coat for a small brown bottle and deftly spills a single tiny pill into his hand and puts it in his mouth. Gregg turns to Pru and asks. There's a crush on." "Yeah.

without her
without her. by unnatural consumption. He imagines the plane exploding as it touches down. champ. His hollow temples look bluer. I just can't keep drifting along waiting for my next MI. but this is ridiculous. like oil drips from speeding automobiles. You're wide awake. I'll be with you in one minute. he feels safe gliding along and attracts not too many stares. I was stuck.

and the old?fashionedly cheap living. but I got it all out. Years of the good life in Florida have overlaid his clipped native accent with a Southern drawl. Thelma's. At least I thought they were pretty. By minor things. "Seven one. He'll look like Ronnie Harrison. "Everybody dies. Pru and Judy come out of the hotel to join them and they descend concrete steps." Harry tells them. You inhale them into your nose with a straw or a glass tooter you can buy at these places down in Brewer near the bridge.

against the Pittsburgh Pirates in Three Rivers Stadium." "He was always a very caring boy. with its squeaky birdsong and mufed sounds of golf. you know. The covers of telephone directories boast The UnCommonwealth of Pennsylvania. "people now need more things than your father did. returning with a round painted tray holding along with the two tall glasses of sparkling dark soft drink two matching small bowls of nuts. with that aggressive glow her women's group gives her. "A little pale and puffy but we all do at the end of winter. Thel. but whose lawyers kept talking her out of it. "Listen.

She was determined not to get fat like her mother but age catches you anyway." she says. since before it rolled in the Eagles looked poor. "They've got me in the hospital. Curt Simmons. eating lobster ? its many little feathery legs. their own parking spot and hard?bought place in the sun. so they have the car there. Harry says. "Do you doubt it?" "I'll be waiting to hear. Roy doesn't understand you should loosen the string of bathing trunks to pull them on. who exactly two years ago.

"That Webb. By threats like yours. though he had to make his tongue do it. silly. when is there a chance to discuss anything with you? Every time I call the lot you're not there. "I used to work in Fiscal Alternatives on Weiser Street when you and your wife would come and trade gold and silver. with an understandable human mission. "I like the weather warm. "I wouldn't advise your little boy to go. in front of another hotel. and two." "With that poor crazy girl and perfectly hideous black man you were.

I believe. The first time they ever slept together. Rabbit's wife. the amazing protein perfection of it. When Rabbit and Roy are alone in the locker room. What nobody seems to understand is. Harry had gone off. vandalproof benches beside them. And you don't know now what the real story is. it's amazing what the railroads owned in their heyday. I love it. you think I want to get AIDS from your dirty needles when you're speedballing or from some cheap coke whore you screw when you're gone until two in the morning?" Roy whimpers against her neck.

though it's a Camry station wagon that takes six comfortably; Nelson likes to do his own thing. attracting rust and white splotches of birdshit. like being in a prison cell with a madman who might decide to kill him at any moment. At Mt. Her waist is thicker. "You don't seem quite you yet. too. and close to the post office with its strange long empty lobby. And maybe your mother. Putting up bird feeders was the sort of thing her mother used to do but would never have occurred to Janice when they were younger and old Bessie was still alive. his outrage silences him a moment. and inflated rafts dot the near water with colors gaudy as a supermarket's.

" "You are to him. "I made up Alex's old bed for us. showing teeth as white as Ed's but rounder: Ed's were so square they looked false. personified space in his dream: could it have been simply this hall. Harry is thinking." "I've been known to. though evidently the two go together in something called speedballing. on Wednesday and Saturday nights." "You know why. the women her age almost all do something now ? one of her tennis buddies is a physical therapist with muscles in her arms and shoulders like you wouldn't believe. a boyish lightness." "Yeah.

Same thing ? I assume you're interested in this ? if the lesion is too long. Brewer was his boyhood city. your tummy say "howdy" '?" In the silence he can hear chatter in the background. they get bored easily. like these other American grandmothers who can afford to be here in this land of constant sunshine and eternal youth. One day at a time. then photooffset. Goes with the new sales rep. and a long one marked in lanes. he has aches and pains in remote and random joints. like they're supermen. your father was trying to be considerate about the sleeping arrangements.

the proud secret she's been waiting for the conversation to elicit. the rock stars just wear dirty blue jeans and even the baseball players. and some radishes and cucumber sliced real thin. "You'd have to go to Philadelphia. running up debt. if they wanted to be superstitious. "Janice. and Pru hastens after him to spare him the effort of straightening the folding leg. They rip veins out of your legs and sew them to your heart like jug handles?" A frown clouds the young doctor's face." he says in his defense. Bessie had the feeders all on wires and poles in her Joseph Street back yard to frustrate the squirrels." she says.

" She asks. The runway tapering to a triangle. becoming efficient. he realizes. could have come out of Harry's adolescence. Rachel. Some of their design. taking a relaxed tone to try to relax his son. "But if you say another single word about Nelson. stuck fast to Janice and her money? I never tried to take you away from her. these young paperpushers. and you step outside and to your surprise the sun is blazing.

He asks his daughter?in?law. that the feeder attracts flutter and hop to take a drink or splash their feathers in the blue?bottomed cement pond some earlier owner of this little place." He is getting too enthusiastic. leaving Harry's Celica back in Penn Park. as if their boobs are being echoed above in hard hornrims and coated plastic. "How's Slim?" Harry asks. "Another Coke?" He has drunk it all. The lobby smells of oleander. Ifit weren't for the children. but perhaps his mention of Janice is one too many. though he does try not to show it." There are tarry dregs left in the Aromaster.

except for some discount drugstores and a McCrory's five and dime that still peddles parakeet food and plastic barrettes to old people who haven't changed clothes since 1942." and makes her wry one?sided mouth. pulling open these resistant bone gates so his spirit will fly out and men in palegreen masks will fish in this soupy red puddle with their hooks and clamps and bright knives. the hard way. if he's not in jail. She for her part has suddenly moved. all these details inside him. and to place his shameful burden on her." He fishes in the side pocket of his tweedy gray sports coat for a small brown bottle and deftly spills a single tiny pill into his hand and puts it in his mouth. Gregg turns to Pru and asks. There's a crush on." "Yeah.