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"The hell I do I s like pick up trash once a ot a view of the da from my bedroou around in the hot sun hunting for other people’s garbage, but I go once in a while And we raise e, and if I’ a table at the bake sale, or God forbid baking so, at least I’ll write out a check But Iperson Endless talking, and then the da?"

"The Athenian song, and no, I’ it for you But that’s hoe close theWe all stand in a circle and cross our ar this Mickey Mouse song"

"Minnie Mouse," he suggested

"I stand corrected The thing is, most of the members have careers of one sort or another, and we don’t just pick up garbage We network, which means we take in each other’s laundry"

"Huh?"

"Beth’s a travel agent, Alison’s a real-estate agent, Lindsay does Tupperware parties"

"So you’ve been buying Tupperware," he suggested "And houses"

"No houses But when I went to Hawaii for a week I let Beth ," she said, "and one of our meo to And of course I bought the Tupperware You go to the party, you buy the Tupperware"

"And drink the Kool-Aid I’o on"

"Anyway," she said, "there they all ith their careers, and there I ith all theti me by"

"That’s what time does"

"I know But I couldn’t shake the feeling that I ought to be doing so But what? Volunteer at a hospital? Help out at a soup kitchen?"

"Doesn’t sound like you"

"So I picked up the phone," she said, "and o? I mean, officially, aren’t you dead?"

"As a doornail," she agreed "Shot in the head and burned up in a fire You Google Dorothea Harbison and that’s what you’ll find out But the people ould call , they never heard of Dorothea Harbison A few of them knew me as Dot, but most of them didn’t even have that much I was a phone number, and a voice on the phone, and a mail drop where they sent payments And that was as much as anybody needed to know"

"And how much did you know about the But I did have a couple of phone nustaff and rented a private mailbox at a franchise operation on South Milton Road, a block from the Embassy Suites hotel On her way home she picked up a prepaid and presumably untraceable phone, and over the next few days she made a couple of calls "I wondered what happened to you," the first man said "I tried your nuotme, because it didn’t work out"

"That was quick"

"For you,and short, I’ive you the number"

She had other numbers, too, of men who’d done what Keller used to do Not all of those numbers worked anymore, but she was able to reestablish a contact or two, and one fellow said he could really use the work Then she sat back and waited for so to happen, not entirely sure she wanted her new phone to ring, but it did, and within the week

"And here’s so, Keller The call was from someone I hadn’t called myself, someone I hadn’t even worked with before One ofreat state of Georgia So I called the guy who’d toldback to hiot paid"

Like old tireed "I’m still me," she said "I’m a rich lady, and I look better than I used to I ht away The place is crawling with energy vortexes, except I think the plural is vortices"

"What are they?"

"Beatslike an intersection, except the streets are is, and they’ve got the saym, can you believe it?"

"You told ot a personal trainer Did I tell you that, too? His naet a littleabout that It’s not as though I turned into whistle bait, and ould he ith a woh to use a teruess people don’t say that anymore"

"They don’t whistle much, either Look, this is a mistake, isn’t it? I shouldn’t have called"

"Well"

"For God’s sake, you’ve got your life to live You’ve got a beautiful wife and an a of New Orleans real estate So why don’t you just wishup, and I’ll leave you alone"