FIVE.

BLACKBURN THE BREADWINNER.

Blackburn met Dolores in a San Francisco record shop four days after his twenty-second birthday. They reached for the same copy ofThe Kids Are Alright at the same moment. It was the last one in the bin.

"Toss you for it," Blackburn said.

"Bet you can't," Dolores said.

Blackburn bought the alb.u.m, and Dolores came to his apartment to listen to it. Blackburn hardly heard the music even though it made the windows rattle. His senses were full of Dolores. She was wearing running shorts and a halter top. She had golden hair, green eyes, a brown stomach, and long legs. She was California incarnate, and Blackburn was not pleased with himself for wanting her. But there it was.

He was h.o.r.n.y as a mule deer.

"My name is Eddie Reese," he said. That was the name on his new driver's license and Social Security card.

"Got anything to eat?" Dolores asked. Her voice was like honey poured over an apple.

Blackburn fed her pepperoni slices and Cheetos. Then they kissed, and Dolores said she would stay the night if Blackburn promised to use protection. Blackburn promised.

That night Blackburn told Dolores that he loved her. He had never said that to anyone, and it surprised the h.e.l.l out of him that he said it to Dolores. Then he said it again, and again. He couldn't stop himself. It was as if a live wire were plugged into his lower spine, and the signal jolted its way through his vertebrae to his mouth. Dolores could do whatever she wanted with him. She could cut him open and bite holes in his heart with her fine pearl teeth. He would twine his fingers in her hair and hold her there.

The next day Blackburn went to his job at a Taco Tommy franchise and made burrito after burrito without having any orders for burritos. The manager came into the food preparation area and chewed him out for his wastefulness. Blackburn stood there and took it without wanting to kill the manager or even hurt him. After all, he was right. Overnight, Blackburn had become an idiot. His hands had been on automatic. The stack of burritos reached halfway to the ceiling.

As the manager yelled at Blackburn, the girl running the counter gave a yelp. Blackburn and the manager turned to look. A busload of Jews for Jesus had pulled up outside, and its occupants poured out like water. They came into the Taco Tommy and ordered one hundred and forty-four burritos to go. The manager stared at them, and then at Blackburn. Blackburn began stuffing the burritos into paper bags.

It was a miracle. Blackburn didn't believe in G.o.d, but he had to believe in a miracle when he saw one.

At the end of his shift, he went home, telephoned Dolores, and asked her to marry him. Dolores laughedand suggested a second date instead.

They ate hamburgers and sawMelvin and Howard. Then they went to Dolores's apartment and made love five times between 11:00 P.M. and 6:00 A.M. Dolores fell asleep then, but Blackburn lay awake, studying Dolores in the glow of her Tom & Jerry night-light.

Her tan lines made her look as if she were wearing an ivory bikini. Blackburn hadn't noticed the phenomenon the night before, because they had made love in the dark. But now that he could see her entire body, he became fascinated with it in more than just a s.e.xual sense. Her tan was absolute; there was no gradual fade to pale, but sharp demarcations between dark and light. She looked both naked and clothed. If it weren't for her nipples and pubic hair, she could go out in public.

Dolores turned in her sleep, snuggling her rump against Blackburn's abdomen. His erection returned. He would eat nails for this woman.

After the Jews for Jesus incident, the Taco Tommy's manager decided that Blackburn had the psychic ability to predict when unusual quant.i.ties of food items would be required. Blackburn almost believed it himself when he made eighty tostadas while lost in another reverie, and then sold them all within forty-five minutes. The manager gave him a nickel-an-hour raise and told him to keep up the good work.

Blackburn did his best. For the first time, he believed he was making progress toward the kind of moral, independent life he wanted to lead. He had even been able to save a little money. Saving money, he had decided, was important. He was determined to repeat his marriage proposal just as soon as he could do so from a position of financial strength. He had discovered that Dolores respected financial strength.

He saw her every evening, and they never fought. This amazed him. He hadn't thought it would be possible to spend so much time with another person without finding just cause to paste that person's brains on the wall. However, despite what his childhood had trained him to expect, his relationship with Dolores was euphoriant.

Blackburn was happy. That in itself was a new and strange experience. It made him stupid.

He reveled in it.

The Taco Tommy's evening supervisor quit in late June, and the manager offered the job to Blackburn. It meant a dollar-an-hour raise, but it also meant working 3:00 P.M. to 12:00 A.M. every day except Sundays. Blackburn hesitated to take the job at first, because it would spoil his evenings with Dolores.

Then it occurred to him that the extra money might make marriage possible right away. He accepted the promotion, then went to Dolores's apartment and waited for her to return from her own job. When she arrived, he explained that his earnings would now be great enough that she could stop working if she liked. All she had to do was marry him.

Dolores said she wanted to think about it. They went out to eat, and over fried shrimp, she said yes.

Then they rushed to Blackburn's apartment and screwed like mad.

"Oh, Ed," Dolores said. "You're the best." Blackburn felt like Jimi Hendrix: He could kiss the sky.

Dolores quit her job and moved in with Blackburn the following week, right after they opened their joint checking account. Blackburn put his clothes in the dresser, and Dolores took the closet. They spent the Fourth of July in bed. The week after that, on Thursday, July 10, they were married at noon by a judge.

They had celebratory s.e.x at home, and then Blackburn went to work. There, he had an inspiration and made a pile of over a hundred sanchos.

But the Jews for Jesus didn't return. The sanchos cooled. It was the slowest night since Blackburn had started. He figured he was allowed one mistake.

The newlyweds planned a honeymoon trip to Marin County for the first Sunday after the wedding, but then a Taco Tommy employee fell ill, and Blackburn had to work. He pointed out to Dolores that he would be paid time-and-a-half for the extra hours, so they could take an even better trip later. Dolores said that was fine, as long as the trip wasn't the next weekend. That was when her parents were coming up from Los Angeles to meet her new husband. Blackburn was not looking forward to the meeting, and he wished that Dolores had given him the same wedding gift he had given her: He had told her that his parents were dead.

When the visitation weekend arrived, Dolores and her mother spent all day Sat.u.r.day shopping while Dolores's father watched baseball games on Blackburn's TV. He only spoke once, to compliment Blackburn on the Old Milwaukee beer in the refrigerator. When Blackburn left for work, Dolores's father was still in front of the TV.

There was another employee shortage at the Taco Tommy the next day, so Blackburn only saw his in-laws for a few minutes in the morning when they came over from the motel. Then he had to go to work again. Dolores's father complimented him on his initiative, and her mother said that he certainly was a catch. They were gone when he returned that night, and Dolores locked herself in the bedroom and cried. Blackburn drank Old Milwaukee and watched TV until she emerged and ravished him on the couch.

Blackburn was glad to be Eddie Reese. He was glad to have a h.o.r.n.y wife and a steady job. He was glad that he no longer had to survive on the run. He hadn't killed anyone since Philadelphia, almost a year ago, so there was no reason to leave San Francisco. Most people here were polite, and the dirtb.a.l.l.s, if they existed, weren't running into him. Or maybe he just didn't mind them so much now that he had Dolores. Thank goodness for Dolores. Thank goodness his old life was over.

Things didn't start to go wrong until he had been married almost a month.

The rent came due on Friday, August 1, and Blackburn wrote a check for it. A week later his landlord telephoned him at work to tell him that the bank had returned the check for insufficient funds. Blackburn didn't understand it. He promised his landlord that he would clear up the problem.

When Blackburn came home that night, Dolores was asleep. He didn't wake her to make love, as was his habit, but instead sat at the kitchen table and went through his checkbook register. He triple-checked the math and then looked at the pad of checks themselves. There were three missing that weren't accounted for in the register. He remembered the shopping trip that Dolores and her mother had taken.

He hadn't been home when they had returned, so he hadn't seen what, if anything, Dolores had bought. He went into the bedroom and turned on the light. Dolores mumbled and stuck her head under her pillow. Blackburn opened the closet and found three empty shopping bags on the floor. The attached receipts were dated July 19 and added up to over four hundred dollars. The checking account was overdrawn even without counting the rent.

Blackburn went to the bed and knelt on the floor beside Dolores. "Sweet love," he said, taking the pillow from her head, "our checkbook is overdrawn. The rent is past due. You spent too much shopping and didn't record the checks."

Dolores's eyes opened. "Sorry," she said.

"Can you take any of the merchandise back?" he asked.

Dolores stretched, twisting onto her back. The sheet slid down from her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. Blackburn started to have an erection.

"Don't think so," Dolores said.

Blackburn couldn't help staring at her rib cage, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, her throat. He wanted to hold her and force his molecules in between hers. "That's all right," he said. "We have enough in savings to cover the deficit, but that's all. So we'll have to be careful for a few months. There won't be any money to spare. We'll have to skip movies and eat lots of Rice-a-Roni." His c.o.c.k ached for her. It was like a grenade with the pin pulled. "But only until we can save a little again."

"Do I have to go back to work?" Dolores asked. She seemed to be waking up.

"Not if you don't want to."

Blackburn didn't know how it was possible, but their lovemaking that night was better than ever. He really did believe that his molecules mingled with hers and engaged in a million microscopic copulations with simultaneous o.r.g.a.s.ms.

Money was meaningless.

Blackburn depleted their savings account, paid the August rent, and then worked his a.s.s off, logging as many overtime hours as his boss would allow. He wanted to be sure that he and Dolores would have enough money to get by in September. Most days he worked double shifts, leaving home by eight-thirty in the morning and returning more than sixteen hours later. He worried that Dolores would feel neglected, but she a.s.sured him that was not the case. She was proud of him. However, she did get bored sitting at home, so would it be all right if she went out with her girlfriends now and then?

He felt guilty that she should even ask such a question. He had been too harsh about the checkbook error. So he held her shoulders, looked into her eyes, and told her that marriage was not slavery. She could do whatever she liked. He only asked that she take care of herself.

They made love, and Blackburn went to work. When he came home at 1:00 A.M., Dolores was gone.

He sat up in bed and waited for her. She came in a little before four, wearing a belted leather jacket that Blackburn had not seen before. Dolores noticed him looking at it and remarked that she had it on loan from one of her girlfriends. She took it off, then stripped naked and leaped on him. Blackburn went to work four hours later and had trouble keeping his eyes open and making his fingers coordinate. His burritos and tacos fell apart. In the afternoon, he fell asleep in the walk-in refrigerator and woke up shivering. His head ached for the rest of the shift. Dolores was waiting for him when he went home, but for the first time, he didn't want to do anything but sleep. Dolores called him "poor baby" and cuddled his head between her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. He dreamed of cotton candy.

He felt better the next morning, but called the Taco Tommy manager and said he wouldn't be in until the afternoon shift. After hanging up the phone, he began licking Dolores all over.

"Why aren't you going in?" Dolores asked.

Blackburn looked up from her belly b.u.t.ton. "I'd rather do this."

"Glad to hear it." Dolores leaned back and didn't talk for a while. Then she said, "But I have a lunch date with my friend Lisa."

"Okay," Blackburn said. He didn't know Lisa. He didn't know any of Dolores's girlfriends.

"I'm supposed to meet her downtown at ten-thirty," Dolores said. "It's really more of a brunch date, I guess. Then she wants me to help her shop for shoes."

Blackburn looked at the clock radio on the dresser. It was nine-twenty. "We still have a little time," he said.

"I know. I just wanted to warn you."

They did it fast and furious. Then Dolores showered, dressed, and left. She wore the leather jacket.

Blackburn wondered if it was Lisa's, and if Dolores had to return it already. He resolved to buy her one just like it as soon as he could afford to.

With Dolores gone, Blackburn had nothing to do until three o'clock. He dozed, then turned on the TV and found only game shows and soap operas. He ate some Post Toasties dry. No wonder Dolores liked to get out during the day. The apartment was no fun when you were alone.

He was brushing his teeth when the phone rang. He ran to the living room to answer it and said a garbled "h.e.l.lo."

"Dolores?" The voice on the other end of the line belonged to a man. Maybe Dolores's father.

Blackburn spat out his toothbrush and swallowed the foam. As he was swallowing, the voice spoke again.

"Dolores, you there? You said twelve-thirty. It's after one. Where are you?" It was not Dolores's father.

Blackburn said nothing.

"Dolores? Dolores?"

The phone clicked, and Blackburn replaced the receiver in its cradle. He picked up his toothbrush and went into the bedroom. He sat on the bed and studied the drying paste in the toothbrush bristles. He satthere for an hour, then went to work.

By the time Blackburn came home that night, he had concocted and rejected a dozen explanations for the voice. A few of them had been innocent. Lisa's boyfriend, perhaps, had confused ten-thirty with twelve-thirty. But Dolores hadn't said anything about Lisa's boyfriend joining them. Blackburn thought she would have said something about that. So most of the explanations he had concocted had been vile.

He had always thought of himself as cool-headed, and it irritated him to realize that he had fallen prey to something as intemperate as jealousy.

Dolores was sitting in bed with the sheet pulled up, reading a paperback romance. The borrowed leather jacket covered her shoulders. When she saw Blackburn in the bedroom doorway, she dropped the book and jumped up. The sheet and the jacket fell away. She was wearing a white teddy. Blackburn sucked in his breath.

"Comeherecomeherecomehere," Dolores said, grabbing his wrists and pulling him to the bed. "Sit down.

Sit down and close your eyes. Oh, come on, Eddie, do it!"

Blackburn sat on the edge of the mattress and closed his eyes. He saw orange blood vessels. Dolores put something in his lap.

"Okay, open your eyes."

He kept them closed. He was tracing the pattern of the blood vessels.

Dolores's hands touched his face, and he shuddered. Her fingertips were hot. She put her thumbs on his eyelids and pushed them open.

A cardboard box lay in his lap. Dolores removed the lid. Inside, nestled in tissue, were black cowboy boots. They were tooled with designs representing prairie gra.s.ses.

"Happy month-and-a-half anniversary," Dolores said. "I would have done it at the actual month anniversary, but I didn't see these until today."

Blackburn was astonished. This was the first gift he had received since he was sixteen. He picked up one of the boots. It was solid. It was his size.

"Cowboy boots?" he said.

Dolores bounced on the b.a.l.l.s of her feet. "Well, you said you were born in Wyoming, and I figured, you know,cowboys, right?"

The Wyoming lie had brought him a present. But there had been cowboys in Kansas too; it didn't matter. He picked up the other boot. The box slid off his lap. "How?" he asked. He'd had a sudden thought of money.

Dolores turned her eyes toward the ceiling. "Oh, I've been saving my pennies," she said. "And Mama sent a check. I didn't use our account, if that's what you're worried about."

Blackburn stood and put his arms around her. The boots clunked together behind her back. She lovedhim. She had proven it every day. She had just done so again. He was a b.a.s.t.a.r.d to have concocted vile thoughts about her.

"I'm not worried about anything," he said, and kissed her. "I'll wear them always."

Dolores grinned. "Not to bed, you won't." She made him drop them, then pushed him down.

The next day was Sunday, but Blackburn worked anyway. Seven-day-a-week double shifts were becoming a steady thing. He wore his new boots to work and was proud of them.

The day after that was September 1, and Blackburn paid the rent and the bills. There was enough money left over for him to give Dolores twenty dollars and to set aside another twenty toward a two-month anniversary celebration. He was determined that it would be a special occasion.

In retrospect, he supposed that it was.