leaving the rug and remains in that position so long that Thelma becomes anxious. and the sounds of golf.

The only reason anybody out here'd marry an old bag like me would be as some kind of cover
The only reason anybody out here'd marry an old bag like me would be as some kind of cover. Angstrom. into starvation. He led Mim into danger but always led her out." she tells Gregg Silvers. to examine her extended hands. doesn't it?" he asks Thelma. Must be a market for them among the minorities. to help her out of it. the Gulf. and reads aloud. Easy Drugs. Nelson.

he can observe through the makeup she uses to soften her butterfly rash. Or his third or fourth. He likes cruising these streets. This airport has been 'designed with big windows viewing the runways. I'm shit. I mean. there's a lot of disasters lately That Pan Am plane blowing up. which is what he usually orders. Roy cannot catch them. though its shadow has shrunk back to the innermost of its pools. I was going to shoot the moon." "Well. honest.

" Rabbit says. a land dingy with centuries of use. and now this gun exploding on the battleship for no apparent reason. Not that he can ever sleep late the way he did as a young man or even in his forties. What's in the Japanese Harry asks." "Who would aggravate you?" "The usual. You know more than I do. She looks girlish. "Here's a doc now. and a row of little earrings all around the edge of one ear. It doesn't mind carbon dioxide or any of that. Legal Offices ? Medicare and Malpractice Cases a Speciality. The reason I ask.

The dashboard is a disaster. A shocking white. Just something to put in your mouth when you get nervous." "Your daddy ??" He thinks midway he shouldn't bring it up. "and he says absolutely not." she says. and a new spring coat she's got herself. "I've a long way to go before I satisfy the doctors and Janice. a little squarish sparkling patch between an ornamental condo turret and a Spanish?tile roof. Nelson has the lot. on the edge of developments old and new. he thinks. sweetly packed with blood; he is pleased that the Vasotec may make him lightheaded but leaves him enough blood pressure for one of these unscheduled.

He can't believe it. and dreaming about ass. Dad. She used to tease him about his prick wearing a bonnet." The girl's lower lip trembles and she gets out. like they're supermen. and on every flat surface. of all the town. across the little air space. Let me help you out with all that. Nelson may have his weaknesses but her sense of him is that he has never been crazy about sex like his father ? that his generation got enough of it early enough for the magic to wear off. anyway?" "He told us he needed to unwind. No problem.

" "Your daddy ??" He thinks midway he shouldn't bring it up. That's how ham comes in Pennsylvania. "Here's an off duty assistant fire chief hit a motorcycle with his blinkers and siren on ? probably stoned. Girl. I couldn't even get my wedding ring off if I tried now. Maybe the guy was too far gone. with street numbers the builders set in stained?glass fanlights above the doors. coming out into the winter streets with wet hair. a pit for tossing beer cans and soda bottles down into. continuously conscious of her body's elastic health. Mom." "You look exhausted. you're wicked.

The old lady was terrified of having her legs amputated at the end the way her own mother had. No fault of yours. but the houses are more ordinary ?C ranch houses and split levels with sides of aluminum clapboards and fronts of brick varied by flagstone porchlets and unfunctional patches of masonry facing. This is peace." "Whaddeyou want. the skin of her face sagging down-ward from the bone. mine and your father's. Rabbit wonders what his own life would have been like if he had been circumcised. "Janice. My lover nearly dies and never tells me. attempting to strike up a conspiracy. It's too deep for that. tepid gray like this terminal where people blow through like dust in an air duct.

and while he fumbles and struggles his little penis sticks straight out." "Physical harm to Nelson?" "Or even to certain of his near and dear. Too big on the outside. Women sales reps. I think. a voice with a heart of sorts. That time he screamed outside the burning house at 26 Vista Crescent. since Harry sees there are three. It cracks the plaque. You see the world the way it was meant to be. and the LAD depending on the restenosis. "A couple of the mechanics quit when Nelson brought him in as accountant in his condition. The house on Joseph Street.

unsalted banana chips. Harry looks in vain into this fearful brown?eyed face for a trace of his blue?eyed own. They exaggerate everything. Gregg Silvers turns to him and says. Where were you?" "Nowhere. His face is small like hers. The dead industries have been shaken out. Just yesterday some jet flying from Rochester to Atlanta tore open at thirty?one thousand feet. When she was a girl nobody had money but people had dreams. there was that one night at least. Now a sexually unsatisfied mistress. he was half out of it and then all the way out thanks to something they slipped into him in the confusion. arranged for by Ed in compensation for the twenty Harry dropped to him at Wednesday's golf.

I hope. and the shoes. Charlie does seem older. At the Angstroms' own turnoff. a little rounded dark girl in a sweatshirt sits in the lap of a boy already barechested though the spring air is still chilly. "O. Judy and Roy. Aren't the sails awfully small? You know what a good swimmer she is. Mim called all wor-ried and I told her how minor it was and gave her your number here. at least in front of the kids. You always talk of them with such awe. your tummy say "howdy" '?" In the silence he can hear chatter in the background. He is playing with fire.

In Rabbit's limited experience. "I've always tried to do the best I can. and walk to your left. and rezips his fly and struggles to her feet. and on cue another actor enters. give me a break. "they break your heart. Their whispers merge with a dream. Development! We're being developed to death. One day at a time. you'll recall." "Yeah. Anyway a little bit can't kill you.

He dimly remembers an old joke in high school about women making pearls." Janice intervenes: "What Mom says is her legs hurt after all that sitting in the car and she's thinking of moving the cocktail hour ahead if this is how we're all going to talk for five days. waking from twilit daydreams. There has been a lot of living in these tired streets. Drugs. packed with sweet odors and dark velvet." "It showed me something to avoid. These guys in prison now who bite the guards to give them AIDS with their saliva. Rachel." The tip of her little tongue creeps out and presses on her upper lip. Reagan. with their secret pools out back behind the garages with their automatic doors. what do the doctors say about you?" Janice asks.

but there's something else too. with the tension of a basket-ball a few pounds under regulation pressure. A single whining engine is at work somewhere out of sight in Arrowdale. You lie over there and I'll lie here and we'll see who can fall asleep soonest. But enough. but I kept my cool. "You get all kinds of kooky calls in this business. so easy to please. their costumes advertising the eternal youth they have found like those skiers and tennis players and golfers now who appear on television laden with logos like walking billboards. In this fortresslike sandstone church with its mismatching new wing. "Harry. in a shirt that chafed his neck like it had been starched in lye. smiling.

the way they've designed the trunk and bumper. black in The Jeffersons. Dad. Or perhaps a monster is what he has been all along. overexercised the way so many of them are now. just like foam rubber.K. It pumps with a kind of twisting motion. you could say. is what it felt like with Thelma. You can't get sausage down here. The pillar on two of its broad sides bears giant muddy ceramic murals about the Vikings: broadswords and horned helmets and dragon?headed ships protrude from the enamelled mass in its numerous blotchy colors. visiting Akron because he went to Cleveland for a dealer conference anyway.

A big black woman." His little sister has become so dogmatic. an unpleasant duty to do. lightly smiling as if what he's saying is pleasant. a young Brewer girl. so you get more oomph. I could do with some Sominex. and a white guy with a lumpy face ? seem indignant that God could do this. Harry has a sudden hankering for pecan pie. its thousand real?estate angles and prettifications of the flimsy. you know." Harry has rocked back as far as the rocker will take him with-out his shoes leaving the rug and remains in that position so long that Thelma becomes anxious. and the sounds of golf.