"I'm the writer who doesn't watch your corporations on your own terms. I don't care if another business is unfairly competing with your business. I care that your business is unfair to the world. That it aggressively exploits children to get their parents to spend money they don't have on junk they don't need. I care that your workers can't unionize, make s.h.i.t wages, and get fired when they complain or when you need to flex your power a little.

"I grew up without any power at all. When I was working for a living, I had no say at all in my destiny. It didn't matter how much s.h.i.t a boss wanted to shovel on me, all I could do was stand and take it. Now I've got some power, and I plan on using it to setting things to rights."

Sammy chewed his roast long past the point that it was ready to swallow. The fact that he'd made an error was readily apparent from the start of Freddy's little speech, but with each pa.s.sing minute, the depth of his error grew. He'd really f.u.c.ked up. He felt like throwing up. This guy was going to f.u.c.k him, he could tell.

Freddy smiled and quaffed and wiped at his beard with the embroidered napkin. "Oh, look -- the jousting's about to start," he said. Knights in armor on horseback circled the arena, lances held high. The crowd applauded and an announcer came on the PA to tell them each knight's name, referring them to a program printed on their placemats. Sammy pretended to be interested while Freddy cheered them on, that same look of unholy glee plain on his face.

The knights formed up around the ring and their pimply squires came out of the gate and tended to them. There was a squire and knight right in front of them, and the squire tipped his hat to them. Freddy handed the kid a ten-dollar bill. Sammy never tipped live performers; he hated buskers and panhandlers. It all reminded him of stuffing a stripper's G-string. He liked his media a little more impersonal than that. But Freddy was looking at him, so with a weak little smile, he handed the squire the smallest thing in his wallet -- a twenty.

The jousting began. It was terrible. The "knights" couldn't ride worth a d.a.m.n, their "lances" missed one another by farcical margins, and their "falls" were so obviously staged that even the chubby ten year old beside him was clearly unimpressed.

"Got to go to the bathroom," he said into Freddy's ear. In leaning over, he contrived to get a look at the reporter's notebook. It was covered in obscene doodles of Mickey Mouse with a huge erection, Minnie dangling from a noose. There wasn't a single word written on it. What little blood was left in Sammy's head drained into his feet, which were leaden and uncoordinated on the long trip to the filthy toilets.

He splashed cold water on his face in the sink, and then headed back toward his seat. He never made it. From the top of the stairs leading down to ringside, he saw Freddy quaffing more ale and flirting with the wench. The thunder of horse-hooves and the soundtrack of cinematic music drowned out all sounds, but nothing masked the stink of the manure falling from the horses, half of which were panicking (the other half appeared to be drugged).

This was a mistake. He thought Freddy was a gossip reporter who liked juicy stories. Turned out he was also one of those tedious anti-corporate types who would happily hang Sammy out to dry. Time to cut his losses.

He turned on his heel and headed for the door. The doorman was having a cigarette with a guy in a sports-coat who was wearing a manager badge on his lapel.

"Leaving so soon? The show's only just getting started!" The manager was sweating under his sports-coat. He had a thin mustache and badly died chestnut hair cut like a Lego character's.

"Not interested," Sammy said. "All the off-theme stuff distracted me. Nose-rings. Blue hair. Cigarettes." The doorman guiltily flicked his cigarette into the parking lot. Sammy felt a little better.

"I'm sorry to hear that, sir," the manager said. He was prematurely grey under the dye-job, for he couldn't have been more than thirty-five. Thirty-five years old and working a dead-end job like this -- Sammy was thirty-five. This is where he might end up if his screw-ups came back to haunt him. "Would you like a comment-card?"

"No," Sammy said. "Any outfit that can't figure out clean toilets and decent theming on its own can't benefit from my advice." The doorman flushed and looked away, but the manager's smile stayed fixed and calm. Maybe he was drugged, like the horses. It bothered Sammy. "Christ, how long until this place gets turned into a roller-derby again?"

"Would you like a refund, sir?" the manager asked. He looked out at the parking lot. Sammy followed his gaze, looking above the cars, and realized, suddenly, that he was standing in a cool tropical evening. The sky had gone the color of a ripe plum, with proud palms silhouetted against it. The wind made them sway. A few clouds scudded across the moon's luminous face, and the smell of citrus and the hum of insects and the calls of night birds were vivid on the evening air.

He'd been about to say something cutting to the manager, one last attempt to make the man miserable, but he couldn't be bothered. He had a nice screened-in porch behind his house, with a hammock. He'd sat in it on nights like this, years ago. Now all he wanted to do was sit in it again.

"Good night," he said, and headed for his car.

Perry's cast *stank*. It had started to go a little skunky on the second day, but after a week it was like he had a dead animal stuck to his shoulder. A rotting dead animal. A rotting, itchy dead animal.

"I don't think you're supposed to be doing this on your own," Hilda said, as he sawed awkwardly at it with the utility knife. It was made of something a lot tougher than the fibergla.s.s one he'd had when he broke his leg falling off the roof as a kid (he'd been up there scouting out glider possibilities).

"So you do it," he said, handing her the knife. He couldn't stand the smell for one second longer.

"Uh-uh, not me, pal. No way that thing is supposed to come off anytime soon. If you're going to cripple yourself, you're going to have to do it on your own."

He made a rude sound. "f.u.c.k hospitals, f.u.c.k doctors, and f.u.c.k this f.u.c.king cast. My arm barely hurts these days. We can splint it once I get this off, that'll immobilize it. They told me I'd need this for *six weeks*. I can't wear this for six weeks. I'll go nuts."

"You'll go lame if you take it off. Your poor mother, you must have driven her nuts."

He slipped and cut himself and winced, but tried not to let her know, because that's exactly what she'd predicted would happen. After a couple days together, she'd become an expert at predicting exactly which of his escapades would end in disaster. It was a little spooky.

Blood oozed out from under the cast and slicked his hand.

"Right, off to the hospital. I told you you'd get this thing wet if you got in the shower. I told you that it would stink and rot and itch if you did. I told you to let me give you a sponge bath."

"I'm not insured."

"We'll go to the free clinic."

Defeated, he let her lead him to her car.

She helped him buckle in, wrinkling her nose. "What's wrong, baby?"

she said, looking at his face. "What are you moping about?"

"It's just the cast," he said, looking away.

She grabbed him by the chin and turned him to face her. "Look, don't do that. Do *not* do that. If something's bothering you, we're going to talk about it. I didn't sign up to fall in love with the strong silent type. You've been sulking all day, now what's it about?"

He smiled in spite of himself. "All right, I give in. I miss home. They're all in the middle of it, running the ride and stuff, and I'm here." He felt a moment's worry that she'd be offended. "Not that I don't love being here with you, but I'm feeling guilty --"

"OK, I get it. Of course you feel guilty. It's your project, it's in trouble, and you're not taking care of it. Christ, Perry, is that all?

I would have been disappointed if this wasn't worrying you. Let's go to Florida then."

"What?"

She kissed the tip of his nose. "Take me to Florida, let's meet your friends."

"But..." Were they moving in together or something? He was totally smitten with this girl, but that was *fast*. Even for Perry. "Don't you need to be here?"

"They can live without me. It's not like I'm proposing to move in with you. I'll come back here after a while. But I'm only doing two cla.s.ses this term and they're both offered by distance-ed. Let's just go."

"When?"

"After the hospital. You need a new cast, stinkmeister. Roll down your window a little, OK? Whew!"

The doctors warned him to let the new cast set overnight before subjecting it to the rigors of a TSA examination, so they spent one more night at Hilda's place. Perry spent it going over the mailing list traffic and blog posts, confirming the plane tickets, ordering a car to meet them at the Miami airport. He finally managed to collapse into bed at 3AM, and Hilda grabbed him, dragged him to her, and spooned him tightly.

"Don't worry, baby. Your friends and I will get along great."

He hadn't realized that he'd been worrying about this, but once she pointed it out, it was obvious. "You're not worried?"

She ran her hands over his furry chest and tummy. "No, of course not. Your friends will love me or I'll have them killed. More to the point, they'll love me because you love me and I love you and they love you, too."

"What does Ernie think of me?" he said, thinking of her brother for the first time since they'd hooked up all those months ago.

"Oh, hum," she said. He stiffened. "No, it's OK," she said, rubbing his tummy some more. It tickled. "He's glad I'm with someone I care about, and he loves the ride. He's just, you know. Protective of his big sister."

"What's he worried about?"

"Just what you'd expect. We live thousands of miles apart. You're ten years older than me. You've been getting into the kind of trouble that attracts armed cops. Wouldn't you be protective if you were my bro?"