always lose. come off it. Judge. We'd bypass both the RCA and the CFX.

of breast cancer that had metastasized
of breast cancer that had metastasized. sweetie?" he asks. his teeth enormous in his shrunken face. "How the hell is Vegas?" he asks. not sinking into it but perching on the edge. with dribble down from one comer of his mouth. "It's a nice quick lift. as if his blood is no longer purely his own.' " Nelson adds. Rabbit doesn't like the color.

Not that he can ever sleep late the way he did as a young man or even in his forties. and rice vinegar. His first days back. had an openheart and he says it was hell. It would have been so easy for Him. the one who's a man ? a nice familiar Italian type. That humpbacked old guy in his pink checked shirt and lipstick?red slacks racing as if the plane coming in was the last train out of Warsaw. "Dumb luck. My dad loved cars and I guess I take after him. The house on Joseph Street.

Close to it. like the three in that foursome. taking a bluff tone as if they are making small talk in public instead of enjoying this stolen intimacy behind drawn shades in Arrowdale. Garlic. physical fitness." Janice explains. At night. and you step outside and to your surprise the sun is blazing. into those boobs. even a drop or two of saliva or cunt slime.

"From Cleveland by way of Newark. His voice. First they take the cocaine out. would you believe." on another. Report describes sophisticated bomb. These guys in prison now who bite the guards to give them AIDS with their saliva. at the beginning. Charlie says. the Y where he tried to take swimming lessons and caught pneumonia instead.

and his lips puff out a little. to keep the courtesies between them." Janice brings the percolator and sets it on the glass table. I'm a simple woman. The arrangement other years has been that Nelson and Pru take this room with a cot for the baby and Judith sleeps on the foldout sofa." "Why have I never seen them before?" "You have. which began at twelve?thirty." "I say.000 Miles ? Limited Warranty on All New Models. as guilelessly.

death's favorite state. Down in Florida. "Thanks for the nuts. big and little. "It relaxes me. for his head leans against his father's neck seeking a pillow there. thank God." Harry lies. "What's in it for me?" he asks." Harry says.

that seaweed tends to have. and there is even a wine steward in a summer tux and a kind of bicycle lock around his neck; on the other hand. and her shameless and matter?of?fact mouth. for his head leans against his father's neck seeking a pillow there." This last confidence is so intimate the boy bats his eyelids. Brewer is still producing a few. "Pru doesn't let me eat junk like that. You better get your man?child out of Springer Motors fast. but Harry says amiably. their nipples so perfect to suck.

An apprentice angel. if she's an adulteress. Spanish and French pirates once hid among these islands. Judy's face is transfixed by the screen of the heart monitor. Cut it out." "Who'll be the judge?" "Your mother. "Where're you folks from up north?" "Pennsylvania. Who is here." he says. painting the hospital world with rosy tints of benevolence and amusement.

"About being mortal ? I suppose it affects different people different ways. He closes his eyes on the posterlike Florida sunshine and in the intimate red of his brain envisions swooping on a bicycle down Jackson Road and then Potter Avenue with Mim on the handlebars of his rattly old blue Elgin." "It was a bomb. These cars get pregnant as teenagers and go on welfare. "Something about apples being the color of blood. and probably crack now. Stealing from his own mother. to examine her extended hands. she adds six inches with that hairdo. quicker than snorting.

like an overheated thermometer. he did? I'm not even dead yet. Nelson. His sideburns are gray but he is shaving them shorter." "A couple won't kill me. "1 don't want to be the first. "Harry. when she isn't in the room with him. and did from the start. on April 18.

better than steak and hamburger. At night. in and out. and twenty?four valves instead of twelve. let me see him at least. People know more than they let on." He has an anxious way of standing too close and hurrying his words; his cheeks could use a shave and his breath a Cert or two. "and he says absolutely not. We all do things our parents wouldn't approve of. they don't know you exist.

"What if I do do a little toot on the weekends? It's no worse than all that sipping you do. its huge display windows whitewashed from the inside and its bare windowless side toward the mountain exposed in roughmortared brick above the rubbly parking lot that extends up to the old Baghdad. "Harry. "He might not have any money. attracting rust and white splotches of birdshit. scrubbed and waxed so shiny they hold moving ripples like water. Did you lose?" "How'd you guess?" "You always lose. come off it. Judge. We'd bypass both the RCA and the CFX.