Chapter Eight

Hello Mary Lou, Goodbye Heart

Rusty got a new girlfriend, the first one since Mary Gold. She give up on Sherlock Holmes and went out drinking with Jean- nie every night. Jeannie was one of the orderlies from South Wing, a dishwater blonde with lots of green eyeshadow. She kept herself real skinny, her favorite subject was being on a diet. Sometimes Jeannie brought over a twelve-pack and they sat in our backyard and drank beer out of ice-tea glasses. The glasses was supposed to fool Evelyn Price, but surely Evelyn noticed Rusty and Jeannie walking crooked when they come back in the house.

Besides Jeannie and Rusty, there was two other lesbians that worked at Reed, Jackie and Helena. Everybody kind of knew about them but nobody said much. The orderlies didn't feel too friendly about lesbians, but they didn't want to start trouble and maybe lose their job for fighting.

After Rusty broke up with Jeannie, she asked Helena out, but Helena was seeing somebody. So Rusty asked out Jackie. Jackie didn't talk about diets, she talked about bowling and softball. She had a 244 bowling average, and pitched for a Division-A women's softball team. When the tournament season started, her and Rusty invited me to go watch the Women's Softball League teams. I bought ham salad and Wonder bread and po­tato chips, and made us all lunch.

Jackie come and picked up me and Rusty. There was a big Thermos jug on the front seat with hen "Lemonade," she said, and she put it down on the floor so Rusty could sit down. I got in the back seat, but I had to get back out again, cause I forgot the lunches. When I come back, Rusty and Jeannie each had a cup of lemonade in their hand.

"Give me some," I said. Jeannie give Rusty a look, and Rusty said, "The rest of the cups is in the trunk."

"Give me some of yours, then," I said to Rusty. "Fm thirsty as hell."

Rusty give me her cup, and she laughed when I made a hor­rible face. It was spiked with vodka.

On our way to the ballfield, we stopped one more time, at the Red & White One Stop Grocery. Rusty got out and come back with a carton of Kools and a cashier. The cashier took off her green work apron, and got in the back seat with me.

"This is Sandra," said Rusty. "Sandra, this is Carol."

"How you doing?" I said.

Sandra was hard to talk to, she didn't say a word about noth­ing, not softball nor diets. I wasn't real talky either, so it was pretty quiet in the back seat. I asked Sandra did she like work­ing at the Red & White One Stop Grocery and she said no. I asked her did she want a cigarette. She said no, thank you. I run out of stuff to ask, so it was good we got to the ballfield.

By the second inning of the ball game, there wasn't a drop left in the lemonade jug. "Better take it easy, Rusty," I said. "You got to go to work in the morning.”

"No, I don't," said Rusty. "Fm off tomorrow."

"You are?" I said. "Since when?"

"I asked Marjorie to put me on the rotating schedule," Rusty said.

"So you're just going to substitute instead of having a regular schedule?" I said. 'That/s going to cut your hours down, ain't it?"

"It pays more on the hour," said Rusty. "Rotation pays thirty cents more to start, then you get another twenty cents for the six-month review."

"Yeah, but there's less hours," I said. Rusty didn't answer me.

By the fifth inning, Jackie wasn't sitting up in the bleachers with us no more. She was hanging out by the wire fence, talking to the Pepsi-Cola team while they was at bat. It seemed like Jackie was talking mostly to the shortstop, the two of them was laughing a lot. I noticed that Rusty started paying more atten­tion to Sandra, she went and got Sandra a hot dog and french fries. She got herself a hot dog too. Jackie was down next to home plate, so I had to eat ham salad by myself. I ate up more than my share of the potato chips.

                           * * *                                               

A couple weeks after the ball game, Jackie dumped Rusty for the Pepsi-Cola shortstop. Rusty started going steady with San­dra. At least Sandra didn't drink, she was a Baptist. Her and Rusty went out every night, and Rusty drunk enough beers for both of them. I just stayed home and watched teevee with Eve­lyn Price. After the late movie, I sat up in our room and looked at the dust piling up on Sherlock Holmes.

One morning at work it was rough on me, I kept running into all Rusty's old girlfriends. I seen Jeannie in one hall and Jackie in the next one. I was going down to the employee rest­room, thinking about all the people at work that wasn't very friendly. I walked right by the restroom. I did a U-turn so I could go back and pee and I about ran into Rusty. She was standing in the hall talking to Mrs. Reed. I couldn't hear what Mrs. Reed was saying, but later on in the break room, an or­derly said, "Your roommate got wrote up for sleeping on duty."

"No biggie," I said.

"Not this time," the woman said, "but the next time she'll get a suspension."

That night after work, Rusty took off someplace and I stayed home. When I got tired of being in our room, it was time to go down and watch teevee. I come downstairs and Mary Lou was sitting on the couch with Evelyn Price. They was eating crackerjacks and watching "Twilight Zone."

"Hi," said Mary Lou. "What’re you doing here?"

"Hi," I said. "I live here. You didn't...I mean, didn't you come to see me?"

"Well, no, not really," said Mary Lou. "Aunt Evelyn invited me over to watch teevee. She told me she had new roomers, but I didn't know one of them was you."

"Yep," I said. "It's me. I can't believe Evelyn's your aunt."

"In a town this small," Mary Lou said, "everybody is some­body's aunt. She's really my great-aunt, she and my Grandma Edith was sisters."

We all looked at "Twilight Zone." There was a guy running away from a car that was chasing him, nobody in the car, just a empty car driving up on the man's heels.

"Is it a ghost car?" said Evelyn Price.

"I guess," me and Mary Lou said at the same time.

Rod Sterling come on and talked, so the show was over. He told how come the man's car killed him, but I didn't listen. I was afraid Mary Lou could tell by my face what I had been dreaming about her.

"Aunt Evelyn, we could all go have a Dairy Queen," Mary Lou said. She was talking to Evelyn Price and not looking at me but she said "all," so I guess she meant me too.

Evelyn Price give Mary Lou kind of a funny smile. "No, honey," she said. "I'm full of crackerjacks. You girls go, you don't want an old woman to drag around."

"Come on with us," I said. "You could just get a baby cone." How come was Evelyn Price smiling? If she could read my face, then surely Mary Lou could. What a embarrassment. Mary Lou probably knew everything. She felt sorry for me, probably.

"Next time, I'll go," said Evelyn Price. She got up and shut off tire teevee. "I'm going up to bed, you all get started or it'll close before you get there."

"Ready to go?" said Mary Lou.

"Yeah," I said. "No, wait, let me run upstairs and get my keys."

"I'll drive," said Mary Lou. "I'm parked out front."

She sure was. A red pickup truck, polished up nice, an old Chevy truck that had been kept up.

"You're the second woman I have met this year that drives a truck," I said. "Don't people look at you funny?" We got in the front seat and I shut my door.

"No," said Mary Lou. "They just think it's my husband's."

"Husband?" I said. "You aren't married, are you?" Then after I said it, I couldn't look at her. I had made it sound like "You don't have leprosy, do you?"

"Me?" Mary Lou said. She was grinning. "I'm not the marry­ing kind." She started the truck up and let it rim. "I didn't figure you was, either." She knew, it was okay, she knew.  "Ready for ice cream?" she said.

"Yeah," I said. "I am definitely ready."

We both had a Buster Bar, Mary Lou paid for both of us. We took our ice cream over to a bench in the gravel next to the Dairy Queen.

"I'm glad you quit the restaurant," said Mary Lou. "I mean, I wish you—I wish I had somebody there to talk to. But it was good you went. Mostly I just keep working there cause they don't make me wear a dress or whatever. You know."

"Yeah," I said. "I was just sorry, cause you wasn't there to say bye."

"Well," said Mary Lou. "I knew I'd see you sooner or later."

"Oh yeah?" I said. A hunk of Buster Bar fell off the stick and made a white gloppy place on my leg. Mary Lou took her nap­kin and wiped it off. When she touched my leg, I jumped.

"Sorry," she said.

"No, it's okay," I said. "I wasn't ready, I'm not used to no­body, uh, touching my...leg."

"Sorry," she said again.

"No, no," I said. "I swear, it was fine, don't..."  She had on a pink shirt, a boy's short sleeve shirt, and now her pink shirt and her pink face matched each other perfect.

"How do you —" I started to say, and the last bite of my Buster Bar took a dive, off the stick and landed pow, in the gravel. "Shit. My ice cream don't want me to eat it. How do you keep your truck up so nice? Working at Joy's and all that, seems like you'd be too tired."

"I love to mess with that dumb pickup," Mary Lou said. "Want me to take you for a ride in it?"

"Now?" I said.

"'Well, whatever," she said. "I mean, do you got someplace you got to go now? I shouldn't of kept you sitting here so long, I —" She was hunting in her pockets for her keys. They was laying on the bench next to her.

"Quit fussing," I said. "I want to go with you. Want to finish your ice cream first?"

"Nah," she said. She pitched her Buster Bar in the trash can. She'd not taken but three or four bites off it, she must be a picky eater.

Me and Mary Lou got in the pickup, and she started it up. "This truck was a mess," she said. "It was my brother Marty's, but he wrecked it."

"Really?" I said. "The body's perfect."

"I put a new bed on it," Mary Lou said. "You want to ride out by the reservoir?" She had this all-business face, I guess she was the kind that took driving serious.

"Sure," I said. "You did? Put a bed on your truck?"

"Yeah," she said. "I mean, Frank helped me put it on. He's my stepfather. But I did most of it. Frank thinks I'm more me­chanical than Marty, so he shows me about engines and that junk. Marty only knows his trumpet, he plays trumpet."

"That's neat," I said. "Trumpets are pretty cool."

Mary Lou turned down this country road, it was real dark under the trees. No street lights out in the sticks. It wasn't like I was scared, I just had to get used to it.

"Frank says Marty is going to be a big trumpet star some­day," said Mary Lou. "Then Marty can pay people to fix his truck for him. Marty's not, he's just not, you know, too practi­cal."

We was riding through the woods, down the winding road that went by the reservoir. The trees was real full and leafy, it made the road pretty and dark. But the sky was still light, the moon was big so we could see the meadows as we went.

"How did Marty have a wreck?" I said. "If it's okay to ask."

"He was fishing, real early in the morning," said Mary Lou. "It was still dark, so he pulled the truck up to the edge of the lake so his headlights would shine on the path. When he caught his limit, he got in this poor truck and backed up into a oak tree." Mary Lou laughed. "That's Marty, he forgot to look be­hind him."

I felt so easy, talking to Mary Lou. Before this I never could think of stuff to say, I would of made more friends but I never would open my mouth. That reminded me of something.

"Want to hear a story?" I said. "One time in grade school, we was all at a big long lunch table, did you have that kind? We was having our bumed-up fish and mash potatoes and squishy peas, and the cafeteria lights started flipping off and on. There was this bad boy in our grade named Tony Monroe, so I said, Til bet it's Tony Monroe flipping the lights.' I remember about eight kids went, 'Oh, sure.' This skinny boy with a brown sweater, his name was Mark I think, said 'Tony Monroe don't even have this lunch period.'"

"I bet you felt like such a dumb-bell," said Mary Lou.

"No shit," I said. The nice country ride was making me sink down easy on the truck seat. I was rested down deep, like after I slept good.

"Look there," said Mary Lou. She slowed way down, the truck was just creeping now. A big fat raccoon was taking a walk across the road, real easy-does-it, dragging something out of its mouth.

"What's it got?" I said.

"A hot dog?" said Mary Lou. "Yeah, I think it's a hot dog."

"Must be a picnic area or something back here," I said.

"There is," said Mary Lou. She pulled the truck over by a gravel path. "Want to see?"

We left her truck parked by the road and walked down the path. The big moon helped us see, we didn't need a flashlight even underneath of the trees. The path went down to the edge sort of like shadows. I was doing okay on it, not great cause I wasn't neat.

In art I always was too messy, they wanted the girls to cut stuff out exactly on the lines. So I got my shadow picture done, I tried hard, but it was going to have paste all over it no matter what. I put it on my desk face down. All the leftover pieces that I cut out of my red construction paper was still lay­ing on my desk, and there was still six minutes to go before time to leave. I was just twirling the pieces of red paper around, there was a circle and a triangle and some wiggly ones, and I laid them out on my desk like a picture. I moved them around to see which way they would look the best.

And then Mr. Brown was leaning over my shoulder and in­side I went, "Oh no, the first day and the new teacher caught me fooling around" and now he was going to turn over my shadow picture and yell about my smeary paste.
He didn't even look at my shadow picture, he was looking at my paper pieces I was playing with, how I laid them out. And he said, 'That's very nice," and then he left and went to help somebody.

"Did you keep on with it?" said Mary Lou. "Your art?"

"No," I said. "I wasn't that good, I just got C's usually."

I watched all the dark trees whoosh by, and clouds moving across the moon. The dark window glass in the windshield was like a mirror, I liked the way it made me look, even with my hair sticking out over my ear. "I don't look so bad," I said to myself.

When Mary Lou pulled her truck up in front of the rooming house, she cut the engine and shut off the headlights. Now it was real dark, real quiet too.

"Well, bye," I said.

"You want to come over tomorrow?" Mary Lou said.

"Okay," I said. I didn't want to be all wild and excited. She might think I was too enthusiastic or something.

"You sure?" Mary Lou said. "I mean, you don't have to." She turned the key and the truck started up.

"Yeah!" I said, way too loud. "I really do—want to. Come over. When should I?"

"Uh, six o'clock?" said Mary Lou. "Is that okay?"

"Yeah!" I said. "That'd be great!" Really, six o'clock was kind of early, I wasn't getting off work till five. But once I was enthu­siastic, I had to keep on with it. I told Mary Lou "Night" and got out of her truck. Maybe she wanted me to hold her hand, nobody could see us in the dark, but I didn't. My feelings was already bent all around, they needed a rest. Mary Lou was just pulling away when I run up to the truck.

"Where do you live at?" I said.

"Oh," she said. "Here, wait a sec." She got a matchbook off the dashboard and wrote it down for me on the inside.

"See you," she said.

"See you," I said.

When I opened Evelyn Price's front door, I wondered what Rusty was going to say about me and Mary Lou. There wasn't any use wondering, though, cause she was gone. No sign of her except five empty beer bottles and fifty million cigarette butts. Her work smock was laying on the floor. At Reed we had to wear a white blouse and a white skirt and a blue smock. Rusty had to work in the morning, how come didn't she have her smock washed out? Hell with her, let her wear it dirty. Or get in trouble with Mrs. Reed. Serve her right, to lose her job. But shit, she wouldn't understand why. All she would get out of it was a good reason to drink more beers, and me the only one with a job.

When I went down the hall to pee and brush my teeth, I took Rusty's stupid wrinkly smock with me to rinse out in the sink. No point starting up a big stink right now, I could wait till she was settled down a little bit.

Rusty never come back that night at all. When I woke up, the first thing I seen was her bed still full of dirty clothes and clothes hangers and crunched-up cigarette packs. I hated living in a pig sty. Maybe after work I could hurry up and get our room straightened up—no, there was something else I had planned. Mary Lou, I was doing something with Mary Lou. I almost forgot about the best thing I ever looked forward to.

I was going right over to her house after work, I needed to take some clothes with me so I could change later on. I didn't want to show up at Mary Lou's dressed up like Cherry Ames.

I was looking around for my smock, I couldn't find it noplace. Usually it was laying folded-up on top of the dresser, maybe Rusty thought it was hers and threw it in with her junk. I went around between her bed and the wall, that's where most of her stuff landed after it fell off the bed. I lifted up a blouse and a towel and a plate and a magazine and another blouse but no smock. I got down on my knees and stuck my face under the bed. No blue cloth, but I seen something square and brown. When I pulled it out, there was lots of dust all over the Sherlock Holmes book. The fine on that baby ought to set Rusty back about half a paycheck.

I put my regular clothes in a paper sack, my blue jeans and a blue shirt and socks and sneakers. When I went out to the driveway, I found my smock in the back seat of the station wagon. I turned the key and took off for Reed.

It was a pretty regular day at work, one patient died and one had a stroke. Two orderlies called in sick, and four just never showed up. We had a meeting about the importance of personal grooming. The only thing that wasn't normal was that I had a little fight with Rusty.

When I went to the front desk to get my paycheck, Rusty was there ahead of me. She had on a clean smock, somebody must of lent her one.

"Hey," I said. "Getting that easy money, huh?"

"Yeah, easy," she said. "Nothing to it."

"Speaking of easy," I said. "It wouldn't be too rough to take old Sherlock Holmes back to the library."

"I'll get to it," said Rusty. "It's not due yet."

"It is too," I said. "You're running up a fine, big time."

"My money," Rusty said. She started walking off.

"How are we getting West with no money?" I said to her back.

"Let me do it, Mommy," Rusty said. She kept on walking. "I'm a big girl."

"Okay, whatever, Rusty," I said. "Whatever."

After I got done with my work on West Wing, I put my Symptom Sheet and Report Sheet on the charge nurse's desk. Then I took my sackful of everyday clothes down to the em­ployee restroom. Some restroom. When they built it, they just walled in one corner of the laundry room and hung up a sign that said Employees Only. The door was warped bad, you had to force it in the frame to slide the little bolt across. I always was worried, whai I got in, was I going to get back out. It was probably a leftover door from one of the wings, all the em­ployee restroom fixtures was leftovers. They used a toilet from East Wing with a crack in the bowl, and the sink was corroded, red and rusty all around the drain hole. The sink used to be in the guest restroom, the Ladies' guest restroom up front. The guests had blue carpet and blue-flower wallpaper in their rest­room, and nice fixtures.

Our restroom was so little you could only turn around if you was standing between the toilet and the sink. It was hard to see, the light was dim, only one of the sockets worked in the light fixture. They put a bulb in the bad socket too, for looks. But only one side shined, when I looked in between the black spots on the mirror, there was shadows on half my face.

I looked at myself in the spotty mirror and I had to admit that I did not look that great, even when I took off my smock and run a comb through my hair. I was yellowish-pale, with dark places around my eyes. I pulled a paper towel out of the holder and soaked it in cold sink water. I scrubbed my face till it was red. Now I looked like I had a fever. My mouth was droopy, I never had liked how it went down at the ends. There was frown wrinkles in between my eyebrows. I took my thumb and rubbed over them, but they wouldn't smooth out. A little wing of hair was peeping up over my ear, I got the comb wet and worked the wing down with it. All that happened was the wing took a new angle off my head.

I thought about not going over to Mary Lou's house. I could just tell her I had to work late. Did she really want a date with a hair-wing woman? Not a date, I didn't mean a date, I was just going over to see her place. Okay, I would go, but I wouldn't stay too long. She probably was just being polite. In a small town you had to be nice to everybody, to get along.

Mary Lou lived in a giant old junky house with her brother Marty and her stepfather Frank. The place must of been fancy at one time. The front curtains was open, I could see in the win­dow. I seen nice wallpaper, maroon with gold flowers pressed into it, and a gaslight chandelier in the middle room. But there was junk all over, newspapers stacked up on the stairs, piles of lumber was laying along the walls. The maroon-and-gold wall­paper was only on one wall of the front room. The next wall had dirty white paper with faded-away rosebuds, and the other wall had no paper at all, just bumpy plaster.

"Frank's fixing up the house," said Mary Lou as I come in the front door.
"I can tell," I said.

"It used to be a funeral home," Mary Lou said. "The under­taker lived upstairs, and he did his business down in the morgue."

"Don't it bug you?" I said. "Living in a morgue?"

"No, it's all shut up," said Mary Lou. "We live up in the regular part. Come on upstairs, you can see my room."

My foot slipped under a black extension cord that was run­ning down the stairs. "Whoa," I said. I got hold of the bannister so I didn't fall down. Then I started singing, "Slipping and a- sliding, peeping and a-hiding."

"I know that, it's a Little Richard song," said Mary Lou. "Bold big conniver, you nothing but a jiver."

"That's his best one, if you ask me," I said. "You got it?"

"Yeah, I've got all his records. Little Richard's. Come on up to my room and I'll put it on."

I said, "Won't it bug anybody else?"

"Nobody else here," said Mary Lou. "Marty's working, and Frank always goes to Kroger on Wednesday."

"A man grocery shops?" I said.

"Yeah, he does all the house stuff," said Mary Lou. "Laundry, groceries, makes the beds, all that. He don't like the way me and Marty does stuff. He's real, you know, everything just per­fect."

"Except two-by-fours in the living room and three kinds of wallpaper?" I said.

"Well, he don't move very fast on his projects, but they get done," she said. "The bathroom is perfect, see?" She stopped and flicked on the light switch, the bathroom was beautiful. The bathtub was the kind like they had in olden days, with little legs. The sides of it was painted blue-gray, the exact same color as the wallpaper. The ceiling was all new white plaster, the shower curtains and the window curtains was gold-and-white. It was like a magazine or something. "Frank done all this?" I said.

"Yeah," said Mary Lou. "He's not too organized, but when he does it, he does it."

When Mary Lou opened up the door to her room, I was sur­prised. It was like a record store in there. Records everyplace, there was wood shelfs built up all over the walls with records crammed and jammed in every space. Mostly singles, it looked like. There was more records in boxes, and some loose ones, piled up on the floor, in big stacks as tall as my hips.

"Got a few records, do you?" I said.

"Yeah, just a few," said Mary Lou. "Come on in."

The records took up most of the floor, you had to walk in and out of the stacks to get across. A lumpy plaid couch was in the middle of the room. I could see the edges of record jackets stick­ing out from underneath of it. Beside the couch was a record player, the kind that opened up like a suitcase and the music come out the lid.

'Where'd you get all these records?" I said.

"My old man's a disc jockey," said Mary Lou. "He gets them free, promotion copies. He sends me a boxful every couple weeks. He feels bad about dumping me and Marty off on Frank. He sends Marty sheet music for his trumpet."

Me and Mary Lou sat down on her couch.

'Where's your dad at?" I said. "How come you live with Frank?"

"My mom divorced him when I was five and Marty was three," said Mary Lou. "My dad moved to Hawaii and my mom married Frank, she met him at a bowling alley. Then my dad come back and Mom fell for him again."

"When was that?" I said.

"A while ago," said Mary Lou. "I was about fifteen, fourteen or fifteen. Mom left me and Marty with Frank, she knew he would take care of us."

"Ain't you mad at her?" I said.

"Not too much," Mary Lou said. "She wants to be married to my dad, but I don't like him. Frank is easier to live with."

"Oh," I said. After a minute I said, "Well, want to play me a record?"

Mary Lou played me Little Richard, then the Shirelles, and Ike and Tina Turner, and the Beatles, and the Marvelettes, every­body. She was the disc jockey, and I just leaned back and lis­tened.

I was sitting on her little couch, scared to move anything, my hand or my foot or anything. I didn't want to ruin the happi­ness, but I knew how I was. If I got too happy, bad stuff would happen. So I was trying to hold real still.

Mary Lou was sitting on the couch too, but down at the other end, so she could reach the record player. She put on three songs at a time, lifted up the little holder arm and slipped on the 45's. Then slap, one would fall down on the spinner and the needle arm dropped down and a new song would start up. All kinds of music, mixed up together, it was great to be surprised. And I knew them all, every one, how did I know so many songs? The words all rolled together, they asked me love ques­tions like "Do you believe in magic?" Then there was love an­swers like "It takes two, baby, it takes two."

All the songs was true. Cause it was all made up by people in love, something good happened to them. All different people was singing it, all different people was putting it on their record machines, but everybody was feeling the same thing. It made me feel so gentle and happy. Everybody really felt the same, everybody knew how to fall in love.

Even me. After Mary Lou put on another stack of three songs, she got up and went around the couch behind me. I leaned my head back, my head was pressing back a little bit on the couch but mostly on Mary Lou's stomach. My eyes was shut, I opened them for a minute and I was looking up to see her breast curves, round and pretty, hiding under her shirt. Her shirt was crisp and plaid, it was like a tablecloth, knowing the shape under it Mary Lou looked down and I was embarrassed, I shut my eyes but my face was hot. I could feel the waistband of her shorts, the big button of it was on the back of my head. Her breath was flat and soft, it went in and out when she breathed, like a little kid's.

The record player went slap, and both of us jumped a little bit. The last record in the stack fell down and started spinning around. It was "In the Still of the Night," by the Five Satins. Really, it was silly. The afternoon light was showing through the weaving in the curtains, and men singing about the middle of the night. The window curtains was a little darker at the bot­toms, where the wide hems was, poofed out on the little breezes blowing through the screens.

The song faded off, and the record player clicked, empty. But I didn't lift my head up, and Mary Lou never moved a muscle except for the ones she breathed in and out with. Her stomach was raising up and going down, my head was moving with it. I didn't want to move, she didn't want to move. Like rowboats that bumped up against each other and decided to stay, just floating together.

Mary Lou took a little pocket comb out and started combing my hair back, not really combing it, more like you do when you pet a cat. She was petting my hair. "Your hair's nice," she said.

"It is?" I said. But really, I knew it. My hair was my only thing to be proud of. I was just medium about everything else, just medium height, medium-brown eyes, medium-size mouth. But my hair was good, real nice deep shiny brown, and it was thick and soft. Like bear fur. Whenever I was depressed, even when I was a little kid, I would go in the restroom and take both hands and rough up my hair, both ways, back and forth. I would think, "Well, I got good hair, anyway. Good thick hair." Then I would look in the mirror where my hair was sticking out, I looked like a wild animal till I took a brush and got it down flat and normal again.

"I'm going to put more records on," said Mary Lou. I didn't see how she could have any more records, we must of played a hundred already. I bent my head forward so she could move away. I was sad and lonely while she was down at the other end of the couch, putting on the records. But then she come back and stood in front of me and said, "Want to dance?"

I said "Sure," and I got up. She put her arms around me. I didn't know how to dance but that didn't matter. It wasn't hard, I just moved my feet a little and tried not to breathe hard from having such a nice sweetheart pressed up against my front.

Her eyebrows was dark and thick, and she had long eye­lashes. Dolls had eyes like that, but a doll's eyes could never make my stomach drop down. Mary Lou was looking at me while we danced, her eyes was green and big and open and they never looked away from me. Mary Lou was the prettiest woman I ever saw, her skin was nice too, kind of dark, not a suntan but just cool dark skin. Healthy skin, she was so strong and healthy. Tight round arms and big square hands with pink fingernails.

Her ears was cute too, small little ears, her hair was pushed back so it curled up behind her perfect little pink ears. I kissed her on the ear, I couldn't help it. I was just looking at this per­fect pink ear and I loved it. My lips just went to Mary Lou and touched the top of her ear. I kissed her hair too, her hair was so shiny and smelled good, not like shampoo, but that good human hair smell.

She put her soft hand inside my collar and rubbed my neck. And her fingers went up and got hold of my hair, hard, and she kissed me on the mouth. Her mouth was wanting me, her whole self was wanting me. She pushed against me, her hands went up and down my sides and back and butt and every­where.

I couldn't even think. For one second, I wondered, 'Is the door locked?" but then I thought, "Probably, I don't know, who cares?"

Mary Lou smelled so good and felt so good. All of me wanted to rub on her, I wanted to rub my whole self all over her. Her hand was rubbing up and down the inside of my legs, not quite up to my secret place, but that's where I felt the heat. I sort of hurt there, not hurt exactly but it felt puffed up and tight. Then my thigh brushed by, in between her legs for a sec­ond, and I felt a wet place on my skin, on the front of my leg. I didn't know what it was, but after a second I thought, "Oh."

We both had shaky legs. I could feel Mary Lou's leg muscles jittering, little tiny fast shakes. My legs was doing it too, my knees might give out and boom, down I'd go on the floor. In between kisses, I looked over at the couch and thought, "We've got to lay down" but then Mary Lou drew back. She held my head, her fingers was up over my ears and her thumbs petted my eyebrows, stroking out along my eyebrows. "Let's quit," she said.

"Quit?" I said. I would rather die than quit. I didn't even know what we was going to do, I didn't know how, but I couldn't quit.

"I want it to be just perfect," said Mary Lou. "I never have done this before, I always have wanted it to be perfect."

"Isn't this?" I said. "No, I guess not, I don't feel perfect about it. Maybe it won't get perfect, Mary Lou."

"Yes it will." Mary Lou kissed me on my neck. "We'll just wait."

I drew myself back. "If you keep on doing that, I can't stand to wait," I said. "You better stop."

"Oh, we can stop when we want to," said Mary Lou. "Here, wait." She opened up the door and went out, down the stairs.

I didn't like that. Where was she going? Was she going to come back?

But here she come, back up to the top of the stairs, holding a little wind-up kitchen timer like people did eggs with. "Now, see," she said, while she was winding it up, "we set it for twenty minutes, then we quit and go get something to eat." She put the timer on the windowsill to tick.

"That won't work," I said. "I won't quit."

Mary Lou put her hands up the back of my shirt and rubbed my bare back. "Yes you will."

It made kissing better, after I knew when we was quitting. I guess I was nervous after all, about what to do. With that little egg timer going tick-tick-tick-tick so small and quick across the room, I could quit worrying and concentrate.

When the egg timer said Ding, we went in the bathroom and rinsed off our face and combed our hair and went to Pepe's Pizza to pick up a large mushroom with extra cheese. It seemed like the counter girl was looking at me funny.

When we got outside I said, "I feel guilty or something."

Mary Lou said, "Why do you feel guilty? Did we do anything bad?"

"No," I said. "We got our rights. Same as anybody."

* * *

It didn't seem like I ever seen Rusty no more, except maybe once or twice a week, when we rode in to work together. The station wagon was fixed, but I was still having car problems, cause Rusty kept messing up. Twice in the same week she took off with the car, and left me stranded at work. Both times I had to get somebody to give me a lift home. And if Rusty stayed out overnight with her girlfriend Sandra, she come back late in the morning. I got in trouble at Reed for being late to work, and got put on probation for a week. If I was late on probation, I got suspended for a month. The whole week I was on probation, Mary Lou took me over to Reed in her pickup, just to make sure I got there on time.

Rusty never told me what was going on, either. When I got my work schedule, I wanted to see Rusty's, so I could figure out about the car. If Rusty would of told me when she needed to go in, I could of brought the car home for her to use. But she just didn't give a shit. A lot of the time Sandra drove her over to Reed. Or somebody, after a while I didn't care that much how she was getting to work. I cared how I got in, though, and I got pissed off when Rusty was supposed to come back with the wagon and she never showed up.

Mary Lou was the only part of my life that was really work­ing out good. Staying at Evelyn Price's was okay, room- sharing with Rusty was okay usually, Reed was okay usually. But Mary Lou was always wonderful to me. Her family was really nice, too. Frank invited me over to eat with them all the time. I stayed overnight with Mary Lou all the time, but Frank and Marty acted like it was normal for grown-up women to have a slumber party.

The only time I was worried was the first time I was over at Mary Lou's house for supper. Frank invited me over cause he was making pot roast, which is my favorite thing to eat.

I could smell the pot roast cooking when me and Mary Lou come in the front door. The other thing I noticed was lots of loud noise. Somebody upstairs had the teevee on way too loud, cause I could hear the Lone Ranger song blaring out.

"What's Frank got his teevee on so loud for?" I asked Mary Lou. "Can he not hear?"

"It's not teevee, it's Marty," said Mary Lou. "Practicing." The song quit, after just a couple more notes.

"Man, he plays that trumpet all right," I said. "What did he do, play in the band at school?"

"No," said Mary Lou. "He wouldn't. It was jazz, a jazz band at school. Marty hates jazz."

"Oh," I said. "I don't know if I hate it or not. I never heard any. I don't think so, anyway."

"Sure you have," said Mary Lou. "Everybody has. Like Louis Armstrong, or—"

"Oh, 'Hello, Dolly,"' I said. "Is that jazz?"

"Jazz?" said somebody coming down the stairs. "Who's down here talking about jazz?"

"Me," I said.

"Hi, me," said Marty, when he got all the way downstairs. "I'm Marty." He didn't look a bit like Mary Lou, except for his hair was the same as hers, dark brown and shiny. He had on glasses, Mary Lou didn't have any glasses, and he was way taller than her. And he was nervous and fidgety. That wasn't nothing like Mary Lou, she was the calmest woman in the world. Marty's hands was jumping all around, pushing up his glasses or pulling down his sleeves or something, all the time moving.

"How you doing?" I said.

"Good," said Marty. "You staying for supper? Is she staying, Mary Lou? Frank's making pot roast."

"Yep, she's staying," said Mary Lou. "Where's Frank at?"

"Rexall," said Marty. "We didn't have any more toothpaste. You know how Frank is when we're out of things."

I was looking at Marty's lip, cause there was something on there. It was a little mustache, he was trying to grow a little mustache. Or maybe that was it, the whole mustache, a little smudge on his face.

Marty looked me in the eyes real quick, like "what are you looking at" and I got flustered and tried to think up something to say. I almost said, "Where's Frank at?" but then I remem­bered Marty said Rexall. The front door opened up, we could hear paper sacks crackling so it must be him.

I figured Frank was going to look like maybe Liberace or something, because of being fussy and doing all the shopping. But really, he just looked like a regular man that does your taxes for you or something. He had a little chin beard, like Mitch Miller, that was mostly gray. His glasses was little on his face, his face was big. He had a big curved-down nose, big gray eyes. Big teeth when he smiled, crooked but white and healthy.

"Hiya," he said. He put his hand out to me. "I bet you're Carol, huh? Listen, Mary Lou, would you take this up to the bathroom for me? I have to get in the kitchen before my pot roast is completely incinerated." He give her a paper sack with two toothpaste tubes in it. When she grabbed it, the sack ripped down the side. The toothpaste boxes fell on the floor. I picked them up for her, but I didn't know what to do with the tore-up sack.

"Here, honey," said Frank. "I'll get that." When I give him the sack, the little white receipt slipped loose and started floating down.

"Marty, get that," said Frank, quick like it was a wild animal loose in the living room. One thing about Frank, he was ner­vous.

He was a good cook, though, he did all right. We had pot roast and mashed potatoes and gravy and green beans and corn and biscuits and pie. Rhubarb pie, I ate a big piece and I didn't even used to like rhubarb.

Frank ate a lot of food for a skinny person. When he stood up to get another plateful, I seen his belt was notched up tight to hold his pants up. Marty's belt was pulled in real tight too. Marty wasn't related to Frank, not by blood, but Frank and Marty both had jumpy hands and a real fast voice.

Mary Lou didn't look like neither one. She looked sort of like me, though. Me and Mary Lou both had to keep our belt loose, we liked to eat. That was good, cause Frank was determined to feed us.

"I didn't know a man could cook," I told Frank.

"Chefs," Marty said, real quick. "Chefs are men, like Chef Boyardee, he's a man."

"Yeah," I said. "I guess nobody thinks about that." I felt bad cause it sounded like I was picking on Frank. It would of been too easy to pick on Frank. I bet some people did, cause he was smart and fussy. Marty really stuck up for old Frank, though, Frank had no worries when Marty was hanging around.

I decided I better say something nice and show Marty that it wasn't National Be Mean to Frank Day. So I said, "It was nice of you, asking me over, Frank. Some people wouldn't of." As soon as I said it, I was disgusted with my mouth. Way to go, mouth. Mentioning why Frank should have a problem with me coming over to see Mary Lou.

"Frank's reasonable," said Mary Lou.

"I try," said Frank.

And that was all there was to it. The whole problem gone. Too bad Frank and Mary Lou couldn't fix up the rest of my life.

* * *

I stayed over that night with Mary Lou, I had brought my work clothes. I had to get up at the crack of dawn. I told Mary Lou to stay in bed a while, but she said, "I'm awake anyway." When we got up, Frank and Marty was still in bed. Me and Mary Lou went down in the kitchen. I made scrambled eggs and she did the toast.

"So," Mary Lou said, "how long are you and Rusty staying around? Just for the summer, or—•?"

"Till we get enough money to go on," I said.

"How much money is that?" said Mary Lou. "You want this other piece of toast? I'm getting full."

I took it and started spreading on grape jelly, real even, up to the edges of the crust. "I don't know how much money. A cou­ple hundred bucks, I guess. Or whatever Rusty thinks." I took a bite of toast, and then I felt a big blob of jelly fall down my chin, I wiped it off quick.

"How much have you all got saved up?" Mary Lou said.

"I've got a hundred," I said. "I don't know if Rusty—what she has."

Mary Lou didn't ask me no more questions. She put a little bit more milk in her coffee and stirred. She stirred it a lot.

"We're just getting our bearings," I said. "You know, get set­tled down to where we can think straight. When things get calmed down, me and Rusty are going to sit down and plan it all out, how to get to Colorado."

I couldn't look up. It would of been easier for me if Mary Lou was babyish and cried and said, "Honey, don't go!" She was brave, though. I knew if I looked up she would look regular, just friendly. It would of hurt me to look at her.

I had to go to Colorado, Rusty was my best friend and she needed to get her new life going. I only had been close with Mary Lou just a little while, but Rusty and me had been to­gether forever, and Rusty was having a hard time. Mary Lou knew how to take care of herself.

I put sugar in my coffee and started stirring it up. "It/s not like I want to go," I said. "I mean, I do, I need to go. I'll be sad...when you're not with me. I'll miss—" My throat was chok­ing, I squinched my eyes up to keep the tears in. Mary Lou wasn't as much of a baby as me.

"It's all right," said Mary Lou. "We'll just be happy while we can."

A couple big tears slid out of my eyes and run down my cheek. I didn't wipe them off.

* * *

There was a phone in the upstairs hall at the rooming house, I never had used it. The only people I knew in New Naples was Rusty and Mary Lou, and I seen them every day. I didn't need a phone to talk to them. But one night, the hall phone started ringing while me and Mary Lou was taking a nap on my bed. I didn't feel like getting up, but I put on my robe and answered it.

"Honey?" the phone voice said.

I wasn't sure if it was the right number. So I waited to see if it was somebody I knew.

"Carol?" said the voice.

"Yeah," I said. "Marlene? That you?"

"Uh-huh, it's me," she said. "You doing all right? You feel all right?"

"I'm fine," I said, "You're the one that sounds funny, your voice is kind of weak. You ain't sick, are you?"

"No, honey, I'm all right," said Marlene. "I went to Dr. Allen, he give me pills."

"Pills? What for?" I said. 'When did you go see a doctor? You hate the doctor."

"It's just a little bug, Dr. Allen says," said Marlene. "He give me some pills."

"Well, all right," I said. "Other than that, you okay?"

"I'm fine, honey," said Marlene. "I just wanted to hear your voice, find out how you're doing. Are you eating good? Not just hamburgers and old greasy french fries?"

"Yeah, I eat," I said. "I do all right. Nobody has called for me, or anything, have they?"

"Nobody," said Marlene. "No, I take that back. Vernon, what's his name, is that right, Vernon? From Redskin Broom Company?"

"Yeah, what did he want?" I said.

"He wanted to know where you was at," she said. "They're short-handed. He wanted to know if you was coming back."

"No," I said. "I'm still going with Rusty when she goes. To Colorado."

"Ain't that where you're at?" Marlene said. "Colorado?"

"Marlene, I've sent you two letters," I said. "We're still in Missouri, in New Naples. We're getting a little bit more money together. Oh yeah, money—you got enough? Getting by all right?"

"Oh yeah, honey, don't worry about me," she said. "I don't need too much."

"Okay, then," I said.

"I just wanted to hear your voice," said Marlene. "You call your mother once in a while, all right? Tell me when you get to Colorado."

"All right," I said. "I will."

When I hung up and come back to bed, Mary Lou said, "What's the matter?"

"Nothing," I said. "Just Marlene."

"You got a funny look," said Mary Lou. "Was she drunk?"

"No," I said. "That's what's weird. What time is it? Nine o'clock? Then it's seven o'clock their time, ain't it? Seven or eight o'clock? Why ain't she out drinking? Broke or sick or something."

I opened up the top drawer of my dresser and took my money sock out from underneath my Bible I never read. I didn't know why I brought the Bible, I never looked at it. I took two ten-dollar bills out of the money sock and folded them up in a sheet of paper. I put Marlene's address on a envelope and went to see did Evelyn Price have a stamp.

* * *

I bought myself a car, cause I was tired of sharing the wagon with Rusty. I decided I would give her the wagon and get me something else to drive. She was never going to have enough saved to buy herself a bicycle, probably.

I seen my new car sitting parked in somebody's front yard. I was on my way back from the library, the day I give up and took back Rusty's Sherlock Holmes book. Sherlock was so over­due I had to pay for the book. But I let the library have the book back anyway. I wasn't going to read it. Every time I looked at it, it would of made me mad.

I checked out a book about Bette Davis, and one about Ame­lia Earhart. When I was driving back home, I went by Second and Maple and there was a blue Plymouth sitting in the grass. Well, it was a mostly-blue Plymouth. It had all different body panels, but it started out blue, you could tell by the roof. There was a white front panel, one of the back panels was red and the other one was creamy yellow with rust dots. At least the trunk lid was the same as the roof. The grass hadn't grew up around the tires, so the engine must run. I seen "4-SALE" wrote across the windshield.

I played like I didn't see it, but then the next week, when I was taking back Bette Davis and Amelia Earhart to the library, the car was still there. I decided to stop and look. The Plymouth belonged to a redheaded, freckle-face lady that had got another car and wanted to get rid of her old one.

I said, "I don't blame you, how much you want for it?"

Freckle Face hemmed and hawed so much I thought for sure it was going to be a fortune. "I don't know," she said, "I hadn't thought. What do you think?" she said. "I was thinking..! prob­ably—is two hundred too much? Two hundred dollars?"

"How about one seventy-five?" I said, and the Plymouth was mine. "I'll come back in a couple hours and bring somebody to pick up the station wagon. Monday or Tuesday, we can meet downtown and get the title fixed and all that."

When I got back to Evelyn Price's rooming house, Mary Lou was in the living room. Her and Evelyn was watching teevee. "Hey," said Mary Lou, looking out the front window, "what time's the demolition derby start?"

"That is a good car," I said. "You and Rusty are mean to Plymouths, she always made fun of my old car. Is she here? Rusty? I need her to go with me and pick up the station wagon."

"No," said Mary Lou. "Her buddy Sandra picked her up a little while ago, maybe ten minutes or something."

"Oh," I said. "I guess she'll have to wait and make fun of my car later. Will you come with me and get the wagon? It's back at the Plymouth lady's."

"Sure," said Mary Lou. "When we come back, you can take me for a ride in your new car."

"Okay," I said.

"I'll just run in the kitchen and get a paper bag to put over my head," said Mary Lou.

"Hey, now," I said. "That Plymouth is a good car."

* * *

It was suppertime when me and Mary Lou got back from our drive in the clown car, which is what Mary Lou started calling the Plymouth. Rusty was already in bed.

When we opened the door and seen Rusty snoring, Mary Lou said, "Passed out?"

I leaned down and smelled Rusty. "No," I said. "She don't smell boozy. Pretty early to go to bed, though. She used to do this, back home. When her nerves got bad, she laid on the bed and slept."

"We could go over to my house and lay on my bed," said Mary Lou. She put her hand on my arm. "And not sleep."

"Yeah," I said. '“Let's do." She went down the stairs first, with me following after her. Out in the street, I lit a cigarette.

"You want to go in the clown car or the truck?" Mary Lou said.

"The truck," I said. 'Let's go in style."

She opened my door for me and I got in.

"But Rusty, though," I said when Mary Lou got behind the steering wheel. "I was thinking, maybe I could take her on a visit. Go visit Colorado, she could see all the mountains and rivers and everything. So she would have her enthusiasm back."

"Rusty gets enthusiastic?" said Mary Lou. "She's always asleep or out drinking."

"She wasn't like this before," I said. "You don't know her. She was the one with the ideas. She figured out going to Colorado, she's the one that does stuff. I just come along for the ride."

Mary Lou looked like she doubted it.

"Rusty is the smart one," I said. I never thought I would have to prove what Rusty was worth, next to me. "She gets excited about stuff, I never got excited and did stuff till I met her. She's the one that did stuff."

"You're the one that did stuff," said Mary Lou. "You're the one that stayed in school."

"She couldn't help it," I said. "She never had—"

"You're the one that joined the army," said Mary Lou. "You're the one that got her to Colorado, figured out the money and got the car. You're the one that knows how to love your sweetheart, and how to be alive and do what you want. Why do you always think she's the best one? You're the one that cares for her, and figures out what she wants. What does she do for you? Noth­ing. She lays in the bed and sleeps."

I never said a word to Mary Lou when we got out of the truck and went up in her room. I never knew Mary Lou was like that. No heart, no appreciation. She was jealous of me being

friends with Rusty. I tried laying down with her but I couldn't sleep. I was mad, I had to leave. Mary Lou said, 'I'll drive you back," but I said, "No, I'll walk." I wanted to get my nerves settled down.

* * *

The next day, at six o'clock in the morning, me and Rusty should of been down at Evelyn Price's breakfast table digging our spoons in our cereal bowl. But Rusty was still up in our room, in bed. When the alarm clock clanged, I got up but Rusty never moved. I left her lay and went down the hall to the rest­room. While I was standing under the shower water, I decided I should try and get Rusty up. I got out of the shower and come back down the hall. She was lumped up underneath of the cov­ers, snoring.

"Hey," I said. "You sick or something? You got to be to work in half a hour."

"Not going in," she said. She rolled over but she just pulled the covers up around her. "Mary Jean said she would work for me."

"Work for you?" I said. "Why? You got something else to do?"

"Cut me some slack, Frehardt," Rusty said. She put the blan­ket up over her head.

"What do you need slack for?" I said. "Cause you got a hang­over? Nobody put that beer bottle in your hand, now get up. Or you want me to go down and get you a beer and bring it up to you? I mean, hell, why even bother getting your ass up? Sandra will come over and bring your beers over and open them up for you. Put them in your baby bottle for you—"

"Shut up, Carol," said Rusty from underneath of the blanket. "Just cause Marlene drinks, you think if somebody has one beer, they—"

I pulled the blanket down out of her hand.  Her eyes were staring at me like a crazy dog.  

"That's right," I said.  "I am an expert when it comes to a drunk.  I wasn't a Einstein in school, but drunks, I got a A in drunks. And you're getting to be one."

"Get over yourself," said Rusty.

"I ain't sitting out here in some pokey town in Nowhere U.S.A. while you drink up your Colorado money," I said. "You better get your ass to work and earn some money, fool! You said we was going to Colorado. That's why I come, cause you wanted—"

"I told you to go back," Rusty said. She got up and got her bath towel off of the hook. "I told you to catch a bus back." She went out in the hall, in a minute I heard the bathroom door shut.

"Back to what?" I said to the door.

When Rusty come back, I said, "Listen, here's my half of the rent on top of the dresser. It's due, so you get your half together and take all of it down to Evelyn. I have to go right this second or I'm gonna be late to work."

I got to Reed right on time, at the time clock I squeezed in behind Janice Myers or the clock would of clicked me late. I put my lunch sack in the cooler and tied my smock while I was walking to West Wing.

I never made it that far, cause a nurse stopped me. "Go out and tell the warehouse man we need fitted sheets," she said. I went, cause she was a nurse, but I hated going out there. Mike the warehouse man was a creep, he liked to make dirty re­marks.

When I went to the warehouse, Mike was his usual dirty- mouth self, but I just stood there till he went and got me a pack of bed sheets. "Going to lay down on the job, huh?" he said. "Want company?"

"You're not funny," I said, and I went back to West Wing.

"There was somebody on the phone for you," the nurse said when I give her the sheets. "They took the message up at the front desk."

I went up front fast, I was nervous. We wasn't supposed to get personal calls at work. The only person that would of called me was Rusty, and the only reason she would of called was a emergency. She probably got drunk and racked up the wagon.

When I got to the reception desk, Marjorie wasn't there. I stood there and stood there. We wasn't supposed to smoke where the families could see us, but I got a cigarette out of my smock pocket and held onto it. It was making my nerves feel real awful, waiting to find out how bad Rusty was hurt.

The door to the visitors' restroom clicked shut, and Marjorie come out. She hung the key up hehind her desk and she give me a nice smile. "Hi, Carol," Marjorie said.

"Hey there," I said. "Listen, Marjorie, the nurse said some­body called."

"It's right here," Marjorie said. She give me a little piece of paper with a number on it. "You can use the phone up here if you keep it short."

It wouldn't take too long. I'd just call and they'd tell me Rusty was dead, and—or Mary Lou! Mary Lou might be the one laying dead in the road. I about collapsed.

"Here, hon," said Marjorie. "You want me to dial for you?"

I nodded my head, and she dialed eleven numbers.

"Long distance?" I said. "It's long distance?"

But there wasn't time for Marjorie to answer me. Right soon as she give me the phone, I could hear a woman on the line saying, "Health Extension Service."

"Hello, this is Carol Frehardt, did you call me?"

"Yes, Miss Frehardt, just a moment. The administrator wants to speak with you. Stay on the line, I'll connect you."

In a minute another woman's voice said, "Administrative of­fice."

"This is Carol Frehardt," I said. "Did somebody call me?"

"Just a moment."

I waited some more, till another woman said, "Miss Frehardt, my name is Rae Blankenship. I administrate the Marion County Health Extension Service."

"Marion County? Is it Marlene?" I said. 'What's the matter? Did something happen to my mother?"

"Marlene Frehardt is your parent then?" said Rae Blanken­ship.

"Yeah, my mom," I said. "What's the matter, is she sick, or what?"

"There is some concern that has been expressed for your mother's mental health, Miss Frehardt."

"Mental health?" I said. "Is she flipping out? What did she do?"

"There have been several incidents of erratic behavior," said Rae Blankenship. "We would like permission from you to admit your mother for a thirty-day period of observation."

'Where, the nuthouse?" I said. "No way. She drinks, but she ain't nuts. When she ain't drunk, she's fine."

"As I said," said Rae Blankenship, "there have been several incidents of erratic behavior. On June first, she attempted to hit a patron of a local tavern with her vehicle. On June eighth, the fire department was called to her residence, in the one hundred block of North Monroe Avenue, to extinguish a fire in the kit­chen. On June ninth, the fire department was again called, to again extinguish a kitchen fire. On June eleventh, Mrs. Frehardt was detained in custody after she was found wandering in the line of traffic, disoriented and without identification."

"I better come home," I said. "I need to see her. Where's she at?"

"I really think it would be best," said Rae Blankenship, "to have your permission for the thirty-day period of observation. A qualified physician is trained to judge whether—"

'Where's she at?" I said. "I'll be there by tomorrow night, or day after tomorrow. I'm not permitting nothing, I'm not signing nothing till I see how she is."

"I can't release that infor—"

"Forget you," I said. "I'll find her myself." I hung the phone up.

"Marjorie, can I use the phone again?" I said but I didn't wait for her to say okay. I dialed and the phone rung twice at the other end before it was picked up.

"Mary Lou?" I said. "I wake you up?"