildings.

"You keep looking at the sky," said Emerson.

"I have a bad feeling that my father and Steve Dubrowski are still following us."

"What a strange family. Just meet with your father––"

"You don't know what you're talking about! Sorry ... When I was seventeen, I realized my family is not 'normal' in any sense of the word. Even if they didn't have a few peculiar habits, there's still the birthday curse hanging over us. Also, Steve Dubrowski."

"Is he your brother?"

"My father treats him like the son he never had, but no, we're not brothers," said Dean. "Steve was the perfect child who grew into the perfect man, according to my father. He owns a start-up in Silicon Valley, season tickets for the Giants, and a Corvette he restored after Liam Neeson drove it through a supermarket. He's a black belt in kung fu, a licensed pilot, and speaks Chinese and Japanese. My father and he are literally bosom buddies. When my parents moved to California ten years ago, Steve packed up and joined them."

"He sounds very good," said Emerson.

"I'm sure he does, and that's why it's hard to impress your father with a first draft of an unpublishable book when he's spending all his time at Steve Dubrowski's Japanese estate in the Los Altos hills."

Emerson linked arms with Dean. "I know one thing this Steve does not have."

"What?"

Emerson hopped a few inches. "A beautiful wife from Kamchatka!"

"That's true," said Dean sadly. "But you're a paper wife, and soon we'll have a paper divorce. Which reminds me of the only stupid decision Steve Dubrowski has ever made in his life."

"Not visiting Kamchatka?"

Dean shook his head. "Marrying my sister."

A dozen old fighter planes were parked outside a green building shaped like half a barrel buried length-wise in the earth. For Emerson's benefit, Dean pointed out a P-51 Mustang, a Marine Corps F4U Corsair, a P-40 Warhawk, a twin-engine P-38 Lightning, a Messerschmitt Bf109, and even a Japanese Zero.

"Must be an air show in town," he said.

"This does not look like restaurant," said Emerson, a hand on her hip. "It looks like shop in prison."

Dean waved at the entrance door. "That sign says, 'Kelly's Kanteen.' It's an old word for a place to eat."

Like a gentleman, he held open the squealing metal door for Emerson, but she stopped in her tracks and squinted at him.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"Ladies first."

"I thought you LIKE liked me! In Kamchatka a man always enters a building first, so he can receive bullet or fight with sock thief."

Dean shrugged. "Okay, then."

The interior was a sweaty haze of smoke and male conversation. Old men in faded green and blue military uniforms sat around round wooden tables, laughing and 'carrying-on' with loud assertions of overpowering fact. Posters of aircraft in muted colors lined the walls, along with flags of various nations and black-and-white photos of men in flying gear or touching the side of a plane. An old tune from the era of big bands and wide lapels played from an ancient phonograph on the bar.

A brisk wind slammed the door with a loud bang. Conversation stopped as twenty pairs of eyes turned to the new couple: Dean in a flight suit and Emerson in an Indian-like red sari and wedding veil.

At the bar, a gray-haired man in a blue serge uniform drained the rest of his beer and slammed it down.

"Back from Thailand so soon, Tony? Don't expect to flog any more of your Asian love connections here. Half of us have already got one of your little beauties cracking the whip at home. Did you forget this isn't Utah?"

The assembled men raised their glasses. "Here, here!"

"Wait a tic," said the man. "Either some back-alley Bangkok surgeon has done a rubbish job on your face, Tony, or you're not Tony."

"I'm not Tony," said Dean. "We're just hitching a ride with him. On our honeymoon, as a matter of fact."

"Prove it," yelled a pilot in a grease-covered jumpsuit.

"Yes, prove it," said the gray-haired man at the bar. "Give us a kiss. For luck and our own entertainment, if nothing else."

Dean pecked Emerson on the cheek, bringing catcalls and boos from all the men.

"She's not your gran," shouted the gray-haired man. "Give her a right smack on the lips!"

Dean sighed. He put his arms around Emerson and kissed her on the mouth for a full five seconds, accompanied by cheering that shook the pictures on the walls.

At least it seemed like five seconds, but it could have been more because he woke up staring at the ceiling and a crowd of faces, including Emerson's.

"He's alive after all," said the gray-haired man. "Must have some dodgy heart condition. Isn't that right, old chap?"

The men helped Dean to his feet.

"He is not sick," said Emerson with a smile. "I am just very good kisser."

The men raised their glasses. "Here, here!"

The gray-haired man shook Dean's hand. "Congratulations to you both. I'm Captain Ian Davies of the 99th Fighter Squadron, Reformed. Whatever you and your lovely bride would like is on the house."

"99th Fighter Squadron?"

"That's right," said Captain Davies. "All of us chaps potter around this place and occasionally fly those beautiful ladies outside. It's cracking good fun and mainly for charity."

"And keeps us out of the house," yelled a portly officer in a green uniform.

The men raised glasses. "Here, here!"

"Yes, quite," said Davies. "Aircraft are much easier to control than women, especially as they get older. In any case, please have a seat."

DEAN AND EMERSON left the kanteen after a quick meal and round of toasts by all the men. Captain Davies had given them a box full of sandwiches and refused any payment.

Back at the old bomber, they found Tony squatting in the shade of a wing, watching the flat fields and distant horizon with an unmoving gaze.

"Thanks for the food, Cherokee," he murmured.

Dean shrugged. "You're welcome. So, when can we leave?"

Tony spat on the ground. "We can't."

"What? Is there something wrong with the plane––I mean, Soaring Dove?"

"There is nothing wrong with Soaring Dove. Her cylinders are as clean as snow and her oil as sweet as the Ohio. Look beyond the fields and above those trees."

Dean followed the line of Tony's finger. A white dot crawled across the sky above the green plains. Another aircraft, this one yellow, followed the first one at a distance.

"So? Two planes, probably coming in to land. Not a shocking thing to see at an airport."

Tony sighed. "You do not feel the sky-spirits or have eyes as sharp as Sekumbah the rooster like I do. They circle, waiting for us to rise from the runway, when they will descend upon us with metal talons like Hawk in the second season of Buck Rogers. We must wait until nightfall to make our escape."

"But that's hours away, Tony. We're in Nebraska and I have to be in Charleston the day after tomorrow!"

"My friend, there is no other way. Soaring Dove is an amazing creature, but she can't outrun a Cheyenne scout."

"Cheyenne?"

"The white plane dips and soars in the manner of the Cheyenne tribe, and there are no better pilots. The yellow plane follows at a distance, but the Cheyenne is not worried––from the second pilot's quick turns and uncertain handling, he is certainly a round-eye. Compared to the Cheyenne, even the best pale-skinned pilots are like flies on a buffalo's ear."

"Can we wait until they run out of fuel?"

Tony laughed. "That will work for the yellow plane, but the Cheyenne are masters of fuel mixture and can glide for many days on thermals left by Nenemehkia, the storm god."

"Let's take off anyway. It doesn't matter if they follow us to Ohio."

"If that second plane is FBI, it definitely matters."

"FBI?"

Tony cleared his throat. "The ... um ... Federal Bakery Inspectorate, that's what I meant to say. As I've told you before, the baking powder I have in my plane is highly illegal in Ohio."

Dean paced below the wing of the bomber. "I've got an idea."

"I hope it's not a rain dance because we don't do that anymore."

"No, it's not. Help Emerson inside the plane and start the engines."

He burst through the door of Kelly's Kanteen, out of breath. The raucous laughter ceased, just as before.

"Gentlemen," gasped Dean. "Brave pilots ... of those beautiful planes outside ... I need your help!"

THE SMALL FIGHTERS DRONED across the taxiway, leading the bomber to the white stripes at the end of the runway like ducklings tottering in front of a huge, olive-green mother goose.

They lined up in front of the bomber in six pairs. When Captain Davies stood from the cockpit of his P-40 Warhawk and waved his cap, the first two pushed throttles to top speed and zipped along the patched concrete.

Dean watched from the co-pilot's seat of Soaring Dove.

"I hope this ends well," he said.

Tony rested his hand on the vibrating throttle control between them. "Hope is for children and the sick," he said. "A grown man acts."

The twelve old fighters roared into the air and split apart, half for the white plane and half for the yellow. Like swallows darting through the twilight, they dove and spun around the two helpless planes, forcing them off course and onto a westerly heading.

"Now!"

Tony pushed the twin sticks of the throttle forward. The engines of the old bomber roared like an express train full of engine parts on fire hitting another train full of engine parts, but she slowly picked up speed. Halfway down the runway, her nose lifted and orange clouds filled the windscreen.

Dean slapped Tony on the shoulder and crawled to the tail of the plane. From the bubble of the rear gunner's position he watched Davies and the rest of the 99th Fighter Squadron chase the two planes into the distance, until they disappeared over the horizon.

Back in the radio compartment, he sat next to Emerson. Her face and hands were pale and cold to the touch.

"Are you okay?" he shouted over the engine roar.

Emerson shook her head. "I hate flying!"

Dean found an old woolen blanket and put an arm around her as the plane droned toward the east and a quickly approaching night.

Tracklist:

My City Was Gone – The Pretenders

Head Over Heels – Tears For Fears

Call Me – Go West
15

Dean dreamed of a party where nothing went wrong. Neighbors and kids from his high school packed the house. Even though most people had to stand, nobody got into a fight or tossed a cat through a plate-glass window. The music stayed at a pleasant level, loud enough to allow Phil Collins to create the mood but soft enough that you could still talk. All of Dean's relatives were happily chatting away for once, and nobody had spiked the punch or the cat, spiked the punch with the cat, or even punched the cat.

Dean squeezed through the crowd, moving from room to room, searching for something. Not his mother––she was in the kitchen using a spatula to lob white grenades of frosting onto a massive ten-layer cake. The lights turned red and began to pulse in and out with the music. Dean's father burst from the top of the cake, naked apart from elbow-length satin gloves and tassels on his new implants.

"Happy birthday, son!"

The crowd cheered wildly. A few of his uncles attempted to hoist Dean onto their shoulders, a laudable expression of joy which unfortunately caused Dean's head to smash through a ceiling panel and two fluorescent lights.

"Wake up!"

Dean opened his eyes to the crimson light of the bomber's interior and Emerson pulling at the fabric of his jumpsuit.

"Wake up, Dean!"

"Okay, I'm awake."

The engines of the B-25 hummed at a lower pitch than Dean remembered and the fuselage shook with an irregular vibration.

"I think the plane has a problem," said Emerson.

Dean pulled Emerson's hands from the front of his jumpsuit and gave them a short squeeze.

"Stay here and don't worry."

He crawled through the access tunnel to the cockpit, where the sky outside was as black as coal. Small crimson bulbs illuminated the instrument panels, where several indicators flashed yellow. In the pilot's seat, Tony strained to hold the vibrating control yoke with both hands.

"We lost the port engine," he yelled. "Not really a problem unless you lose the other one. Soaring Dove is a steady girl when it comes to flying."

Dean looked to port and gasped. "Good gravy!"

The propeller was visible in the intermittent flash of navigation lights. The blades had stopped and were "feathered," or turned ninety degrees to face the airstream and reduce drag.

"This leads to the second problem," said Tony. "I think we're going to lose the starboard engine."

"You can't be serious!"

"It's completely my fault. Somehow I strayed over the river that Kichimanetowa, the snake monster, calls his home. He will bring us down to the water and drink our blood in anger. Even worse, we're over Kentucky."

"Pray to another god or call the Air Force or something!"

"I can't call for help. I have three tons of cocai––three tons of illegal baking powder on board. When I land they will take everything, and my family will go to prison. You've met two of my brothers, and you know they won't survive!"

"What do we do?"

Tony pulled a large blue backpack from behind his seat and shoved it at Dean.

"To appease Kichimanetowa, you must fill his belly."

"You have got to be joking, Tony. This is a parachute!"

"I am as far from joking as the never-smiling face of Wisaka himself. You can die when we crash into the muddy Ohio, or jump from the plane."

"But what about Emerson?"

Tony waved to the rear of the plane. "Another parachute is stowed in the radio operator's compartment. Wait! Do not jump until I reduce airspeed. The light will change to green."

Dean pushed the parachute pack ahead of him through the access tunnel, vowing to never again fly in a converted bomber from the Pacific unless it had four engines. Probably not even then.

He dropped the parachute next to a wide-eyed Emerson and opened the scratched metal doors of cabinets one after another. He found a second olive-green parachute and slid his arms through the straps and buckles.

"What's wrong?" asked Emerson.

"Put this on. We don't have time for questions."

Dean helped her buckle on the heavy pack, but the crotch strap that looped between her legs gave him pause.

"Wait," said Emerson.

She pulled up the hem of her dress and stepped out of a ruffled taffeta petticoat. Dean looked away as she buckled the crotch strap over the now much-slimmer skirt of her silk dress.

The light in the compartment changed from crimson to bright green. Dean led Emerson through the bomb compartment packed with duct-taped bricks of baking powder to a door at the aft of the plane.

He pointed at a silver ring on her shoulder strap. "Count to five and pull that one! If it doesn't work, pull the one on the left side!"

Emerson shook her head and tears rolled down her face. "I can't! I really can't!"

Dean grabbed her shoulders. "Listen! I've done this before, and it's very easy. Count to five and pull. The plane is going to crash, so we have to jump."

He'd never used a parachute in his life so that part was a lie, but Dean considered dying in a ball of fire more of a sin at this point. He used his fingers to wipe away the tears on Emerson's cheeks, and she nodded.

"We'll jump together," shouted Dean.

He pushed up on a red emergency bar and slid the door to the side. A torrent of freezing air blasted him in the face with bitterly cold force, a force to possibly rival that of falling twelve stories into an ice cream truck. A patchwork of dark forest and cleared farmland lay far below, with only a few scattered lights as clues that humanity still existed.

Never the bravest of souls, Dean panicked and turned back, intending to hide under a box somewhere, but the starboard engine chattered loudly and the old bomber tilted to port. Dean lost his balance at the edge of the door, felt himself falling backwards, and frantically grabbed Emerson's hand, pulling her out of the plane with him. The old bomber shrank into the night sky and turned slightly to port, navigation lights blinking red-green, red-green.

As they tumbled together, Dean's fingers caught on the silver hoop of Emerson's chute-release ring and she flew out of his arms. He twisted to face the earth and air blasted across his skin like water from a fire hose. He thought you were supposed to count to ten in these situations but made it only as far as 'eight' before he grabbed the ring on his shoulder strap and pulled. A monstrous force jerked his arms and crotch upwards, and he floated in peace and silence, a circular white umbrella above his head. A river curved like a gray ribbon into the distance, and as he swayed on the cables of his parachute, Dean smelled thick fungal air full of rotting bark and crushed leaves, of copper mud and barges piled high with brittle chunks of coal.

He missed a barbed-wire fence at the last minute by pulling up his knees and landed in a cow pasture. The parachute floated down and covered him like a white shroud. Dean spent a few anxious moments freeing himself from the tangle of flimsy material and nylon cords. He scanned the star-filled backdrop of the night sky and spotted the pale blob of another parachute floating over a nearby forest.

Branches tore at the hem of Emerson's red dress and her feet cracked through limbs at the treetops. Dean tripped over roots as he ran through the forest and tried to keep her in sight. A body of water sparkled with star-shine as the forest thinned to the edge of a shore, but the floating girl would not escape the claws of the forest so easily. She smashed through the crown of an oak tree and tumbled into the silver water like a dying fairy, if the fairy wore a parachute and was unlucky enough to have it shredded by branches.

Dean splashed through neck-deep water to the floating mound of white fabric. He pulled Emerson's limp body to the shore and touched his lips to hers, ready to perform mouth-to-mouth, when she threw up.

Dean wiped his chin and held Emerson sideways on his lap while she coughed and spat up more lake water.

"I'm sorry," she managed to say between coughs.

"Having a girl vomit in my mouth is not the greatest experience, but I'm happy you're alive. That's better than the opposite."

"The opposite? What's the opposite of throwing up?"

"Diarrhea, but that's not what I meant."

Emerson cleared her throat and spat into the mud.

"Did the plane crash?"

Dean waved a hand at the lakeshore and the dark horizon. "I didn't see or hear anything, but I was more worried about the whole falling-from-the-sky and staying-alive thing."

Her veil had disappeared and wet strands of hair covered her face, but Emerson smiled and that was enough to make Dean feel better.

"Thank you," she said.

Dean turned red. His mouth and nose were still covered in regurgitated lake water, but the dangerously cute female in his lap trumped all other sensations. He desperately tried to remember why Canadian-rules football is called Canadian-rules football.

"Are you okay?" whispered Emerson.

"I'm perfectly fine," stammered Dean. "Your thanks are appreciated, but not necessary. I can't let my paper-wife drown in a lake, can I? At least not until we've had a proper paper-divorce. After that you'll have to save yourself, missy. Preferably not on paper."

Emerson stared at him, her pupils wide and black. "Dean, I must tell you something."

"Yes?"

"I have never said this before, but ..." Emerson paused for a second, and her smile of contentment instantly changed to a frown. "What's that horrible smell?"

"That's a strange thing to have never said before."

"You smell like the back yard of Burger Chef, where the cattle live before dinner."

"I ... uh ... landed in a pasture. There may have been a few encounters with cow pies on my part."

Emerson wrinkled her nose. "This is not a pie for eating. Please jump in the lake."

"Women have said that many times in my life. This is the first time I think it's a good idea."

Emerson sat up and watched as Dean waded into the lake and rubbed the worst bits of his clothing with water. She began to shiver, and crossed her arms tightly.

"What do we do now?" she asked.

Dean splashed at a brown stain on the leg of his jumpsuit. "The pasture had a fence. Where there are fences, there are farms, and where there are farms, there are roads. We'll have no trouble finding a ride into town."

BY THE TIME they walked back to the pasture, Emerson's teeth chattered from the cold. The sight of his parachute on the ground gave Dean an idea. He used the sharp barbed wire of the nearby fence to rip the white material into a smaller section, which he put over the head of the shivering girl.

"But I can't see."

"I'll soon fix that."

Dean ripped two small holes in the center and handed it back.

"This is a strange thing to wear," Emerson said, after sliding the white material over her head and body.

"At least you'll stay warm. I'll wear one, too, just so you don't feel strange."

He ripped holes in another large section of parachute and covered himself. As Emerson followed him across the cow pasture, Dean glanced back and thought that yes, she did look a bit odd, but he adjusted the eyeholes in his sheet and kept walking.

Their feet crunched on grass stiffened with early October frost, an icy shroud that transformed harvested stumps of corn into a field of brittle bones. Many of the night birds had flown to warmer lands so the night was quiet. They saw no wildlife, apart from a handful of deer trotting through the dead corn and a great-horned owl that glided noiselessly through the forest.

The barbed wire guided them to a dirt road, which led to an asphalt road and a farmhouse. A shaggy farmer in his pajamas opened the door and promptly slammed it shut again. His shouts about finding a firearm in the house made Dean think that these were not very hospitable folk. He and Emerson quickly moved on.

This identical scenario played out at the next three farmhouses.

"They're all escaped mental patients," puffed Dean as they ran from the last house, where the resident had accidentally discharged his shotgun in their direction three times. "Or there's been a chemical leak. I'd call for a HazMat team if I had a phone."

Emerson pulled off the white parachute material as she ran and dropped it by the side of the road.

"I'm very warm now," she said. "It is the exercise."

"Good point," said Dean, and tossed his sheet into a ditch.

After another mile of walking along the road and past fenced pastures, a cluster of white buildings appeared over a rise.

"I hope we meet nicer people this time because I'm exhausted," said Dean. "Strange that they don't have any lights."

"Maybe it is vacation."

"Dear girl, farmers don't go on vacation."

The buildings appeared to be part of a business and more organized than the family homesteads they'd encountered so far. A massive two-story structure of white-painted clapboard stood in the middle of a meticulously cut lawn. Dean counted so many darkened windows that he guessed the house had at least thirty rooms, maybe more. White wooden fencing protected the lawn, something Dean hadn't seen for thirty years. Most farmers and companies had gone to treated lumber or plastic because of the constant repainting. Behind the house stood several large barns and a collection of smaller white-painted buildings. The faint musk of horses floated on the breeze.

A large wooden sign spanned the gravel driveway, with Ins Weltall oder der Tod painted in black gothic letters.

Emerson pointed to the sign. "Do you understand?"

Dean shook his head. "Probably means 'The Inn of Todd Weltall' or something. A bed-and-breakfast would be fantastic right now."

He led Emerson to the darkened porch and knocked quietly on the door.

"The lack of lights is very odd," he whispered. "I wonder what time it is."

Emerson giggled. "It is time for you to go to commissar and ask for a ticket to buy watch."

"Is that a joke?"

"Yes, of course. It is Russian."

"Good job, but don't use it too often or people will stop laughing."

He knocked again, harder this time, and heavy boots thumped inside the house. Dean and Emerson backed away from the door, knees bent in case firearms were mentioned.

A tall man opened the door, a candle lantern in one hand. A white dressing gown that dragged on the floor made the muscular figure less fearsome than he would have been while wearing a football uniform or pointing a shotgun. A black chinstrap beard with no mustache framed his tanned face and short, rumpled hair. He peered at them with brown, almond-shaped eyes.

"Car run out gas? Hit a deer? Stranded by your meth dealer?"

The man spoke with languorous confidence and his vowels were drawn out: not a typical Southern accent, but a throaty whisper from the high plains.

"Um ... none of those things," said Dean.

The man's eyes narrowed. "Are you from Amway?"

"No, of course not!"

"Well, what happened? You didn't just fall out of the sky, did you?"

"That's it! How did you guess?"

The tall man frowned. "Luck of the Irish, I suppose. We don't have a phone, so you can't call anyone to pick you up. Try the Wilson's down the road."

"Wait! Mr. Weltall, we've already tried that house, and they wouldn't even talk to us. My wife and I are freezing to death here––can't we at least stay in your barn?"

The man lost some of the hardness in his face and gave the pair a wry grin. "I'm sorry. It's late and I've been very rude, probably almost as bad as that skinflint Ernest Wilson. Of course you can stay here for the night. Please come in and rest in my living room."

COVERED IN thick wool blankets, Dean and Emerson slept like the dead, she on a plush sofa and Dean on the floor beside her. Dean felt like it had been ages since he'd slept somewhere other than a moving vehicle, but in fact it had only been three days.

The early morning clatter of the farm didn't wake him, nor did the tromping of boots up and down stairs. The smell of bacon, however, was powerful enough to pull Dean from a quite fascinating dream starring Paulina Poritzkova and a radish.

Emerson's carefully folded blanket lay on the sofa. Dean stumbled into a bathroom and washed his face and hair as best he could. He followed the smell of bacon and the sound of Emerson's voice to the kitchen.

Inside the white-painted room, an older woman cleaned away the remains of breakfast while three girls kneaded large balls of dough. They wore plain gray dresses with aprons and strange white caps, a costume that reminded Dean of the shops at Williamsburg, Virginia. Dean half-expected a busload of tourists to knock on the door or peer through the windows at any moment, and became very self-conscious of his filthy jumpsuit.

Emerson and the gentleman from the previous night were sitting at a long table made of unvarnished maple.

"Good morning, Mister Cook," said the tall man. "Your wife and I have been talking about the strange adventures you've had in the past few days."

Mr. Weltall wore a white button-down shirt, black trousers, and suspenders. Emerson had changed out of her ragged wedding outfit into the same gray dress and cap as the women in the kitchen. She looked refreshed and clean, and certainly not like a girl who'd fallen out of a plane into a lake.

"Thank you for letting us stay, Mr. Weltall," said Dean.

The tanned gentleman laughed. "I don't know this who this Mr. Weltall is––I'm Charlie Snaps His Fingers. You can call me Chuck if you like, but all the men call me Butterfingers. Drop a hammer from the roof one time, just once, and nobody lets you forget it."

A few neurons accidentally rubbed together in Dean's brain, and he squinted at Charlie.

"I've heard that name before."

"So have a lot of people ... too many, as it turns out. Why do you think I'm living on a farm in Kentucky?"

"Peace and quiet?"

"This place definitely has an abundance of those two qualities, and many people come here for that reason. My intentions must remain private for now, and I hope you understand. On to more pressing matters––clean clothes and breakfast will make you feel much better, as they have your pretty wife."

"We really have to be going."

Charlie waved his hand dismissively. "I can't expect you to walk all the way to town. A rider has been sent to borrow a car. Please relax and enjoy my farm's hospitality until the vehicle has arrived."

A small girl in a gray dress handed Dean a stack of folded clothes and led him back to the washroom. He cleaned up a bit more, and changed into the same type of cotton shirt and wool trousers as Charlie.

Back at the table, he sat in front of a cup of steaming coffee and a large plate of eggs over-easy, bacon, and buttered toast. Charlie's distinctive voice could be heard outside the house, although it sounded to Dean like he was speaking German.

Emerson sipped her mug of tea. "Mister Fingers seems like a good man."

"I've heard of this character somewhere," said Dean. "I just can't put my finger on where that was."

Emerson nodded. "When you are finished, can we look at the farm and the animals?"

They wandered through a greenhouse full of potted herbs, over the brown, thatched earth of a long-harvested garden, and beside pens of goats and chickens.

"There's something very strange about this place," said Dean. "No electricity or cars. They're like the Amish, but Amish don't have names like Charlie Snaps His Fingers."

"What is Amish?"

"Farmers that don't use electricity or cars. Also, no zippers."

"How are American farmers so poor?"

"Most farms aren't like this. The Amish live this way not because they have to, but because they want to."

Emerson sighed. "This place reminds me of my small years. The uniforms everyone must wear, the smell of the animals, the growing of vegetables to eat."

"Wasn't your orphanage in the city?"

"Anyone can raise goats and chickens in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky. Also the electricity is never good, there is no car, and Russian machinery breaks down after buying from factory. Many times we lived same as these Amish."

Dean nodded sympathetically, but his mind was on the farm workers. The men and women dressed plainly and were all pale as snow. From his skin color and the shape of his eyes, Charlie was obviously not from around here.

"I heard the girls talking about horses," said Emerson. "Let's find them!"

"I don't see why not."

They wandered through the barns and smaller buildings, but failed to discover any equine-shaped animals.

"Definitely a horsey smell around here, but I don't see any," said Dean.

"How about that building?"

A long white building stood apart from the rest, with square windows covered in steel mesh and a sturdy padlock that secured a pair of wooden doors. Dean rattled the handle and something whinnied.

"Definitely horses," said Dean. "Want to sneak inside?"

"Oh no! I don't want to be in trouble."

Dean laughed. "They're just horses and won't eat you. If anyone catches us we'll just pretend we couldn't find the bathroom or needed some private time alone, if you know what I mean."

"I don't know what you mean."

"Never mind."

Dean tugged at a rectangle of steel mesh covering a window and it came free. He squeezed through while Emerson kept a lookout, then helped her climb into an empty stall full of fragrant bales of hay.

Many of the stalls in the long building were empty, apart from a gray mare and a white-patched Indian pony.

Emerson rubbed the nose of the mare and giggled.

"I think he likes me."

"She," said Dean. "Watch your fingers, she might be hungry."

Emerson looked at him with wide eyes. "You said horses don't eat people!"

"Tell me the difference when it bites you."

"Husband Dean Cook, I think your mouth is full of poop."

"That's not really––wait ... do you hear something?"

Voices murmured from the far end of the building.

"Hide!"

Dean and Emerson crouched on the straw-covered floor of an empty stall. The voices neither approached nor left the building, but kept speaking in a soft conversational tone.

"Can't wait here forever," said Dean. "Let's go back out the window."

They approached the stall and the empty window. Footsteps crunched outside and a man's voice spoke in a strange language.

"No good," Dean whispered. "Let's find another way out."

He held Emerson's hand and duck-walked for part of the way down the long corridor of stalls, until his thighs started to burn with effort. He decided normal posture would be more dignified if they were caught, and straightened up.

The voices grew in volume and Dean caught words here and there. The sound came from behind a metal door with a small window in a freshly drywalled part of the building.

Emerson tugged on his arm. "There's a door," she whispered.

"I see it."

"No, no, another one."

Across from the drywalled section was a wood-slatted door. Sunlight gleamed through the gaps in the wood and a loop of rope held it shut.

"... Partridge ..."

Dean held a hand to his lips. "I recognize that voice."

"No, let's go," hissed Emerson.

"Just a second."

Dean crept to the door and carefully peered through the small window. What he saw would have made him drop to the floor in a dead faint, if Emerson hadn't been there to catch him. Therefore, he only fainted.

The room inside had been painted to resemble the bridge of the U.S.S. Partridge from the old television show Space Trails, with fake instrument panels and display screens covering the walls. The navigation and weapons station at the front had been replaced by a long table. Three men sat behind the table in authentic Space Trails uniforms that were far too small, making them look like fat sausages in tiny sausage casings. From left to right, Dean recognized Nick Frost, Diedrich Bader, and a very pale Nando Phoenix, his head strangely drooping to his chest. The hands of the first two were chained behind their backs. At the center in the captain's chair sat Sergio Martinez, wearing the immaculate and well-fitted white uniform of Dr. Winston Braintree, ship's surgeon and psychic marriage counselor.

Nick Frost kicked a table leg and made it shake. "Listen, mate––if you call me Thg'thg'thg one more time, I'm going to bust out of these chains and explode all over you like a Trident missile. Stop asking these stupid questions. Do you know how many people are looking for me? I've won a British Independent Film Award, for Pete's sake!"

Sergio shrugged, his hands full with index cards. "You keep saying that, but I still don't see these 'people looking for you' or have any idea what a British Independent Film Award is. Perhaps if the corrupt snails in Hollywood had given me an award instead of sycophantic, untalented pigs like yourself, then I might have a clue." He cleared his throat and pulled down on his uniform jacket. "Someday soon I'll take pity on you, Thg'thg'thg, and put you out of your misery like I did Captain Sparx."

"I swear to the gods," said Nick, "if you shoot me twelve times and push me off a balcony into a waiting ice cream truck, then have my body professionally stuffed and made into an animatronic zombie of myself, you'll regret it."

"I don't think so. I certainly don't regret what I did to Nando Phoenix, because that self-satisfied buffoon deserved everything he got. For every successful sci-fi spinoff he shoved in my face over the years, for every Broadway show he headlined, and for every one-dimensional role as a smarmy lawyer he stole from me, I'm giving him tenfold the humiliation. The ignominious bastard can do my bidding for the rest of eternity."

Nando's mangy-looking head bobbed up and down and spoke in a guttural, electronic voice.

"Spleen pickle."

"Thank you, Nando, but that was three questions ago."

"You don't have the guts to kill us or you'd have done it already," said Nick.

Diedrich struggled to raise a hand. Since both were chained behind his back he had to settle for rocking back and forth.

"Guys! Can we stop fighting? It's not moving the game along."

"I don't regret what I did to Nando Phoenix," said Sergio. "I'd do the same to both of you, but we're in Kentucky. How can I throw you off a twelve-story building when I doubt there's one in the entire state?"

Diedrich shook his head. "Finally I'm winning and you guys won't stop fighting."

"Now, here's a man with the right spirit and competitive zest," said Sergio. "What was your name again?"

"I was in The Drew Carey Show and Napoleon Dynamite," said Diedrich. "We're co-stars on the radio show. Hello?"

Sergio shrugged. "Hello."

"My name is Diedrich. Diedrich Bader."

"For the life of me, I don't know why I keep forgetting that name. Your face certainly rings a bell, although a very depressing, blank-faced bell. Such a dull expression would make you the perfect secret agent!" He sighed. "Sadly, when it comes to career choices, you don't seem to make the right ones, do you?"

"Speak for yourself," said Nick.

Sergio smiled thinly and pressed a button on the arm of his captain's chair. Diedrich's whole body jerked with a brief electric shock.

"Stop it," said Nick. "I'm the one you should torture."

"Do you mean literally or figuratively? Poor what's-his-name doesn't have tolerance for either type of pain."

"No, no I don't," whispered Diedrich. "Whatever it was you said."

Nick shook the table again. "Just finish this stupid game."

"Is eating stupid? If you lose, that's what you won't be doing. In your case, Mr. Frost, this is not a dire circumstance. Have you considered going without pie for a few days? I'm sorry. Should I have said 'minutes?' "

"Don't make fun of my weight, and I won't mention that pimple between your ears that you call a nose," said Nick.

Sergio cleared his throat. "Question 342: In 1988, Sergio Martinez––that's me––guest-starred in an episode of what BBC comedy?"

Nick lowered his forehead to the table and groaned. "God almighty, how are we supposed to know that?"

"Wrong answer!"

Sergio pressed a button, and Nick jerked with an electrified shock.

"Keeping Up Appearances," said Diedrich.

"Quite right. An extra half-slice of bread for you."

"I'm English, and I didn't know that," said Nick. "How in the name of baked beans did you?"

"1988 was a slow year," said Diedrich. "Actually, most years have been slow. Sergio didn't even have to kidnap me––I was just happy to be around people for once."

"So true and yet, so sad," murmured Sergio.

Nick thumped his forehead repeatedly on the table. "You're the strangest bunch of idiots I've ever met," he whispered.

Dean shook off the haze of his fainting spell and like a demon possessed by a man possessed by a demon, pummeled the metal door with his fists. As he was a man of less-than-average strength and the door was of higher-than-average tensile steel, it did not budge. Emerson tried to pull him back, but Dean turned the door latch and swung it open.

"You bastard," he shouted. "You utter, utter bastard. You killed Sparx!"

All eyes in the room swiveled, even the dead yellow orbs of Nando Phoenix. Sergio jumped out of the fake captain's chair.

"Who the devil are you?"

Dean pointed at the half-robot, waxen face of Nando. "How could you do it? Millions of people loved him! Space Questions was the top syndicated show on evening radio––we can't go back to John Tesh!"

"I'm sorry. I don't respond to accusations unless I've been properly introduced."

"I'm Dean Cook, and I'm going to tell everyone what you did. This whole crazy setup is going to blow up right in your face!"

Sergio raised an eyebrow. "Dean Cook? I thought you'd be taller."

"Dean, not Dane. We're distant relatives, but that's not important right now."

"Can you get me tickets? Never mind. It's not as if I've got any free time these days, what with covering up a murder and these kidnappings."

Diedrich swayed back and forth in his chair. "I volunteered!"

"Shut up. It would be great to go out for a few hours. Have a breather, you know? Stress kills, as I always say. And bullets. Sharp knives. Ice cream. So many things to worry about."

Nick rattled his handcuffs. "That's great and everything, but now that our rescuers are here, how about letting me go?"

"Rescuers?" Sergio jabbed a hand into his uniform jacket and pulled out a banana. "I don't think so."

"Don't point that at me, I'm allergic," said Dean.

Sergio dropped the banana and took a revolver from another pocket.

"That's better. Nobody's going anywhere, especially not Mr. Frost. He and I have a very lucrative ransom appointment in the near future."

"Thank Cerberus," said Nick. "I've got a casting call tomorrow."

"I didn't say you'd be ransomed in one piece, you fawning Nando lackey!"

Sergio pressed a button on the captain's chair and both Nick and Diedrich jerked with an electric shock. Emerson screamed, and the heavy hand of Charlie Snaps His Fingers clamped on Dean's shoulder.

Tracklist:

Ain't Gone 'N' Give Up On Love – Stevie Ray Vaughn & Double Trouble

Space Oddity – David Bowie

I Fought The Law – The Clash
16

Charlie Snaps His Fingers and a group of Amish men escorted Dean and Emerson to a bedroom in the second story of the farmhouse. The pair were pushed onto a narrow bed that creaked loudly from old, rusted springs.

"You'll be sorry, Charlie," said Dean. "You and all your German-speaking minions are about to feel the incredible sound and considerable fury of the American motivational speaking industry."

Charlie crossed his huge, muscular arms in the doorway.

"Be that as it may, I'm afraid you must remain here," he said. "I haven't completely decided what to do in this situation. It's likely that one of you will be strangled and buried in a ditch. The other will be sent to Japan to work as a sexy maid in a coffee shop."

Dean pointed at him. "I don't speak Japanese and I hate sushi. If you lay a finger on my wife's neck––"

Charlie held up a palm. "You'd be the one in a ditch."

"I see."

"We haven't done anything to you at all," said Emerson. "How can you be so cruel?"

"Mr. Martinez and I have an arrangement. I'm not going to be silly enough to tell you what that arrangement is, just know that there is one."

Dean knelt on the floor, hands clasped. "Mr. Fingers, I'm pleading with you. I absolutely have to be in Charleston tomorrow morning. Just let us go, and that's it. We won't tell anyone. We especially won't say a word about a kidnapped Nick Frost and that other guy, or the reanimated body of Nando Phoenix."

"Who's Nando Phoenix?" whispered Emerson.

"The star who committed suicide by shooting himself in the back ten times and falling twelve stories into an ice cream truck," whispered Dean. "He was actually murdered by his longtime rival Sergio Martinez, the mean guy back in the horse barn."

Charlie shook his head. "I'm standing right here. The fact remains that the pair of you are the perfect murder victims, fortunately for me and unfortunately for you. You've parachuted into the middle of nowhere without a trace. The authorities don't have a single breadcrumb to follow. You've left no cell phone signals, none of the neighbors have seen your faces, and there are absolutely no friends coming to save you."

BELLS JANGLED and the shop clerk jerked out of his chair and away from the television like an arthritic marionette.

"Five minutes before closing," he muttered. "Every day, five minutes before closing. Probably some gol-danged welfare baby from some gol-danged holler trying to pawn his momma's gol-danged shotgun what ain't worth a Confederate dollar to buy some gol-danged crystal meth."

The old clerk limped out of the back room. Two men stood in the middle of the shop, one tall and blonde in a rumpled tuxedo, the other in a strange light blue suit.

"Can I help you?"

"Show me your guns," said Duke Nichego. "Do you have shotguns?"

"Yessir," said the clerk. He laid a glossy shotgun on the counter. "This here is an almost new Remington twelve-gauge. Available in pump or auto."

"Very good." Nichego picked up the gun and pulled back the breech to examine the chamber. "You have rifles?"

"What caliber you need?"

"The highest. Much stopping power."

The clerk leaned his cane against the counter and reached on his toes to a long rifle on the wall. The weapon had been painted in mottled green and brown.

"This is a thirty caliber magnum rifle with a twenty-power sight. It'll stop anything in these hills. You two in Kentucky for some hunting?"

The Duke nodded. "You could say that. We flew to Ohio to meet some friends, but after we arrived at the airport, we discovered they'd dropped in somewhere around here."

"Well, I hope you have good luck with the deer. I can sell a permit, too, if you need that."

"It is not necessary. Show me that .45 long slide with laser sighting."

The clerk took a massive silver revolver from the glass case and placed it on the counter. "I may close early today."

"And finally," said Nichego, "Phased plasma rifle in the 40-watt range."

The clerk shook his head. "You think you're the first young pup to quote that movie? I probably hear that three times a week. The worst thing this country has ever had to put up with is James Cameron and his gol-danged movies on the gol-danged USA Network."

"Hand warmers?"

The clerk searched the shelves behind him for the chemical warmers. When he turned around, Nichego was pushing a shell into the breech of the Remington shotgun.

"You can't do that!"

"Wrong," said Nichego, and fired the gun into the clerk's chest.

AS EVENING APPROACHED, Dean slumped below the windowsill and slowly banged the back of his head against the wall.

"No escape," he muttered. "What would Ray Liotta do in this situation?"

Emerson sat next to him and patted his hand. "Do not worry, husband."

"Of course––I'm just being silly. Nothing to worry about. We've only been prisoners of a bloodthirsty Amish farmer for ten hours, my favorite actor in the entire world has been murdered, made into a walking corpse slash robot, and I have to be in Charleston tomorrow morning or never work as a motivational speaker again! Good times."

"I promised that we would die together," said Emerson.

She glanced at the door and held up the silver, two-shot pistol.

"Where'd you hide that?"

Emerson shrugged. "These Amish men are too shy to look under my dress. They are opposite of Japanese man, who looks up skirt everywhere on bus and train, stair and sidewalk. Camera under skirt here, camera under skirt there."

"Right," said Dean. "How about we don't kill ourselves until the absolute last moment? Let's agree on that."

Emerson waved the pistol. "How do you know this is not last moment?"

Dean grabbed her hand and gently lowered it. "Dear girl, I want to die as much as you do, maybe even more, but let's table that option for the moment. We could use the gun to escape."

"This has only two bullets: one for me and one for you. When it is last moment, I will shoot you in face and then shoot myself in face."

"That's very romantic."

Emerson smiled. "Of course. All boys in Kamchatka say this to girlfriend."

She lifted her skirt and hid the gun as steps thudded in the corridor. Metal clicked, and the door opened to reveal a pair of stout Amish men.

"Dinner's ready," said one.

A DOZEN AMISH MEN and women sat around a wide table covered with plates of food. Emerson and Dean were seated across from each other, an Amish guard on either side. Unlike the others, they were given only a wooden spoon to eat with.

At the head of the table sat Charlie Snaps His Fingers, just settling in his chair after a long speech in German. For all Dean knew, he could have just recited the Gettysburg Address, but you generally don't speak bow your head for that.

An Amish girl placed a bowl of milky white chicken and dumplings in front of Dean. The oniony smell reminded Dean of Funyuns and a particular gas station. This caused a few of his brain cells to drop the other shoe.

"You're from the Kickapoo tribe!"

Charlie raised his chin and chinstrap beard. "Quite right. Don't tell me you're a Harvard man?"

Dean shook his head. "Tony had a picture of you on the wall of his store. He told me all about you––the great Charlie Snaps His Fingers, the Harvard cricket champion who disappeared."

"Tony? Do you mean Tony Montana, of the Montana sextuplets? I haven't seen them for ages."

"So you're that Charlie?"

The tall man nodded. "I was the greatest batsman the college had ever seen and led them to four national championships. Unfortunately, it's cricket, so few people heard about it."

"What are you doing here?"

"That's a good question and it's a long story, but as we have quite a bit of time on our hands, I will explain." Charlie leaned his elbows on the table. "At Harvard I majored in Applied Mathematics, but was really no more than a shallow child, and floated through a myriad of social circles without a care. Girls, money, and the occasional Hyundai dropped through my fingers the same way. I was on top of the world and it was only my sophomore year. At that point I met Gerda."

"A girl?"

Charlie nodded. "The sweetest and most beautiful creature you could ever meet. I took a psycholinguistics class just for fun and fell in love the moment I laid eyes on her. A fair-haired, blue-eyed vision of loveliness who sat in the front of the classroom and smelled of apricots. She was eating one, in fact. The only problem: she was Pennsylvania Dutch."

Dean almost choked on his soup, but instead sprayed it through his nostrils.

"Amish don't attend college," he said hoarsely.

"Gerda was part of an experimental program. The administrators of Harvard had decided the college lacked diversity vis-à-vis the Amish folk. Ten young people were kidnapped from random farms in Lancaster County and sent to Harvard while unsuspecting philosophy majors were left in his or her place, four years at a time. It was a perfect plan because nobody really likes philosophy students––especially their families––and Amish are afraid of the police. Everyone came out on top, including the administrator of the program who now works for the CIA. I was young and didn't care about all that. I fell in love with Gerda, and she with me."

"What happened to her? I bet you locked the poor girl in a bedroom, just like us."

"Not at all––she graduated. Gerda drove back to Pennsylvania and out of my life. All those fervent exhortations made at midnight, all the tear-soaked hugs and excited promises to the future were nothing against the wall of Amish culture. She returned home, closed all of her social media accounts apart from Twitter, and married a dairy farmer."

"The eternal story of Kickapoo boy meets Amish girl majoring in psycholinguistics," said Dean.

"She majored in physics, you dolt. It was an elective."

"Sorry."

"I was heartbroken because Gerda wouldn't marry me. Also because she'd taken my last Hyundai, but mainly for the not-marrying thing. I gave away my trophies, clothes, even a cricket ball autographed by Shane Warne. A few weeks later my parents died in a tragic jet-ski accident, so I had no reason to return home. I wandered the interstates and cloverleaves of America for years, surviving with the skills I'd learned as a boy in the Kickapoo tribe and by teaching cricket at local community colleges. Then, under a bridge in Rancho Cucamonga, I met Sergio Martinez. He'd had a few bit parts in film since Space Trails, but not enough to feed the ego of any self-respecting former star. Sergio lay under that bridge, covered in filth and surrounded by copies of Writer's Digest––the lowest point of his life. He'd been rejected for a part in According to Jim and savaged by a roving gang of amateur novelists."

"Literally or figuratively?"

Charlie slammed his fist on the table. "Does it matter? Using the natural healing methods of my tribe and several McCafe iced coffees, I nursed him back to health. We became close friends. I stayed in his home in the Hollywood Hills for several months, getting a grasp on who I was as a person while running the escort business Sergio had set up through Craigslist."

Dean stifled a yawn by stuffing a dumpling in his mouth, causing another choking spell and spray of debris from his nostrils.

"During that time in Hollywood, surrounded by C-list actors and formerly popular pop stars now forced into prostitution, I realized that I wanted to do something with my life after all," said Charlie. "I wanted to be an astronaut, the first Native American in space. With tears in my eyes, I said goodbye to Sergio and the Hollywood Hills and traveled to Cape Canaveral. I spent five years getting my pilot's license and doing the things nobody wanted to do at NASA: deep-space calculus, high-G experiments on a stomach full of airline food, and cleaning the men's bathroom. Everyone liked me and I would have been green-lit for a shuttle mission, if it weren't for one single fact: John Horse With No Name had already flown in 1997, the first Native American in space."

"That doesn't mean you couldn't go."

"I just told you they already had a first Indian to check off in their little black book of political correctness. It would have taken another decade or two and probably an engineering degree to get to space. So I decided to turn their little game to my advantage––I converted to Amish."

"You can't just do that," said Dean. "I think it's more involved than just starting a farm."

"It doesn't matter what you think, it matters what Samuel P. Fiddlebottom in the Public Relations Department at NASA thinks. Guess what, genius? Once I told him about my Amish conversion, he green-lit and fast-tracked me for a mission to the International Space Station nine months from now. You're looking at the first Amish in space. And the second Native American, of course."

"I'm looking at a madman."

"We're all mad at one point or another," said Charlie. "It's all context. Why is it okay to wear a bikini on the beach but not in Safeway? Why is it okay to shoot a man at Dien Bien Phu but not Sunset Boulevard? Why is it okay to wear a muumuu ... Actually, there's never a good time to wear a muumuu."

"Your examples just show that society is crazy, not that you're a sane person. Your dream of becoming an astronaut is going to vanish when the police find out about Nando Phoenix and Nick Frost and what's-his-name in your horse stable."

"The police aren't going to find out, are they? You'll be in a ditch, Mr. Dean Cook, and your lovely wife will be wearing a French maid's outfit and serving coffee to businessmen in Harajuku."

Dean lowered his voice and leaned forward. "We could both do the whole coffee-shop slavery thing. I don't really want to wear a dress, but let's be honest––it's happened before."

Charlie looked down at his hands. "I'm sorry, but your fate is sealed."

AS THE LIGHT FADED, two figures in black jumpsuits crawled to the top of a hill overlooking the farm.

"This better be the last one," said Duke Nichego. "I am starving to death. It is also possible I am allergic to face paint."

Vassily offered a silver-wrapped bar. "Another food stick?"

"No, you fool! Those are five hundred calories and will go straight to my hips. Also, it creates very bad toilet explosion."

"Taste is good."

"You will see, trust me," said Nichego. "Great taste, fills toilet."

He squinted through the scope of a high-powered rifle and scanned the farm.

"No movement in buildings," he murmured. "No dog on farm. Moving to house. Windows have lights, but not very strong. Many people in kitchen of house dressed strange like Kamchatkan street cleaner, but they are not eating."

"Maybe dinner is finished," said Vassily.

"It is my luck," said Nichego. "In top of house are windows with light. Bozhe moi!"

"What is wrong?"

Duke Nichego thumbed off the safety of his rifle.

"Angelika is alone with a man. The bastard is rubbing against her!"

DEAN HELD Emerson in a friendly hug.

"Don't cry," he said. "We're going to get out of this, I promise."

"How?" sobbed Emerson. "If you break the glass everyone will hear. Even if we climb down and run across the fields, how will we escape? They have horses."

"I heard one of the Amish mention Ghent and Warsaw. That means we're in Carroll County, Kentucky."

"So?"

"So if we head toward the river we'll find more people. Someone's bound to help."

"How do you know this Ghent and Warsaw? We are in wilderness area."

"My parents sent me to a lot of church camps. There's one near Ghent."

Emerson sighed. "I think it is time to die together."

She lifted her skirt to her chest and the glass in the lower half of the window burst into a spider web of cracks, with a tiny hole in the center.

"What's that?!!"

"It's what you get with Chinese construction materials," said Dean. "Buy American."

An identical hole cracked through the glass of the window's top sash, and Dean batted at the air around his ears.

"There it is again! Another horsefly. I'm suddenly very popular with the horsey-fly set."

The glass in both windows shattered and fell to the floor, and a lamp on the bedside table exploded in a shower of green ceramic.

Dean pointed at the broken lamp on the floor. "Another one! Do horseflies have a mating season?"

Emerson grabbed his hand. "This is our chance. Let's run for it!"

VASSILY PEERED at the farmhouse through a pair of binoculars.

"A hit! No, he is moving. Definitely a miss."

Duke Nichego looked up from the rifle scope. "The sound of your breathing is standing on my nerves, Vassily. It is like small pig with his little nose in the dirt, making herk, herk, herk all day long."

Vassily put down the binoculars. "Should I stop breathing? Next time you ask for vacation bodyguard I will stay in Kamchatka. At home the small women who beat me to death do not steal my car."

Nichego slapped Vassily on the shoulder. "Because that small woman is your wife! Why would she steal her own car?"

He bent his head down to the rifle scope.

"The room is empty. Quick, Vassily! Look for Angelika!"

"I cannot see her. The street cleaners are in her room and must have taken her."

Nichego shifted the telescopic sight over the windows of the house. He gasped and stopped moving the rifle.

"Look at that ..."

Two windows to the left, a tall wardrobe stood open to the window. Candlelight glowed over rows upon rows of socks in a variety of colors and patterns, all folded neatly with the perfection of a master. A teenage girl stepped into view and closed the wardrobe. She turned like a ballerina, her hair a fan of gold, skin as pale as Ivory soap and smiling teeth like ... well, like Ivory, too.

"The face of God is upon us," whispered Nichego.

"Duke, we must find Angelika and the kidnapper. Those socks can wait."

"Do you know how long it's been since I've touched as much as a shoe horn? Do you, Vassily? It's been days. With one attack, we can kill two doves in their bushes. Now help me execute the street cleaners and steal their socks!"

Vassily nodded, and joined Duke Nichego in firing his rifle at the windows of the farmhouse.

A WHITE Chevy Malibu stopped in the gravel driveway.

"I think we should call it quits for the night," said Chip.

Billie glanced back at him from the front seat. "That's because you don't have a son."

"We're not talking about the Lindberg baby––Dean's thirty-six. You know what? Forget you people. I'll take a bus home."

Frank tossed the locks of his long brown hair over a shoulder.

"Nobody's taking a bus anywhere. A reward is always offered in these kidnapping cases and I'm not letting you collect it by yourself."

"But we know he didn't kidnap her!"

Frank batted his eyelashes. "That doesn't mean we won't get a reward."

Steve Dubrowski leaned out of the driver's window and pointed at a sign above the gate.

"Anybody read German?"

"Ins Weltall oder der Tod," said Billie. "Outer Space or Death––don't see that on too many ranches."

"How do they brand the cattle?" murmured Chip. "Skulls and rocket ships?"

Billie rolled down the window and spit. "Somebody better know where Dean and that girl landed, or we're driving back to Hamilton County to scalp one Indian pilot."

"He'll be halfway across the country by now," said Frank. "I told you we should have dragged him along. Wait––what's that? I spy with my little eye ..."

He pointed at the farmhouse with a red-painted fingernail.

Billie searched her pockets. "I don't know ... something that begins with clothesline? Jesus wept––I'm out of snuff."

"Look closer. That's the same kind of jumpsuit the Indian pilot was wearing. Next to it on the line is a red dress. The radio said the girl had a red wedding dress."

They parked next to the house. Billie took a black automatic from the glove box and stuffed it in the back of her jeans.

"Time for some shooting and looting," she said.

A thumb-sized hole smacked into the windshield, and the glass fractured over the dash in a thousand bouncing pieces.

"Someone's way ahead of you!" yelled Chip.

All four scrambled out of the car and to the front porch of the farmhouse.

"Talk first," said Frank. "I don't want this manicure chipped any more than it already is."

Chip watched an Amish man and woman run across a field and into the night. A bullet struck the house and threw splinters across his face, forcing him to duck. When he looked up, the Amish couple were gone.

"On my count," said Billie, at the door. "One, two––"

"Three," yelled Steve Dubrowski, and smashed his shoulder through the wooden door like a human torpedo.

Inside the darkened house, a dozen men in suspenders and chinstrap beards crouched near the shattered windows, some with hunting rifles in their hands. At Steve Dubrowski's loud, wood-shattering entrance, the tallest of these farmers turned and waved a fist.

"Here come the bastards," yelled Charlie. "Give 'em hell, boys!"

The Amish farmers leaped at Steve, swinging rifles, jabbing pitchforks, and throwing punches in a determined effort to deliver some portion of Hell, or at least evil-smelling brimstone. This might have worked against anyone but Steve Dubrowski.

A skinny and bookish kid throughout high school, the constant rivalry with Dean for girls that liked skinny and bookish boys had turned him into a college freshman who avoided all social contact. His father forced him to spend a summer teaching English in Beijing, however, and he made many new friends, one of whom was the son of a famous kung fu master, Wie Hit Lo. Steve dove into this new hobby with a passion, and when he returned to college in the fall, found a local teacher to continue his studies of Wounded Duck and Dyspeptic Ocelot styles. He ran marathons and began to gain muscle. By graduation his mastery of fighting had outpaced even that of his original Chinese master. He never won a national championship, but neither did the twelve Amish guys who jumped at him.

Steve Dubrowski dodged fists and rolled away from haymakers like a duck that really doesn't want to be there, and smashed jaws, twisted elbows, and kicked groins in the same manner as a jungle cat that has eaten a rotten dodo and is infuriated at the pain in his stomach. In less than twenty seconds he stood alone in the living room, surrounded by sprawled bodies.

Charlie Snaps His Fingers bowed his head in honor of what he'd just witnessed. Ignoring the continual blast of rifle fire from the windows, he ripped off his farmer's shirt with one smooth motion, exposing chiseled muscles and the tattoo of a standing wicket over his heart. Charlie calmly walked to the fireplace, grabbed a worn cricket bat that hung above the mantle, and ripped loose a war scream that caused everyone within half a mile to pause and wonder if Predator was actually a documentary.

Epic combat ensued between the two warriors. Charlie smashed tables with his cricket bat and overturned sofas with great, dangerous strength, and Steve Dubrowski dodged, punched, and kicked like the master of Wounded Duck and Dyspeptic Ocelot he certainly was. Many fists crunched on chins, many ribs felt the polished wood of a bat, and many nipples were tweaked until Billie shot the huge Indian in the leg.

Steve wiped a trickle of blood from his left eye. "Why in the name of Pauline Calf did you do that?"

"You were losing," said Billie, aiming her gun at Charlie on the floor.

"No. I was winning, you hot-tempered, uncultured––"

"Mother-in-law with a gun wins the argument," said Frank.

He stepped gingerly over the bodies on the floor and placed a red heel on the three-post wicket tattoo over Charlie's heart.

"What a strangely tan and muscular young Adonis. I never thought I'd meet someone like you in Kentucky."

Charlie held his bloody thigh and grimaced in pain. "What a strangely ignorant and violent group of tourists. I never thought I'd be defeated by an uneducated lout who doesn't even know Goldbach's conjecture."

"Every even integer greater than two can be expressed as the sum of two primes," said Steve Dubrowski.

Charlie nodded. "Well played."

Frank put downward pressure on his strappy red heel and Charlie yelped.

"Tell me where my son is."

"I don't know who YOU are, much less your son."

"I'm Fran Cook, Dean's father."

Charlie blinked for several seconds. "Really?"

"Yes, really, and if you look up my skirt again I'll have Billie shoot you in a more sensitive area."

"They're locked in a bedroom upstairs."

Billie stayed with the wounded man while Steve and Frank searched the rooms.

"Not here," yelled Steve, from the top of the stairwell.

Billie jammed the pistol into Charlie's tanned jaw. "Not here is not good."

"I swear that's all I know! I locked Dean and the girl in that room myself."

"Nice knowing you, weird-looking Amish dude," said Billie.

"I don't think he's Amish," said Chip. "Wait! What were they wearing? When we got here, I saw a couple of Amish running across a field."

Billie stood up. "Why didn't you say something?"

"Seemed natural that someone would run from gunfire."

Charlie grimaced. "If it was the field near the house, they are heading for the river."

Tracklist:

The Lonesome River – The Stanley Brothers

Oh Very Young – Cat Stevens

Suicide Is Painless – Johnny Mandel
17

A thick, mournful mist rose from the harvested fields and slowly spread toward the muddy Ohio. Even though he ran for his life, Dean found that the cold droplets of fog calmed him and lay a soft lens upon the harsh, uncaring world.

Emerson ran beside him, her white Amish cap long gone and her black hair streaming behind her.

"How much farther?" she asked between breaths.

"A few minutes," puffed Dean. "I can see the lights of the bridge."

The damp asphalt road paralleled the river. No cars approached and none followed at this late hour––a fact that relieved but also worried Dean. He would have knocked at one of the handful of houses near the bridge, but given the cold welcome they'd received the previous night it seemed prudent to simply keep running.

As they ran closer to the bridge a thicket of steel girders emerged from the fog, a sight which reminded Dean of how Captain Phoenix and the landing party of the U.S.S. Partridge would re-materialize after a visit to a planet usually inhabited by sex-crazed alien women. The main structure over the river was completely obscured, but slow, red flashes in the white mist marked aircraft-warning bulbs at the pinnacle of the two towers.

"That is bridge? But it is blue," said Emerson.

Dean slowed his pace and tried to catch his breath. "It's called the Blue Miracle. Painted peacock blue."

"Why a miracle? It was hard to paint?"

Dean rested his hands on his knees and tried to catch his breath.

"No. Because it hasn't fallen into the Ohio."

He led Emerson up metal steps that spiraled high into the cold mist and led to a pedestrian walkway along the western side of the bridge. A peacock blue, waist-high metal railing separated this walkway from the main deck and protected it from vehicular traffic.

Emerson leaned over the edge and peered into the white nothingness.

"I can't see the river!"

Dean clapped his hands together and rubbed them vigorously. "It's great, isn't it? I've always thought a good fog brings out character in a person. Like having a flat tire in the freezing rain, or a flat tire in a blizzard. Actually, any flat tire."

As they walked toward the Indiana side, a horn sounded a long and low warning, like the dried-up moan of a boat crossing the Styx.

Emerson startled at the sound and clutched at Dean's hand.

"What was that?"

"Just a barge on the river. Hurry! There's a town on the other side of the bridge."

"These people in the town will not help us, just like everyone else. The security forces will give me back to Duke Nichego and torture you because they are bored."

"Maybe in Kentucky, but this bridge leads to Indiana," said Dean. "Is that a car? Quick, get down!"

They lay on the sharp grate of the walkway. Beads of mist settled on the soft hair of their arms and the river slapped wetly on faraway banks. A pair of headlights glowed through the fog and a car roared past at high speed toward Indiana, a jarringly loud specter in the stillness of early morning.

"I don't know why we're hiding," said Dean. "Amish don't have cars."

He helped Emerson to her feet and they walked at a brisk pace over the mist-covered Blue Miracle. Near the center of the bridge, Dean heard the growl of another engine. The headlights of a second vehicle glowed from the Kentucky side.

"I'll flag this one down."

Dean swung a leg over the metal railing, intending to step into the roadway, but Emerson grabbed his arm.

"I'll come with you," she said.

"It's too dangerous in this fog. The driver might not see us in time."

Emerson smiled. "Someone forgot how he jumped from a plane yesterday."

"Okay, okay."

Dean took Emerson's hand and helped her over the railing. They held hands and stood over the double yellow lines of the roadway as the approaching headlights grew into a blinding glare.

A large truck with a massive silver grille squealed to a sudden stop. The engine shut off but the headlights stayed on, attracting curious moths as the radiator fan pinged a last, dying rotation. A pair of doors creaked opened and boots smacked the asphalt. The steps approached slowly and carefully, like a grizzled hunter on the prowl.

Dean held a palm against the light. "Hello, there. Can you help us? We're stranded and need a ride. We're not really Amish. That's not to say we stole these clothes, if that's what you're thinking. We only borrowed them and decided to go for a walk. Is anyone listening? Hello?"

Duke Nichego stepped in front of the truck.

"Hello, Angelika."

"No!" shouted Emerson, and covered her mouth.

"I don't know why my fiancée is so frightened," said Dean, as Emerson pulled him away from the gleaming blue eyes of the mud-covered hunter, "but you should apologize for scaring her like that. Also, her name isn't Angelika."

Emerson slapped his arm. "That's Duke Nichego!"

The sound of a rifle bolt clacked from the other side of the truck, and a male voice spoke a short, foreign phrase.

"No, don't kill him yet," said Nichego. "I have many questions for this bride-stealing bastard."

"I didn't steal her. She ran away because you're a pig."

"What did you call me?"

Emerson stepped in front of Dean and pointed the silver two-shot revolver at Duke Nichego.

"He's right. I ran away because I never wanted to marry you. From the beginning it was all fun and happy agreement between you and everyone else, but never me! I hate everything about you, especially those disgusting socks!"

Nichego bowed his head. "Angelika. I know I have been bad person, but that is in the past. Shut up, Vassily! I can hear you snickering. Dear Angelika, if you come with me I will spare the life of this moderately successful stand-up comedian. When we return to Kamchatka, you can have an affair with two dozen moderately successful stand-up comedians, that is how much I love you."

"He's Dean Cook, not Dane. Most important of all, he is my husband."

"What are you talking about, Angelika? You cannot marry an American just by wishing for it. There are bribes to be made, dancing girls to be hired, and Broadway numbers to be sung."

Emerson tossed a folded paper at his feet. "There is wedding certificate. That is proof."

Duke Nichego took the certificate from the damp asphalt.

"Terry Joe Bukowski? Destiny Klara Schicklgruber? I do not see your name, dear Angelika. This paper is fake and not even good for cleaning up toilet explosion."

"It doesn't matter. I'd rather have a fake marriage to a fake person than see your disgusting face ever again."

"This is why I love you so much," said Nichego. "Such spirit of mouth!"

Emerson pointed the muzzle of the gun at a pink cloth sticking from Nichego's jacket. "Is that a sock?"

"It is my underwear," said Nichego, hastily pushing the sock into his pocket. "I have forgot to change."

Emerson stepped back, one hand pushing Dean. "That is the point, Konstantin––you will never change. You are the master of lies, every girl in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky knows that. We are leaving now and you will never see me again. Follow us and I will shoot. If you do not believe me, also believe I will shoot myself with this weapon before I let you touch me."

Nichego sighed. He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped mud from his face. "I knew wedding in San Jose was bad idea."

"Barbados was better package," said Vassily, from the side of the truck. "So nice and on the beach."

Dean and Emerson had backed ten yards away from Nichego when another pair of lights glowed from the Indiana side of the bridge. A vehicle approached, engine howling as it sucked in fog and insects and tires rubbing the damp asphalt like fingers across a wet metal fence.

"Good," shouted Nichego. "I hope it is American security forces, here to accept a generous donation for rescuing my bride Angelika from this nasty kidnapper."

The white Chevy Malibu slowed to a stop and doors squealed open in the fog.

"There he is," said Frank Cook. "Dean! Thank God we found you."

"Stay back, Dad! These guys have guns."

"So do we," yelled Billie.

She walked forward, both hands around a black automatic that pointed at Nichego.

"This is my lucky day," said the Duke. "I catch all of my birds in one bush. You and the man in dress will be tortured like no sock merchant has been tortured before. Where is the little black book with detailed notes on my sock collection? If you return this, perhaps I will be merciful and put you in trunk of car. Of course, I will set car on fire."

"Don't get involved in this, Mother," yelled Dean. "I don't want anyone to get hurt."

"Someone's getting hurt all right," said Billie. "Number one on the list is that asshole aiming a rifle at my son."

Dean spread his arms. "Why are you even here?"

"It sounds silly, after thirty-five chances in the past," said Frank. "But we wanted you to have a happy birthday for once." He pulled the white trenchcoat tighter around his chest. "Holy Jeff Koons, this fog is cold!"

"I'm thirty-six, Dad, and old enough to have a happy or unhappy birthday by myself now."

Billie lowered the automatic. "You don't want a party? Dean Orlando Cook, that's like saying you don't love your family."

"Of course I do, Mom, and thank you for that question. I've just been really busy and had to leave suddenly for a conference in Charleston, where in nine hours, by the way, I have a very important speech to give in front of Robert Timmins."

Duke Nichego nodded. "The motivational speaker? Very nice. Now listen to a speech I hope will motivate everyone. To put it simple––I am crazy person. I have tortured more people and stolen more socks than anyone in history of world. Did you hear of Japan tsunami? That was me––top of leaderboard was guy in Japan until I destroy his entire sock collection with giant wave. Give my bride Angelika to me, and everyone is walking away, not drowned in river or dead with bullet in face. If she does not go with me, definitely there is face-bullet action."

Emerson stamped her foot.

"Never!" she shouted.

"Dean," said his father. "Let her go with this man. After all, they're engaged, and you barely even know the girl."

Billie nodded her spiky blonde head. "We'll drive straight to Charleston, and you'll get to speak in front of Tim Robbins or whoever the flip he is."

"Robert Timmins, and I can't do that. I promised to keep her away from this maniac, and that's the end of it."

His father waved his arms with a jangle of gold bracelets. "In the heat of passion certain things are said. We understand and that's fine, Dean, but she's a crazy foreigner engaged to another crazy foreigner who wants her back. Just walk away, son, and we'll help you get through this."

"And to Charleston," said Billie.

Dean took Emerson's hand and squeezed it. They backed away from both groups toward the edge of the road.

"I can't for three reasons," he said. "First of all, you can say I'm a failed writer, failed speaker, and failed person in every way, but I always keep a promise. There's not much honor left in the modern world, so don't ask me to give up mine. Secondly, she's my wife, and that means I don't turn her over to sock-crazed Russians at the drop of a hat."

Nichego made a snoring sound. "Bored! Tell us third reason."

"Last of all, I love this girl from the tips of her toes to the top of her beautiful, stubborn head!"

Dean took the two-shot revolver from Emerson's hand.

"What are you doing?" she whispered.

"Trust me. Don't say anything, just trust me."

The pair slid over the protective barrier to the pedestrian walkway, and climbed up the waist-high railing at the edge of the bridge. They stood hand-in-hand above a thick river of fog, backs to everyone.

"Dean! Stop!" screamed his father, a tube of scarlet lipstick near his mouth.

"Bozhe moi," said Vassily.

Duke Nichego raised his hands. "Angelika, I take it back! Do not do this!"

Dean and Emerson nodded once to each other, and jumped.

Tracklist:

This Is Heaven To Me – Madeleine Peyroux

Down By The River – Neil Young

Ohio – The Black Keys
18

Our perception of time changes depending upon our mental state, because that's where we get our perception of time. A recent study by scientists at Ruzu Sokkusu University in Tokyo discovered that it was indeed true that "minutes felt like hours" when subjects were forced to watch episodes of The Nanny. In contrast, "hours felt like minutes" during a surprise visit by the university's cheerleading squad, or when the girls were allowed to give the test subjects a full body massage (data may have been skewed because test observers also participated).

Dean awoke to a world of brilliant white, buried to his neck in a pile of warm ivory powder. Clouds of white dust filled the air, as if a giant St. Michael were banging giant chalkboard erasers behind a giant school. Dean wriggled back and forth and slowly pulled his arms free of the soft material. Unlike snow, the powder had a sticky, warm consistency and seemed to fall through Dean's fingers in slow motion, but this could have been due to his near-concussion.

"Am I dead?" he said. "Helloooo out there ... Jehovah? Yahweh? Krishna? Michael Bolton?"

The snow bank a few feet to his right trembled in a tiny avalanche and Dean heard a moan. He twisted and kicked himself free of his own mountain of powder and dug toward the sound. His fingers touched warm skin, then an arm. Dean pulled hard and Emerson burst to the surface, coughing and completely plastered in white dust.

"As I expected," said Dean, wiping the powder from her face. "You're as beautiful in death as in life. How about me? Did I cross the pearly gates a few pounds lighter?"

Emerson glanced left and right suspiciously. "We are not in heaven. Where is the ice cream and rivers of chocolate?"

"I think you're confusing the land where all good people go after they die with the Land of Dairy Queen, where all fat people go to die."

Emerson giggled. She pushed Dean back against the powder and traced a finger across his cheek. She leaned forward and her white-dusted face was dangerously close to his.

"Did you really mean it?"

"Yes, of course. There's no chocolate at all."

"No. On the bridge, when you said you loved me."

"Ah, yes. I do remember, although it was literally a lifetime ago. I guess it's true. It's very hard for me to say things like that, but ever since you climbed from that ambulance compartment––"

Emerson straddled his waist. "Yes?"

"We can't do this," said Dean, twisting his hips in an attempt to escape.

"But we are husband and wife!"

"Like the Duke said, our marriage was fake. As fake as a bottle of Tang in a Beijing train station."

"That doesn't matter now. You just said we're in heaven, and I agree. When two lovers die together, their souls are bound forever."

"Still, I don't feel good about it. You're only eighteen, or were back on Earth, and I'm thirty-six. Even in heaven I could be your dad, if my parents had let me drink beer at that age."

Emerson laughed. "I'm not eighteen. I said that just to make myself look better. In Kamchatka, a girl who is twenty four and not married is called an old cleaning woman. If we see her on the street we say, 'Hello, old cleaning woman! Which house are you cleaning today?' "

"So you're twenty-four?" Dean chewed on his lower lip. "I could still be your father, if my parents had left the twelve-year-old me in front of a sorority house with two bottles of Thunderbird taped to my vest and a sign that said 'Get It Here.' "

"Do you like me, Mr. Dean Cook?"

"Yes, of course."

Emerson's breath was hot on his face. "Do you LIKE like me?"

Dean kissed her open mouth for a long, time-stopping moment, a mouth that tasted of strawberries and white dust.

"No," he whispered at last. "I LOVE love you."

[LEGAL NOTICE: Children and adults with a heart condition or pacemaker should avoid this section, take a walk in the park (I hear the swings are fantastic), catch up on the cricket match from yesterday, or recalculate the interest payments on that 100K debt you took out to attend graduate school in fashion design. Pregnant ladies are fine, as they've obviously ... Never mind, it's over already. Good. Wait, false alarm. Go back to the cricket.]

Afterwards, the pair snuggled together, Emerson's head on Dean's chest, both naked and covered in the strange, sticky powder.

"You were wonderful," murmured Emerson.

"Thanks," said Dean. "Was it ... heavenly?"

Emerson giggled. "Yes! Like an angel."

"Sorry about the crying. That doesn't usually happen."

"You are American man who is sensitive. The television said you would cry during sex."

"That bastard! Well, I never liked television anyway. All these years and not one birthday card from him."

She rubbed Dean's belly. "Do you know when I started to like you?"

"Two minutes ago?"

"Silly! The day your book fell from the sky. I lay on the pavement with all the Duke's relatives standing around, and your face stared at me from the back of the book. In my heart I knew you would help me escape."

"It was taken a long time ago," said Dean. "I was fifty pounds lighter."

"True, but your face was honest and your eyes clear."

"If I remember correctly, that photo was taken right after I received a letter from Publisher's Clearing House," said Dean. "I really thought that would be the year ..."

"Thank you for not giving me to Duke Nichego. You could have made it to your speech in time."

"I may be all kinds of awful, but I'm not that kind of awful. I've been wondering, why did the Duke call you Angelika?"

"Because that's my name."

"Not Emerson?"

"When we first met, I didn't want you to know my real name. I thought you would help me escape Nichego, and we would never see each other again. It wouldn't matter if you knew my name."

"Which is?"

"Angelika Ivanova."

Dean laughed. "Next you'll be telling me there aren't any Kamchatkan people in the mountains of West Virginia."

"That, too, was a lie. I could not ask for help without someplace to go. Without that, you might have given me to the American security forces, who would have tortured and sold me to Duke Nichego."

"You didn't have much of a plan, did you?"

She kissed him. "No, but I had you."

"Quite right. So should I call you Angelika or Emerson? Perhaps your legal name––Destiny Klara Schicklgruber?"

Emerson smiled. " 'Dear wife' is good enough for me."

SOMETHING POKED Dean in the ribs.

"Taste the freshness," he murmured.

"That one's alive," said a gravelly male voice. "He ain't no ghost."

Dean opened his eyes to a bearded face and deep blue sky. Beside him, Emerson yelped and grabbed the Amish dress to cover her body.

"Yep, definitely alive, both of them," said another voice, this one belonging to a clean-shaven older man in a knit cap. "I been working this river for thirty years, and I ain't seen nothing like this."

With all the delicacy one can muster in these situations, Dean covered his crotch with both hands.

"Excuse me! What's going on here?"

The bearded one laughed. "We should ask you that. It's our shipment of flour you're standing on."

"Shipment of flour?"

Dean pulled on his trousers and got to his feet. He and Emerson stood in the center of a crater, surrounded by a mountain of flour. The muddy Ohio stretched around a chain of barges, and at the end steamed a white, four-decker tugboat. On either side lay riverbanks and the orange-brown trees of Ohio.

"We saw a plume last night," said the older sailor. "Came out to see if it was fire, then heard this terrible groaning and moaning."

"Thought for sure it was a ghost," said the other. "That was an awful, murderous racket. It was like a woman being strangled by a man who was also being strangled."

"Yes, quite," said Dean.

"Also, we heard this horrible, nasty smacking sound, like someone hitting a side of beef with another side of beef."

"I've never been so afraid in my life," said the older sailor. "And I've seen Carrot Top in concert."

"I understand," said Dean, turning red.

"Good thing was, it didn't last that long, maybe a minute or two," said the bearded man. "We walked forward a little bit, and it started again!"

Dean held up a hand. "No need to explain."

"At that point, we skedaddled back to the towboat and called it a night," said the older one. "It was time for Friends anyway. So what you reckon made all that racket last night?"

"Probably a ghost," said Dean. "Not to change the subject, but is there any way we can take a shower? Maybe wash the flour out of our clothes?"

"Shower we can do," said the bearded man. "We've got a laundry, and can probably find a spare room."

"Thank you, but a room won't be necessary. When can we get off the boat?"

The bearded sailor waved at the wide, caramel-colored river. "You can leave now if you don't mind a swim. The closest place we can stop without putting the barges aground is Huntington, West Virginia. The current's pretty strong going upstream, so we probably won't get there 'til after midnight."

"It would be great if I could make a call," said Dean. "Could I use your radio or a cell phone?"

"Ha! Murphy spilled coffee on the radio last week," said the older man. He slapped his thigh. "Cell phones are too much trouble, all that modern world invading our peace and quiet. We got all we need: good paycheck, the flour pretty much takes care of itself, and the most beautiful river you ever seen. Working on a barge thirty days at a stretch––son, that's heaven."

The bearded sailor leaned forward and whispered, "We'd go crazy without the USA Network."

THE POWERFUL SHIP that housed all ten of the sailors was called a towboat, even though it pushed rather than pulled the long barges of flour. The rooms in the towboat were well-appointed, with a kitchen, dining room, living room, laundry, and quiet berths for everyone on board.

Dean and Emerson spent much of the day lounging about deck in bathrobes, waiting for their clothes to dry like trust-fund babies on a "Club Ohio" vacation cruise. Emerson had to keep wearing her Amish dress, as the sailors claimed not to have any female clothing on board. Dean was familiar enough with the habits of sailors to know this was a lie but decided not to press the issue. He refused any gifts of clothing and wore the simple Amish shirt and trousers with suspenders from Charlie's farm. This was only so he and Emerson would look like a pair and avoid nosy questions from the police, many of whom might think he'd kidnapped an Amish girl. Their hats and shoes had disappeared in the mountain of flour, but after much searching of dusty storage bins, the crew found two pairs of puffy gray snow boots and a black baseball cap with "Spaced" in large white letters. Dean was the fairer-skinned of the two, and appropriated the cap.

The towboat churned against the brown water with great determination, but traveled at a modest pace. Dean had never seen many of the tiny river towns from this perspective, only from the highway or on final approach to the Tri-State Airport in Huntington. An age of industry and success had come to the villages on the river and left almost as quickly. The solid two-story American Craftsman houses were all built before television, so each had a porch facing the street. Most were clean and well maintained with fresh coats of paint, like an open-air museum of wartime America. The towboat leisurely pushed her cargo under bridges that spanned the Ohio, both steel-beamed relics of the war and newer, more brilliant marvels of suspension engineering. To a man who had missed his best chance at fame and fortune, it was a melancholy homecoming. His spirits were only kept out of the proverbial doldrums by the fact that he'd just married a beautiful woman who actually liked him, had not punched him in the jaw yet, and who did not have the phrase "bring over the entire football team" in her vocabulary.

Showered and wearing dry clothes, Dean and Emerson stood at a railing aft of the pilothouse and watched the river bubble and hiss in the towboat's wake.

"Who would have known they shipped flour like this," said Dean. "I guess Tony was right all along."

Emerson leaned on the railing. "You jumped off the bridge and expected to die?"

"I heard a fog horn, saw the navigation lights, and thought there was a fifty-fifty chance we could land on a passing barge. Honestly, I wasn't thinking. I just didn't want you to go with the Duke, no matter what."

"Good, because I would not go with him, no matter what. Do you know, it was good that person rejected your book. If she had not thrown it out the window and struck me in the head, I'd be married to the Duke."

Dean sighed. "True, but where do we go from here? I've already missed the greatest speaking opportunity of my life. I'll never get close to Robert Timmins again––he's furiously punctual and rumored to have an incredible temper. Never mind his army of rabid followers that will probably hunt me down for not showing up."

Emerson slid an arm around his waist and squeezed. "Remember when we swam in the salt lake? You said your dream was to live on the river and watch the world go by. Look at where we are!"

"And you're traveling the world, albeit at the very slow pace of a river barge. However, unless we come upon a tragic boating accident involving a flock of Rockefellers, you won't have your Louis Vuitton handbag anytime soon."

"A girl must always have dreams," said Emerson. "You, dear husband, can write another book."

Dean laughed. "Nobody would believe what's happened to me this week."

"Maybe sell as science fiction, or romance. Do you call that 'sci-mance?' "

"Exactly," said Dean, hugging her.

The river flowed away from them, a vast stream of mud and bark and dead fish.

Tracklist:

Throwing It All Away – Genesis

Shaker Song – Spiro Gyra

Last Christmas – Wham!
19

A few minutes after midnight the towboat cut engines and began to coast the last few miles to Huntington. The largest city on this part of the Ohio with port facilities, it shone on the murky water like a string of Christmas lights. Once a jewel in Collis Potter Huntington's railroad-baron crown, the city had shouldered through the decline of rail, steel, and coal, but in the age of distributed computing and instant communications had begun to reinvent itself as a hub for health care and outsourced customer service.

The sailors left Dean and Emerson at the dock with handshakes and tight hugs respectively. Against Dean's wishes, the sailors had taken up a collection which amounted to over two hundred dollars. Emerson had lost all of her jewelry and the formerly flour-covered pair didn't have two halves of a credit card to rub together.

Dean waved furiously as the water churned behind the towboat and it slowly moved away from the dock.

"It's amazing the way people offer help when you need it," he said. "Without any benefit at all."

Emerson giggled as she waved at the departing men. "Then I will keep it a secret that all the sailors asked to marry me."

"Even the captain? He's older than Methuselah."

Emerson shrugged. "It is always this way with sailors."

They walked hand-in-hand through ten blocks of the warehouse district to the university, where Dean knew there would be places to stay. Past shuttered comic book stores, overgrown lots, and international houses of pancakes stood the gleaming neon horseshoe of the Silver Spur. A sixty-year-old relic of the nation's obsession with cowboys, the lemon-painted two-story motel had not fared as well as other buildings from the era. Peeling paint covered the wooden slats and grass spurted through the faded asphalt of the parking lot. The "Vacancies" sign was lit, however, and that was the most important fact for a pair of tired travelers.

An elaborate carving of a herd of wild horses trotting across the plains covered the lacquered wood of the double entrance doors. Dean remembered what Emerson had said about Kamchatkan men entering a room first, and pushed inside with a loud jangle of bells. A stooping, white-haired man shuffled into the lobby and took his place behind an ancient, glass-covered oak counter.

"Can I help you?"

"We'd like a room for the night," said Dean.

The old man glanced at Dean's suspenders and Emerson's plain gray dress. "Would you like the Mennonite package or the Lancaster County Deluxe?" He leaned forward and whispered, "Tell you what, feller––there's a special discount on The Shaker."

"Excuse me?"

The old man waved his hands. "Never mind. You're not Amish, my mistake."

"What's this about Mennonite and Shaker rooms?"

"Nothing."

"But you just said––"

"Listen, Mister, can't you see that I'm a strange old coot? I get confused sometimes. I turn on the TV in the mornings looking for David Hartman and Joan Lunden, and instead get a face-full of rap music. Nobody eats his eggs Benedict with a face-full of rap music."

"I don't care. I grew up around here, and I've never heard of a Mennonite room."

"I can't tell you. Haven't you heard of the Amish mafia? They'll come and burn this place down like they did the Shake Shoppe on Third Avenue."

Dean turned away. "Let's try another hotel, dear."

"All right, all right," said the old man. "The rooms aren't that much different from the English ones, they just don't have electricity. Well, apart from The Shaker. You put quarters in the bed and it vibrates real good. The little lady would love that, I'll tell you that for free. She's turning red, and that's a sure sign if I ever saw one."

Blood had indeed rushed to Emerson's face.

"I don't know what you mean!" she said.

"We'll be moving on," said Dean.

"Wait! Just this once I'll upgrade you to a Shaker at no charge," said the old man. "But if a guy called Ludovico Ariosto comes around asking questions, you never stayed here and I don't know Jack Squat or his momma."

Visions of a backwoods cabin, a tight-fitting miniskirt, and lipstick that tasted of roses flashed through Dean's mind.

"If Ludovico Ariosto does show up, I guarantee we won't be here for long."

DEAN SLEPT FITFULLY, running naked through miles and miles of a forest made entirely of tights and women's foundation garments. He woke early and showered while singing "Wake Me Up Before You Go Go"––an old homemade remedy for clearing away bad dreams. According to his father, any song by Wham would do the trick.

After they checked out of the Silver Spur, he took Emerson across the street to a Denny's and found seats by the window.

"How would you like your breakfast?" asked the waitress. "Mennonite, English, or Hutterite?"

"Miss, we're not Amish so don't even start," said Dean. "These '80's snow boots didn't give you a clue?"

"I'm sorry. I thought maybe you had cold feet. I mean, Amish are people, right? They can have cold feet. Or can they? Don't ask me, I'm a sociology major."

Dean rested his forehead on the cold Formica of the table.

"I'll give you a few minutes," said the waitress. "Would you like a paper?"

"Yes, thank you," said Emerson.

Dean murmured the words to "Last Christmas," his forehead still on the table, while Emerson turned the pages of the Herald-Dispatch.

"Can I read aloud?" asked Emerson. "To practice my English."

"No problem, dearest."

Emerson cleared her throat. " 'Interstate 64 construction in Barboursville to begin on Thursday and will restrict the highway to one lane ...' "

Dean ordered coffee, eggs, and bacon for two as Emerson read quietly for several minutes.

" 'A Melee-vational Mixup,' " read Emerson. " 'Charleston Civic Center was the scene of heavy rioting yesterday, when several groups clashed at the National Motivational Speaker's Conference sponsored by famous life coach Robert Timmins. According to Charleston Police Chief––' "

"Wait a second," said Dean. "Let me see that!"

Emerson pouted. "Okay, but you have to read it to me."

Dean scanned the article.

According to Chief Bob Duncan, the fighting began even before the doors of the conference officially opened. As fans of Dr. Timmins assembled outside the civic center, they exchanged words with a group of men and women who were part of Yogi Sanjeev Gupta's Holyisme Movement. The Timmins group allegedly became incensed when taunted by the Holyismiacs to "unleash the bank accounts within." Hundreds of Timminites overturned display tables, threw punches at passers-by, and set aflame the very flammable robes of the Holyismiacs. By mid-morning, police and firefighters had the scene almost under control until Ken Shimabara, the property magnate and speaker, stepped into the fracas by telling everyone they were stupid and poor because they hadn't bought an apartment building when they were six. The ensuing three-way riot between the Timminites, Holyismiacs, and Shimabarans lasted until mid-day, when someone remembered that General Hospital was on, and it was a new one. Dr. Robert Timmins has made a statement apologizing for the mess. Speakers scheduled for Wednesday, the first day of the conference, will be moved to Thursday. Thursday's schedule will be moved to Friday and the speakers for Friday will be rescheduled for "who cares, they're just a bunch of Shimabarans anyway and I need a shower," according to the press secretary for Dr. Timmins.

Dean sprinted over to the waitress and waved the newspaper in her face. "Is this today's?"

"Of course! Where do you think you're at, IHOP?"

Dean ran back to Emerson and interrupted a fork-load of eggs halfway to her mouth.

"We've got two hours to get to Charleston. My speech is today!"

"Really?"

"It's all in the paper. They rescheduled my speaking time for ten this morning."

"That's great!" Emerson jumped up and hugged him. "We must find the train immediately."

Dean shook his head. "This isn't Berlin, sweetheart. There aren't any passenger trains in West Virginia, at least not any fast ones."

"Airport? There must be airport."

"You want to get into a plane after jumping out the last one? US Airways doesn't hand out parachutes."

"I would suggest bicycle," said Emerson. "But not even the fastest will make it there in two hours."

"Some of my relatives live across the river. If I borrow a car, we can drive to Charleston with time to spare. Let's go back to the motel and call them."

Outside the office of the Silver Spur sat an obsidian Chrysler 300 with the engine still running. On the rear of the massive black car was a West Virginia license plate that read "FURIOSO."

Dean ignored the car and walked to the carved wooden doors of the entrance. Shouts of a familiar male voice vibrated the heavy wood and Dean froze, one hand on the golden pull-handle.

"Perhaps we should go somewhere else," he said.

Emerson pouted. "You said there is no time! Not even for me to finish eggs and fried pig."

"Right," said Dean. "No time."

He stared at the black Chrysler, wheels spread wide on the sun-faded pavement. Even at idle the engine breathed and clicked like a slobbering hyena, transforming the car into a peculiarly hairy Italian wrestler who had chased a naked young Dean through the woods during a peculiarly hairy birthday party.

"I think we're about to steal a car," he said.

Tracklist:

Run To You – Bryan Adams

King of the Road – Roger Miller

Cleveland Rocks – Ian Hunter
20

The Charleston Civic Center sat on the tree-lined bank of the Kanawha River like a smug white-and-blue pillbox, if pillboxes were giant conference centers surrounded by hotels and parking garages. Luckily it was an hour from Huntington and right off I-64.

Dean parked at a street meter, searched his pockets for change, then realized that paying for parking was rather silly in a car stolen from a murderous Italian fifteen minutes before a speech at the National Motivational Speaker's Conference.

He ran with Emerson through the crowds of waiting fans and under security tape toward the Civic Center. Dean pushed through glass doors marked "Conference Speakers Only." Staff in dark blue suits with clipboards in their hands ran pell-mell through the lobby on various missions. Near the front of the lobby a lady in gray suit sat behind a table with a banner labeled "Registration."

The lady looked up as Dean entered the lobby.

"Can I help you?"

"Sir! Stop right there," said a deep voice behind Dean. "Return to the line with the other guests."

A security guard approached, his arms stretched out like he was shoving an impossibly fat and invisible lady.

Dean waved down at his outfit. "Do I look like one of the rabble?"

"I know you guys are half off today, but that doesn't mean free," said the guard.

Dean followed his pointed finger to a crowd of bearded men pressed against the glass of the entrance doors. All wore dark suits and black, wide-brimmed hats.

"I'm not Amish! I'm a conference speaker."

"Whew," said the registration lady, and wiped imaginary sweat from her forehead. "Thought we'd have to Tase you for a second. What's your name, Sugah?"

"Dean Cook."

"Yes, we've got you on the schedule, Mr. Cook. You speak at eight o'clock tonight, on the topic of––gracious me––'Osama Bin Swallowed.' "

Dean sighed. "Not Dane Cook––Dean Cook: d-e-a-n."

"Oh! Sorry for the mix-up, Mr. Cook." She rechecked the schedule papers. "For a second my heart was all a-flutter at meeting the amazingly talented comedian. Dear me, the things that come out of that man's mouth! Between you and me and the wall, I'd do the marryin' if he was doing the askin'. Have you met him?"

"Could we move this along? I'm in kind of a hurry."

"Certainly, sir. I see you're scheduled to speak in the main auditorium in––oh dear Lord of Hosts––twelve minutes. Could I see some identification?"

The security guard crossed his beefy arms. "Yeah, Mr. Cook. Show us some I.D."

"Here's the thing––my girlfriend destroyed my passport. Not this girl with me, she's my wife. Well, not really, but it's a long story. I don't have a driver's license, but I had one of those Matricula Consular cards from Tijuana, for reasons that are neither here nor there. Suffice it to say, I was using that for I.D. The actual card, however, is somewhere between the Great Salt Lake and the Merciful Sisters of Saint Patrick. I might have dropped it in Nebraska. I definitely did not have it with me when we parachuted out of the plane over Kentucky, when the Amish took us captive, or when we jumped off that bridge into a barge of flour. I'm not saying it could be anywhere, because it couldn't be on the Moon, obviously, since I'm not a fascist, but it's not ... here."

"All right, bud, come with me," said the guard.

"Get your hands off me! Call the people at the main auditorium and ask them if Dean Cook is there yet. He won't be, because Dean Cook is talking to you right now and feeling a little strange using his own name so much!"

"Just a moment, sir," said the registration lady.

After speaking into a handheld radio and confirming with auditorium staff who were, in fact, frantically chewing their fingernails while waiting for Dean Cook to arrive, she commandeered an electric cart and the security guard and drove all four of them through the halls of the Civic Center at dangerous speed, exactly like a frantic conference registration lady at the controls of an electric cart. Dean had only a minute left before his speech as she careened to a squealing halt behind the main stage. The cart hissed and vomited black, evil-smelling fumes from every surface.

"Code Red," she screamed. "Code Red!"

Two muscular men in "Back Stage" T-shirts threw Dean and Emerson over their shoulders like sacks of grain and ran at top speed. These brawny Mercuries wove through boxes of electronics, leapt over audio cables, dodged racks of microphones, and at last set Dean and Emerson down at a sign labeled "Main Aud. Stage Right."

Dean heard the rumble of a huge crowd and constant applause. A skinny young man with a headset and microphone appeared from behind a curtain and yelled into his ear.

"Are you Dean Cook? You've got thirty seconds."

Dean nodded and took a few deep breaths. He looked at Emerson, and she squeezed his hand.

"You'll do fine."

"I might, if I could remember what I was supposed to say."

"You forgot your speech?!!"

"I thought I was going to have a few days in Charleston to memorize it. As it happens, my birthday got in the way. One disaster piled onto another disaster and I just didn't have time to prepare."

"Dear, sweet husband," Emerson put her arms around his neck and kissed him. "Good luck."

The applause continued as an extremely tall, older gentleman with white hair and a mustache jogged from the stage. His face dripped with sweat.

"John Cleese," gasped Dean. "I mean––Sir John Cleese!"

"Bloody disaster out there, mate," said the exhausted actor as he shook Dean's hand. "I've never been heckled like that since boarding school. If I were you, I'd scamper off to somewhere where they respect British humor. Australia comes to mind."

A platoon of stage handlers whisked away the tall Briton. The floor vibrated with the deep voice of an announcer.

"Yes ... well. That was a nasty performance. I'd to remind everyone that one horrific comedian does not tar the reputation of an entire people, except perhaps in this case. Our apologies to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth for having to live in a country with such filth. The next rising star of the motivational industry hails from the great city of San Jose, California. For almost a decade, he's worked from the ground up to supercharge Silicon Valley leadership and motivate highly paid, overfed, and underworked employees. He recently finished a contract with the number-one corporation in social media, where he exhorted everyone to 'get a life and stop using computers so much.' Here to stir the pot of your lifelong dreams and drop a few spices of his own is Deeeeeeeeaaan Cook!"

Dean took a deep breath and walked into the lights. The applause changed to laughter: a few scattered hoots at first, then full-blown guffaws.

Dean nodded to the astonished master of ceremonies and stood behind the microphone. Before him sat an audience of at least a thousand, some close by on the floor of the auditorium and others in sloped rows around the edges, every group clustered in sections color-coded to represent a different motivational school. Police wearing armored gear and slapping riot batons against their thighs lined the aisles and the back wall. Rob Timmins and several hundred disciples of his rich and famous philosophy filled the front rows.

"Good morning, ladies and gentlemen," said Dean. "I'd like to talk to you today about three points."

"Rough Around The Edges," yelled someone from the back.

"Isolated Incident," shouted another wag. "Harmful If Swallowed!"

"I'm Dean Cook, not the comedian," said Dean. "If you want him, you'll have to come back in nine hours. Probably seven with traffic and parking."

"Not funny," yelled another heckler.

"Shouting those hurtful words at me, does that really make you feel better?"

"Yes!"

"I think it doesn't," said Dean. "Deep inside, you feel like you're not good enough. You think you're not a good person."

"Look at those Moon boots! It's the Amish spaceman!"

Dean pulled the microphone off the stand and walked across the stage toward the heckler.

"By making fun of my puffy snowboots, my plain clothing with suspenders, and my Spaced hat, you think everyone respects you. For a few seconds after that, you feel good about yourself. They're laughing at me, right? They're laughing, and it was all because of you."

"Yes!"

"But deep inside, you know they should be laughing at you, because you know you've failed. The grades in high school that weren't good enough, the classes that you barely passed in college, the girlfriends that weren't good-looking enough, the jobs that paid nothing ... What a list of failures. I'm talking about myself now, because standing before you on this stage is the King of Failure."

The crowd hushed.

"When I was young I failed at every single endeavor that life or my parents threw at me. Name it and I was wretched: baseball, basketball, mathematics, chemistry, personal relationships, shopping, walking on the street without breaking momma's back, even dressing myself. It was a constant topic of conversation whether or not I had been dropped on my head as a child, or whether or not my parents SHOULD have dropped me on my head as a child. Even today there are few things in my life that do not end in catastrophe, as is obvious by my appearance in this hybrid of Amish and Ohio-boatman clothing. To be fair, if you worked in the fields or on the river like they do, you'd want something this durable. Mending the knees on a pair of Garanimals is hard enough––never mind when you're river-sick."

Dean walked toward the center of the stage.

"I said that I had three points to deliver. You're probably aware of all three but ignore them, just as everyone is aware of combustion engines, but ignores them until your car runs out of gas or the timing belt shreds on the way to Krispy Kreme to buy creamy treats for a very special girl on a very special Friday night. These secrets are not contained in a series of audiobooks, a special tea from Bhutan, or 24-Hour Fitness. I'll tell you the truth freely and honestly. The first point is this: you're a failure."

"You know it, even if you don't show it. Especially if you don't show it. We're all festering bags of offal filled with squirming mealworms–-that's a scientific fact. We will always come up short in the grand scheme of life simply because we aren't perfect and never will be. Accept in your heart and mind––totally, not halfway––that you are a complete clown of the first water, a tapeworm in the intestines of a modern society that was built by men and women with more courage, intelligence, and tapeworms than you. Only then can you rebuild your life. The alternative to this process is to go into politics or the theater."

"Once you've admitted your failures, find part of your life that gives you the most reward and focus on that. Perhaps you've lost a bid for the Nobel Prize in Physics and disappointed your parents. Focus on the happiness you gained while researching those physics things. Don't worry, your parents will eventually call again––they should have had more kids but didn't, so you're sitting in the catbird seat. Perhaps you haven't been the best father. Spend time with your children if it makes you happy. If not, there's always Alaska, and having other children. I'm not saying to do whatever you want because that would lead to chaos––no one wants a hippie at the controls of a 747––but if flying a large cylinder filled with screaming babies and peanuts and no parachutes through the air gives you joy, then let it give you joy. I won't judge that. The people inside that plane may judge you, and rightfully so, but not me."

Dean waved Emerson onto the stage.

"Finally, we've arrived at the third point of my three-point plan for turning around your life, business, company, or family reunion––once you've found something you love, don't ever give up."

Emerson stepped meekly across the stage and held Dean's hand.

"During the last few days I had many opportunities to quit. My girlfriend left me, I was chased by a murderous Kamchatkan mobster, and my parents tried to throw me a birthday party. If I'd given up at any one of those stages, I wouldn't have married this beautiful woman with a heart of gold. Okay, so we're not really married, and she doesn't have a real heart of gold because that's ridiculous and she'd be dead in seconds, but I hope you see my point. If you're as lucky as I've been and find a guiding light for your life like her––not specifically her, because as soon as we leave here we're getting married for real––then hold on tight, because it's not worth it to let go."

Dean and Emerson bowed together. Everyone in the crowd jumped to their feet with furious applause, including Robert Timmins. Bundles of roses landed at the feet of the smiling couple, and they waved at the unending cheers.

Two familiar figures ran down the aisle, dodging the hands of police and too-friendly Timminites. Four security guards tackled the largest and most round of the pair, but she flung the burly men to the side like empty bags of onion-flavored snacks. The two women climbed onto the stage, and with tears in his eyes Dean hugged Lin and Fanta.

The applause faded and the audience settled into quiet murmurs. Dean walked with his three companions toward stage right.

"Bastardo!"

At a nearby fire exit, the massive, hairy Ludovico Ariosto held up a small black box.

"You are stupid weasel," yelled the large Italian. "I have LoJack!"

Dean pointed at him. "Sponsored by Ken Shimabara!"

Screams of outrage erupted from a third of the audience. A human wave of Armani-suited Timminites rolled forward and covered the Italian in a mass of fists and Gucci loafers. Ironic, thought Dean, that fine Italian fashions would be used to beat an Italian in such a fine fashion.

Backstage, Dean took a handkerchief from Lin and wiped sweat from his forehead.

"It's good to see a familiar face, Lin. How did you find us?"

She shrugged. "After the riots all the speakers were rescheduled. I guessed that you'd figure it out and show up today."

"Good guess," said Dean. "That was exactly my plan."

"Fanta and I drove from Nebraska in a rental car. How did you get here from Cincinnati?"

"It's a long story."

"Promise me I don't have to drive across the country again, that's all."

"It's very hard to predict the future, Lin, as many times as I've tried, but believe me, I have no desire to repeat the trip."

Someone gripped Dean's shoulder firmly. He turned and shook the hand of Robert Timmins.

"Congratulations, son," said Robert. "I haven't heard a speech with that kind of energy since Phil Donahue drank a whole bottle of Tony's Red Indian Juice."

"Thank you. I didn't have much time to prepare."

"I know, I know," said Robert. "But that leads to electric performances, just like Phil and that juice. Would you like to join my speaking tour next month?"

"Sir, I'd like nothing better."

"Great. See my assistant for details. Also, I love the hat! Spaced is one of my favorite shows––that Nick Frost is an absolute riot. Speaking of which, I need to get back to the fighting."

Dean watched him leave and rubbed the back of his neck with one hand.

Emerson jumped up and down and clapped. "You got a job! It's so wonderful!"

Lin shook her head. "Cheer up, Dean. You always said Robert Timmins was your hero."

"I know what's wrong," said a familiar voice. "I bet he wishes his parents were here."

Frank Cook squeezed by a pile of boxes, followed closely by Billie and Chip. Dean's parents both gave him a hug.

"Son, don't ever jump off a bridge again," said Billie.

Dean nodded. "I promise. What happened with the Duke?"

"What do you think happened? I'm a very good shot," said Billie.

"You didn't kill them, did you?"

Frank laughed. "Worse. We left them with that muscular Amish Adonis. We gave him the impression that the Duke and his lackey were the ones shooting all his farmer friends. Those two will be milking cows and smelling the wrong end of a barn for a long, long time."

Dean collapsed to his knees, his face as white as barge flour.

"You don't look so good," said Lin. "Maybe you should lie down."

Emerson knelt beside him. "Dean! What's wrong?"

"I'm fine," Dean whispered hoarsely. "It's just that ... I forgot about Nick Frost and that other guy."

DRESSED IN A DIRT-SMEARED Amish shirt and trousers with suspenders, Diedrich strained to lift the huge pumpkin into a wagon made of rough-hewn wooden planks.

"That's another one," he said.

"Nice and easy, mate, nice and easy," said Nick Frost, from the cushioned driver's seat. A broad-brimmed straw hat shielded him from the morning sun and a rifle casually rested on his lap. A brown mare hitched to the front of the wagon lazily switched her tail.

In a nearby field, Sergio struggled to carry a pumpkin the size of beach ball toward the wagon. The pale, sweat-soaked actor was dressed in the same Amish farmer's garb as Diedrich.

Diedrich took a swig from a plastic water bottle and watched Sergio shuffle over the uneven mounds of dirt.

"You know, Nick, our old friend doesn't look so good," he said.

"He's not our friend, you moron," said Nick. "Did you forget already how he tortured us and kept us locked up?"

"Right, about that. When can we have another quiz show?"

"If you ask me that one more time, I swear to God I'll murder everyone in sight."

Sergio hoisted a pumpkin into the wagon. "You won't shoot anyone, you fat windbag. You're not a stone-cold killer, just an overweight Limey with a Napoleon complex."

Nick leaned forward. "Go for the gun again," he said through clenched teeth. "I promise I won't miss this time."

"Guys! Why do you always have to fight?" asked Diedrich. "It's like I'm back home, and my mom and dad are throwing plates at each other."

"I'm sorry," said Nick. "Did your parents separate when you were a child?"

Diedrich shook his head. "No, I was talking about last week."

"Right," said Nick. "Well, keep loading the pumpkins, boys. Once we make enough money for a plane ticket back to London, then I'm outta here."

Sergio held his arms straight out. "Stop this nonsense! You can leave anytime!"

"I know, but it's more fun watching you sweat," said Nick.

"I wish the police would have recognized either of you or what dumb TV programs you were on," said Sergio. "At least in prison I'd get some rest."

"Well, they didn't," said Diedrich. "They also didn't recognize you, Mister Please-Kiss-My-Butt-I'm-a-Famous-Actor-That-Nobody-Remembers."

Sergio leaned close to Diedrich's face. "I can't help it we're in Kentucky. These gormless tobacco-chewing cretins can't spell 'Martinez!' They can't even spell 'spell'! "

Two more pumpkins rolled into the wagon.

"Stop with fighting words," said Duke Nichego. He adjusted his wide-brimmed Amish hat. "It is making Vassily and me see the––how do you say––red mist on our eyes."

Nick spread his arms and spoke to the blue sky. "Calgon, take me away!"

END
Spurious Footnotes

1. Orlando Furioso (X, 84): "There never was such beauty in another man. Nature made him, and then broke the mould."

2. The correct form of the joke: "Euripedes pants, Eumenides pants."

3. This never happened.

4. December 15, 1967, in Point Pleasant, West Virginia.

5. As told to me through the drive-through window of a Rax in Ironton, Ohio, by an employee on B shift named Carl who wishes to remain anonymous.

6. Fong lay on the motel bed and smoked while Lee paced the threadbare carpet. As he walked, Lee rubbed his face with both hands, like a teenager trying to scrub everything away.

"Maybe they won't see it. It's so small," he said in Chinese.

Fong hated Lee and his working-class Beijing accent. The slurred r's made him sound like a dog trying to talk. Fong wasn't high-class either but at least he made an effort to speak like a human being. He flipped the fake security badge onto the nightstand.

"Let's try it anyway," said Lee.

Fong shook his head. "The date is wrong on the chip. The scanner will pick it up."

"But my family won't get the money!"

"I know. Do you think I'm stupid?"

Fong lit another Hongtashan from his dying cigarette and flipped the butt across the room. It bounced off the peeling wallpaper and lay on the dead carpet like a dead mealworm, a trail of smoke curling up from its dead mouth.

Lee stared at the blue security uniform in the closet, then punched the flimsy plaster of the nearby wall. "It has to get into the––"

"Stop!"

Fong lowered the finger he'd pointed at Lee. He finished his cigarette in silence.

"Time for what the Americans call, 'B Plan,'" he said.

7. 2 Kings 2:23-24––"And he went up from thence unto Bethel: and as he was going up by the way, there came forth little children out of the city, and mocked him, and said unto him, Go up, thou bald head; go up, thou bald head. And he turned back, and looked on them, and cursed them in the name of the Lord. And there came forth two she bears out of the wood, and tare forty and two children of them."

8. Again, this never happened.

9. Children should not be reading this.

10. The two Chinese left the motel and sprinted across the street. Leeani used both hands to rip the seam of her pencil skirt to the waist, and clicked her heels like Dorothy. The spiked pumps were very fashionable and five-inch, but also military-grade footwear. The spikes made a metallic snap as they flattened to a soft rubber sole, and Leeani began to run.

11. The county population was 62,450 as of the 2010 census.

12. The original lyrics were "God save the Queen - God save Windowleen."

13. Try Wilkinson's down the block. No, not that way, the other way.

14. A better novel that's set in post-apocalyptic Colorado: A Girl Called Badger.

15. Originally, it was to be a coming-of-age story about the daughter of a traveling barbeque salesman and titled "A Grill Called Badger."

16. It takes three hundred bands to make a super-stripe fishtail bracelet.

17. According to Jim. Not that putrid television show––Jim the plumber who lives across the street. He once busted his head on the inside of a cabinet and it swelled up like a watermelon. His head, not the cabinet.

18. One baby in two trash cans.

19. Orlando Furioso (XVIII, 58): "Che l'uomo il suo destin fugge di raro."

20. It's an urban myth, because frogs always jump out of the pot before it starts to boil.

21. It was a beastly thing for Charles to do and everyone knew it, especially Charles. The ring had been a gift from his previous fiancée, Angela, who had died of consumption only a handful of years before. The shock of presenting this ring to her sister Amelia and asking for her hand in marriage before the proper end of mourning turned the entire community of Biggleswarte against him, and he was hanged from an oak tree the next day. This was a frightful problem for Charles, but not, in fact, for anyone else.

22. Peter Ostrum left the film business and later became a veterinarian.

23. Manufactured by baby monkeys on equipment that processes tree nuts. What other kind of nut is there? I'm not counting peanuts, that's a fruit.

24. Developed by Markus Persson and released for the PC on May 17, 2009.

25. The /a/ in "Lara Croft" is pronounced the same as the /a/ in "lard," not like "Larry."

26. The security demands of the conference and an unfortunate ten-minute satellite blackout meant that Leanni was on her own. She didn't like being on her own, and didn't like having only Pete as backup. She sprinted down the alley after the Chinese and turned a corner. Something boomed and a massive force like an elephant's kick slammed into her stomach and rolled her over and over on the asphalt. The Chinese were stupid and more interested in getting away with the virus than finishing her off, however, and Leeani pulled her Colt XSP from the leg holster. Holding her bloody abdomen with one hand, she turned sideways on the asphalt and emptied the magazine at the backs of the two running men. One flung out his arms and collaped with a hole in the back of his skull and one in his spine, but the other only missed a few steps and kept on going.

Leanni wasn't one to pray in time of need or otherwise, but she knew that wherever this Fong was sprinting with his vial of toxic virus, it wasn't going to end well.

27. "Die bayerische Bier" by Die Koenigsbaum

28. It's a little known fact that all billionaires wear pantyhose under their trousers and attribute a large part of their success to this humble but fashionable support garment.

29. Gimme A Call by Sarah Mlynowski

30. Filmed in Munich in 1970 and released on June 30, 1971.

31. Eddie Deezen of Midnight Madness fame

32. Previously known as "Twist Bands."

33. This "Land" did exist as recently as sixty years ago, but was three hundred kilometers by bus from Lhasa and received few foreign visitors. Consistent with the legend, there were mountains of chocolate, rivers of fudge syrup, valleys of ice cream, hillocks of cake, and vaults of candy. One of the Guggenheim boys heard of this confectionary Xanadu and trekked overland with a swarm of sherpas in 1957. However, he was unaware of his own allergy to peanuts and died there in a contradictory mix of utter joy and extreme agony. His family torched the place and shipped the inhabitants to Belize.

34. Spoon Snake, from Noel Fielding's "Luxury Comedy"

35. Steve Coogan, without question.

36. Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971). The children lick the wallpaper and Gene Wilder pinches the cheeks of Veruca Salt and her little tongue sticks out.

37. For the third time, this never happened.

38. Contrary to what is stated in the passage, the main character is not 'too sexy for a shirt.'

39. If you've made it this far, you may have realized that every single footnote I've included is completely fake. If not, the nice man will be in soon with your medication, Aunt Martha.

40. So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish

Full Soundtrack

1. Moi Je Joue – Brigitte Bardot, Alain Goraguer

1. Saturday In The Park – Chicago

1. Computer Games – Mi-Sex

2. Maui Waui – Chuck Mangione

2. Ain't Nobody's Business But My Own – Tennessee Ernie Ford & Kay Starr

2. Hells Bells – AC/DC

3. Born To Run – Bruce Springsteen

3. Something About You – Level 42

3. Jubel (Original Mix) – Klingande

4. The Modern World – The Jam

4. Our House – Madness

4. Runnin' Down A Dream – Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers

5. Nightshift – The Commodores

5. Obsession – Animotion

5. Take On Me – A-ha

6. Cowboys and Indians – Pearl Harbor & The Explosions

6. Familiar Spirit – Allen Bruce Ray

6. I Got Stripes – Johnny Cash

7. Missing Cleveland – Scott Weiland

7. Major Tom (Voellig Losgeloest) – Peter Schilling

7. Why Does It Always Rain On Me? – Travis

8. Drivin' – Pearl Harbor & The Explosions

8. White Wedding – Billy Joel

8. Ila Nzour Nebra – Jalal Hamdaoui, Driver

9. Russian Dance (Trepak) – Christmas At The Devil's House

9. God Save The Queen – The Sex Pistols

9. Surfin' Bird – The Ramones

10. Tonight, Tonight, Tonight – Genesis

10. The Lady In Red – Chris Deburgh

10. The Way It Is – Bruce Hornsby and The Range

11. Dreams – The Cranberries

11. Our Lips Are Sealed – The Go-Go's

11. True – Spandau Ballet

12. Learning To Fly – Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers

12. Run-Around – Blues Traveler

12. The Joker – Steve Miller Band

13. Losing My Religion – R.E.M.

13. Salsa Cubano – Mambo Companeros

13. Son de Baloy – Afro-Cuban All-Stars

14. Knockin' On Heaven's Door – Bryan Ferry

14. Begin the Beguine – Artie Shaw & His Orchestra

14. Lone Red-Tailed Hawk – Allen Bruce Ray

15. My City Was Gone – The Pretenders

15. Head Over Heels – Tears For Fears

15. Call Me – Go West

16. Ain't Gone 'N' Give Up On Love – Stevie Ray Vaughn & Double Trouble

16. Space Oddity – David Bowie

16. I Fought The Law – The Clash

17. The Lonesome River – The Stanley Brothers

17. Oh Very Young – Cat Stevens

17. Suicide Is Painless – Johnny Mandel

18. This Is Heaven To Me – Madeleine Peyroux

18. Down By The River – Neil Young

18. Ohio – The Black Keys

19. Throwing It All Away – Genesis

19. Shaker Song – Spiro Gyra

19. Last Christmas – Wham!

20. Run To You – Bryan Adams

20. King of the Road – Roger Miller

20. Cleveland Rocks – Ian Hunter

 Full soundtrack on Spotify
Coming Soon

The Roman Spaceman

Dean Cook travels to Europe to unravel the mystery of his kidnapped bride. Unfortunately for Dean, he travels with the only person in the world more oblivious to reality than himself: his Uncle Phineas.

Available now! For updates and release information, visit amishspaceman.com.
