Page 34 (1/2)

1

Shortly before being knocked unconscious and bound to a chair, before being injected with an unknown substance against his will, and before discovering that the world was deeply ined, Dylan O'Conner left his hted fast-food franchise to buy cheeseburgers, French fries, pocket pies with apple filling, and a vanilla milkshake

The expired day lay buried in the earth, in the asphalt Unseen but felt, its ghost haunted the Arizona night: a hot spirit rising lazily froround that Dylan crossed

Here at the end of town that served travelers from the nearby interstate, forns warred for custoht battle, however, an ileamed from horizon to horizon, for the air was clear and dry A westbound moon, as round as a ship's wheel, plied the starry ocean

The vastness above appeared clean and full of proround level looked dusty, weary Rather than being coht was plaited with many breezes, each with an individual quality of whispery speech and a unique scent Redolent of desert grit, of cactus pollen, of diesel fumes, of hot blacktop, the air curdled as Dylan drew near to the restaurant, thickened with the aro on a griddle, with fried-onion vapors nearly as thick as blackdamp

If he hadn't been in a town unfamiliar to him, if he hadn't been tired after a day on the road, and if his younger brother, Shepherd, hadn't been in a puzzling ht a restaurant with healthier fare Shep wasn't currently able to cope in public, however, and when in this condition, he refused to eat anything but coh fat content

The restaurant was brighter inside than out Most surfaces hite, and in spite of the well-greased air, the establishment looked antiseptic

Contemporary culture fit Dylan O'Conner only about as well as a three-fingered glove, and here was onepinched: He believed that a burger joint ought to look like a joint, not like a surgery, not like a nursery with pictures of clowns and funny animals on the walls, not like a balossy plastic replica of a 1950s diner that never actually existed If you were going to eat charred cow smothered in cheese, with a side order of potato stripsoil, and if you were going to wash it all doith either satisfying quantities of icy beer or athe caloric equivalent of an entire roasted pig, then this fabulous consuuilty pleasure, if not sin The lighting should be low and warany, tarnished brass, wine-colored upholstery Music should be provided to soothe the carnivore: not the e rise in an elevator because it was played by musicians steeped in Prozac, but tunes that were as sensuous as the food – perhaps early rock and roll or big-band swing, or good country s

Nevertheless, he crossed the ceramic-tile floor to a stainless-steel counter, where he placed his takeout order with a plump woman whose white hair, well-scrubbed look, and candy-striped uniforer for Mrs Santa Claus He half expected to see an elf peek out of her shirt pocket

In distant days, counters in fast-food outlets had been nificant number of teens considered such work to be beneath the to supplement their social-security checks

Mrs Santa Claus called Dylan 'dear,' delivered his order in thite paper bags, and reached across the counter to pin a proan FRIES NOT FLIES and the grinning green face of a cartoon toad whose conversion from the traditional diet of his warty species to such taste treats as half-pound bacon cheeseburgers was chronicled in the con

Here was that three-fingered glove again: Dylan didn't understand why he should be expected to weigh the endorsement of a cartoon toad or a sports star – or a Nobel laureate, for thatwhat to eat for dinner Further him that the restaurant's French fries were tastier than house flies should charful of insects

He withheld his antitoad opinion also because lately he had begun to realize that he was allowing his If he didn't eon by the age of thirty-five He smiled at Mrs Claus and thanked her, lest otherwise he ensure an anthracite Christmas

Outside, under the fatpaper bags full of fragrant cholesterol in a variety of fors for which he should be thankful Good health Nice teeth Great hair Youth He enty-nine He possessed a measure of artistic talent and had work that he found both etting rich, he sold his paintings often enough to cover expenses and to bank a littlefacial scars, no persistent fungus problem, no troublesome evil twin, no spells of anails

And he had Shepherd Si and a curse, Shep in his best lad to be alive and happy to be his brother

Under a red neon MOTEL sign where Dylan's traveling shadow painted a purer black upon the neon-rouged blacktop, and then when he passed squat sago pal, and also while he followed the concrete ays that served theand softly clinking soda-vendingabout the soft chains of family commitment – he was stalked So stealthy was the approach that the stalker must have matched him step for step, breath for breath At the door to his roo with his key, he heard too late a betraying scrape of shoe leather Dylan turned his head, rolled his eyes, gli moon-pale face, and sensed asdoard his skull

Strangely, he didn't feel the blow and wasn't aware of falling He heard the paper bags crackle, smelled onions, smelled warm cheese, smelled pickle chips, realized that he was facedown on the concrete, and hoped that he hadn't spilled Shep'sFrench fries

2

Jillian Jackson had a pet jade plant, and she treated it alith tender concern She fed it a carefully calculated and ularly misted its fleshy, oval-shaped, thureen beauty

That Friday night, while traveling from Albuquerque, New Mexico, to Phoenix, Arizona, where she had a three-night gig the folloeek, Jilly did all the driving because Fred had neither a license to drive nor the necessary appendages to operate a motor vehicle Fred was the jade plant

Jilly's ht-blue 1956 Cadillac Coupe DeVille was the love of her life, which Fred understood and graciously accepted, but her little Crassula argentea (Fred's birth name) remained a close second in her affections She had purchased hi with four stubby branches and sixteen thick rubbery leaves Although he had been housed in a tacky three-inch-diameter black plastic pot and should have looked tiny and forlorn, he'd instead appeared plucky and determined fro care, he had grown into a beautiful specihteen inches in dialazed terra-cotta pot; including soil and container, he weighed twelve pounds

Jilly had crafted a firhnutlike seat provided to patients following heery, which prevented the bottoer's-seat upholstery and which provided Fred with a level ride The Coupe DeVille had not come with seat belts in 1956, and Jilly had not come with one, either, when she'd been born in 1977; but she'd had si in his custom pilloith his pot belted to the seat, he was as safe as any jade plant could hope to be while hurtling across the New Mexico badlands at speeds in excess of eighty miles per hour

Sitting below the s, Fred couldn't appreciate the desert scenery, but Jilly painted word pictures for hi vista

She enjoyed exercising her descriptive powers If she failed to parlay the current series of bookings in seedy cocktail lounges and second-rate comedy clubs into a career as a star co novelist