"Huh?" asked the bartender.

"I'm avoiding my truth-facing session."

"You want another shot?"

"Of course."

The three-piece band played "Jambalaya," "Stand By Your Man," and "Big b.a.l.l.s in Cow Town." Some oil field roughneck types shot pool while some cowboy types tromped a circle around the dance floor. The few girls present seemed to prefer cowboys to oil-who can blame them? The farmers nursed beer and looked sullen. Who can blame them, either?

I did my own drink nursing, determined not to waste myself before the appropriate time. Only amateurs throw up before last call. I wondered why they call making a drink last "nursing." I can see the baby-on-Mama's-t.i.t a.n.a.logy with alcohol, but in my experience babies are hungry. Auburn sucked it down fast as I put it out, as if I might be yanked away at any moment. What little I nursed Shannon she was slower, somewhat like a bar nurser. Sometimes she fell asleep at the wheel.

On "Across the Alley from the Alamo" the energy level of Pepi's picked up a couple of notches. It was a noise deal-the dancers shuffled louder, the pool player broke rack with more oomph. Took a moment to figure out what was waking people up, until I heard the harmonica riff twisting in and out of the guitar lead. Shane sat at the base of the band platform, puffing his rosy cheeks into a hand-held microphone. He had two harps cradled in his left hand, different keys, I guess, and a jailbait cowgirl on his lap. Shane, the jailbait, and all three band members seemed especially pleased with themselves.

The bartender paused in his lemon cutting. "The old guy can really blow," he said.

"That's one way to put it."

"I heard he lost his legs riding Tornado."

Anyone even vaguely connected to rodeo in the sixties knows who Tornado was-the Babe Ruth of Brahma bulls. The most famous cow athlete of all time. Cowboys still take their hats off at the mention of his name, which is a bigger deal than you think. Those old cowboys never take off their hats except for showers and sometimes s.e.x. A hard-core code follower even tips his over his face to sleep.

To say Shane rode Tornado was akin to saying I danced the two-step with Hitler.

"You really believe that?" I asked the bartender.

"If Mr. Rinesfoos says he rode Tornado, you better know he rode Tornado."

"Mr. Rinesfoos?"

After his break, Shane spun circles on his left wheel while the cowgirl in his lap squealed and did nose-to-nose b.u.mps. I'd wager tomorrow's bottle she'd never been on a horse. As he flashed in the circle, Shane pinched b.u.t.ts all around. The fluttery girls took this as an honor bestowed on them by the life of the party. The boyfriends grinned like a bunch of good sports. Crippled or not, if the pervert ever touched my a.s.s, I'd wheel him through the jukebox.

It's weird when the whole world takes delight in some guy you think is a dirtbag. Everybody's-wrong-but-me doesn't wash when other people make the claim, but I'm different.

Shane played "Setting the Woods on Fire" with the band, then did a solo version of "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry" that was pretty moving in spite of coming from a man with three chins. I was raised country but broke loose in college when I discovered Jimi Hendrix, Joni Mitch.e.l.l, and the Mothers of Invention. Those frat boys I went out with were big on Bread. Psychedelic wonder rockette as I became, some elemental deal from my upbringing left me susceptible to Hank and Patsy. I tried to outgrow sentimentality and failed.

Just as Shane had me dewy-eyed, he spoiled the mood by leading the crowd into a round of "Cotton Eye Joe." That's the one where everybody drapes arms around each other's shoulders and hops up and down, and at the proper moment they all shout Bulls.h.i.t. I hate "Cotton Eye Joe" above all things rural in America.

The jailbait in his lap raised both hands high when she shouted Bulls.h.i.t, practically sticking her t.i.ts up Shane's nose. Some guy with sideburns down to his armpits grabbed my hand and tried to drag me onto the dance floor. He wouldn't take "No" for an answer, so I said, "No, c.o.c.ksucker." He left me alone after that. Drugstore cowboys hate it when you call them c.o.c.ksucker.

Through the noise and cigarette smoke, I saw Lloyd working his way down the bar, showing the picture to each hunched-over nurser. He had on a clean pair of overalls that looked exactly, down to the soft right thigh, like the pair he'd had on since we met. His hair was Vitalis slicked, with the part running straight as a knife edge. Gave him that untrustworthy look of a door-to-door Bible salesman.

When he came to me, I said, "I've been thinking this over seriously and I've decided that I'm not, technically speaking, an alcoholic."

He had the photograph in his left hand and a bottle of Coca-Cola in his right. "I'm happy to hear that," he said without a smile. "What made you decide?"

I set down my drink and held up three fingers. "First, it doesn't run in the family. Second, when I wake up with a hangover, I never crave a drink right off the bat. None of that hair-of-the-dog jive for me."

Lloyd looked me in the face. I'll never quite get past those eyes of his. "And third?"

"Third, I never black out. Real alcoholics black out entire days, and I remember every move until the moment I fall asleep." Third was partially a lie. Only partially since I never lost an entire day, but there were times I went from A to B with no idea what happened in between.

Sipping drinks, I'd come up with a fourth reason that I didn't tell Lloyd because it's an old bar joke: How do hospitals define alcoholic? Anyone with insurance. I didn't fit that description, either.

Lloyd kept staring at my face; made me nervous. "I'm glad you discovered you're not an alcoholic," he said.

"So am I."

"Answer me one question. This afternoon, if I'd told you I had hidden a bottle of whiskey somewhere in Moby d.i.c.k, what would you have done?"

"Did you really?"

"Reality is not the point, Maurey."

I stared at my drink in search of answers. I had none, then I had six, all of them lies, then I had none again.

Lloyd held his hand out toward the tattooed truck driver on my left. "Have you seen this woman? Her name is Sharon Carbonneau, but she may be calling herself Sharon Gunderson."

From there the evening took on a fuzz mode. Cowboys danced as roughnecks chain-smoked around the pool tables and farmers sulked. Shane sang a few songs in a voice like a cartoon frog. The women ate it up. Lloyd finished the hopeless quest number and sat alone at a table drinking c.o.kes. I had another Yukon Jack and ate a pickled egg.

I thought about something Sam Callahan said in one of his short stories: "You can't be paranoid unless you once trusted; you can't be cynical unless you once believed; you can't hate unless you once loved." I wasn't paranoid, cynical, or hateful, so I must not have ever done those other things, either. I missed out.

A narrow-hipped boy in a Rainbow Radiators windbreaker asked me to dance on "Walking After Midnight," and I did. The boy had lovely fingers and sweet breath. His eyes reminded me of Auburn. At the end of the song I allowed myself two seconds of resting my cheek on his shoulder, but when he asked for a second dance, I said, "No thanks. Two in a row is more of a commitment than I can handle." The boy looked at me funny, which was to be expected, and went away.

I felt flat. I didn't want to drink more, didn't want to stop drinking, wanted to find the motel room and take a shower, didn't want to leave the anonymity of the crowd. I wanted to think about the children I'd had and lost and the men I never had but lost anyway, only I was too tired to sink. Even depression takes energy.

What I really wanted was to be young again-before s.e.x, before whiskey, before anyone I loved died.

"Where's Shane?" Lloyd asked.

With effort, I raised my eyes from staring at the dew ring my gla.s.s left on the bar. "Hustling jailbait on the dance floor."

"No, he's not."

I looked over toward the band. Three or four couples had their eyes clenched in ecstasy or desperation or something as they slow-dance-hugged across the floor, but none of them were sitting down. "People disappear from the bar, they're either outside drinking, outside doping, or gone somewhere to get laid."

"He's not drinking."

"Can you be sure?"

Lloyd rubbed his leg. "I'm sure."

"That leaves doping and nailing."

Lloyd's eyes went into their dubious wrinkle. "Shane doesn't take dope."

My head lurched an inch, then bounced back up, kind of aping Shane's twitch. "Can a man in a catheter nail?"

"Maurey, you're more obsessed with Shane's s.e.x life than he is."

"What a disgusting thing to say."

After Lloyd left the fuzz turned dense fog and lights coming out of the darkness. Time and s.p.a.ce imploded. So to speak. As it were. I asked the bartender for a dry napkin and a pencil. I drew a map of the Pepi's complex with an arrow going from the bar across the parking lot to Moby d.i.c.k, then I wrote, "Take my body to room five. I have friends there."

17.

I blinked awake to Andrew pointing a toy pistol at my face. "Bang, bang," he said. His other hand clutched a single-scoop ice cream-chocolate-on a sugar cone.

"Didn't anyone ever tell you not to point guns at grown-ups?"

"The people with the treasure map wanted to shoot you, only the lady wouldn't let them. But I did. I shot you good right between the eyes."

Shot me good. "Little punk, I'll show you what grown-ups shoot back with." I felt around and found my windbreaker next to me on the sheet, but no Charley hidden in the pocket. He wasn't on the narrow nightstand between the two beds, either. I hate it when I wake up without my gun.

Andrew crawled onto the bed and settled down next to my knees. "The man said you could be easy pickin's. He smelled like throw-up."

"Look, kid, I'm not responsible for your ice cream, you understand? You'll lose it any second now, so don't scream at me. It's not my fault." He nodded without looking at the cone. I went on. "Have you seen a .357 Magnum? The bore looks blue when you hold it in the light."

I scooted to the edge to look under the bed-no Charley, but enough dust bunnies to start a hutch. When I lifted my head the room filled with yellow-and-black balloon-like sc.u.m. I realized I was naked with a six-year-old mini-Shane staring at whatever slipped from under the sheet.

Chocolate drips came across Andrew's grubby little hand and soaked through the sheet over my thigh. "He told Mama you were ripe to bang-bang."

"I was ripe for a gang-bang, Andrew. Not bang-bang."

He shrugged, knowing the difference didn't matter. The cone leaned at a fifty-degree angle or so, and I really wanted to be out of bed when it dropped. But Marcella wasn't the type to ignore a floozie flashing her kid. I know those pa.s.sive women. They turn tiger where their children are concerned. I could say "Close your eyes and I'll give you a surprise" like Walt Walsowski did when he handed me his trout-p.e.n.i.s, but Andrew was way too interested in staring at my weak cleavage to fall for the deal.

"Where's your mother, Andrew?"

"She's outside fighting with Daddy."

"Your daddy?"

"Uncle Shane says my dad porks on the side. Do you know what pork means? It means he kisses girls with his mouth open. I saw him kiss Mrs. Gilliam like that. I was disgusted."

"Will you look over by my suitcase for my pistol? I can't get up without him."

"When you kiss with your mouth open it makes you married. After that the daddy has to pull a plow."

The chocolate fell off the cone onto my crotch area. I flipped the sheet-ice cream, windbreaker, and all-over Andrew's head, then made a dash for the John. His howl barely started when I slammed the door.

Desperate people often mark time in days and nights. "If I can make it through one more day/night, I'll be okay." Which is a lie, of course. Desperate people are never okay. In the last few days I'd developed a similar system of marking time using showers. "I'll be fine if I can just get a shower." Or, "I remember talking to Pud. It was between the first shower at Lydia's and the second." Time had transcended the sun.

The shower in Amarillo was pretty good, as far as showers go. I ran out of hot water with a head full of soap, and Pepi should call the Culligan man for a softener, but on the whole I was satisfied.

Sam Callahan says women mark time by meals, but he's usually wrong. He wrote a short story where all the women in the world were divided between those who stopped eating under stress and those who ate like pigs under stress. The men built a tall wall between the two groups with guard towers every hundred yards with machine-gun nests. Only the women who stopped eating under stress were allowed to have babies, so within three generations obesity was bred out of the human species. The only problem was the men had to keep the women under stress at all times. Sam said his story was set in the past.

After my shower I dressed in clean stuff, searched the room high and low, and went out into the absorbent Texas sunlight to watch Marcella and Hugo Sr. fight.

They'd reached that point where you've run through all the loud accusations and reb.u.t.tals at least twice and you've fallen into tense silences. Time out for rearmament. Marcella and Hugo Sr. both held ends of the bowling bag strap, as if they'd given up on a tug-of-war. Marcella stared at the white gravel next to the horse trailer while Hugo Sr. blinked at her through rectangular eyegla.s.ses. He was rectangular in many ways-bread box-shaped head, squared-off shoulders, square-cut boots with loop buckles like the dope dealers wore back in college. Only Hugo sure didn't look like a dope dealer, he looked like a rectangular man who took mug shots of grade school children.

Marcella held Hugo Jr. on the arm that didn't hold the bowling bag. Andrew knelt by an eighteen-wheel Otasco semitruck, letting air out of a tire with a wooden matchstick. His parents were too busy being tense to notice.

"The driver's liable to yank off your arm and beat you with the stub," I said to Andrew. That was Dad's favorite threat. I was eight years old before I realized he couldn't actually do it.

Andrew looked up at me. "I saw you naked."

"Call the police."

"You have freckles on your b.u.t.t."

Which was a lie if I ever heard one. Lloyd's sandals stuck out of Moby d.i.c.k's hood as if the ambulance had eaten him alive and was just sucking up the last morsel. With the hood up, M.D. looked more like a pelican than a whale. When you're comparing things to animals I guess size is irrelevant.

His head popped out and looked down at me. "The map to your room trick was a good idea. When I pa.s.sed out in bars they used to roll me out by the trash."

"I've used it before."

"One of the waitresses spotted it or you'd've been roughneck mincemeat. Those oil field guys don't care if their dates are awake."

I looked into the engine. Lloyd was tightening something to something. I'm not real mechanical for a ranch girl. "Where'd you and Shane sleep?"

Lloyd stuck a socket wrench on a k.n.o.bby thing. "I spread my bag in Moby d.i.c.k, same as I always do. Figured since you paid for the room you ought to have a bed. Marcella and the kids took the other one."

When had I paid for the room? Behind me, Marcella said, "What's Annette Gilliam got I don't?"

Hugo Sr. said, "She thinks I'm interesting."

"The tulip behind her ear is cotton, Hugo. Didn't you realize that?" When I turned to look they'd switched with his head down and her staring at him. The motel was on the edge of Amarillo-I wasn't about to pa.s.s a bar yesterday-so across the road the fields stretched out flat and black. The sky wasn't even the same color as home; it was a bleached-out blue like the eyes of a malamute.

"Why would people live in this G.o.dforsaken land?" I asked.

Hugo Sr. glared at me like I was being snippy. "I live here," he said. Marcella dropped her end of the bag and turned around to cry. I could see she was crying; Hugo Sr. couldn't. For all he knew she was admiring the view.

"Water pump was forty-five dollars," Lloyd said. "Receipt's in your basket. Shane didn't make it in."

"I hope he didn't spend the night outside," Marcella said. "He knows in his condition he's p.r.o.ne to pneumonia and death."