What if you could change it back? 7 страница

8

It was quarter to eight when Al unlocked the door of the silver trailer that the Famous Fatburger called home. The glimmering chrome fixtures behind the counter looked ghostly. The stools seemed to whisper no one will sit on us again. The big old-fashioned sugar shakers seemed to whisper back no one will pour from us again—the party’s over.

“Make way for L.L. Bean,” I said.

“That’s right,” Al said. “The fucking march of progress.”

He was out of breath, panting, but didn’t pause to rest. He led me behind the counter and to the pantry door. I followed, switching the briefcase with my new life inside it from one hand to the other. It was the old-fashioned kind, with buckles. If I’d carried it into my homeroom at LHS, most of the kids would have laughed. A few others—those with an emerging sense of style—might have applauded its retro funk.

Al opened the door on the smells of vegetables, spices, coffee. He once more reached past my shoulder to turn on the light. I gazed at the gray linoleum floor the way a man might stare at a pool that could well be filled with hungry sharks, and when Al tapped me on the shoulder, I jumped.

“Sorry,” he said, “but you ought to take this.” He was holding out a fifty-cent piece. Half a rock. “The Yellow Card Man, remember him?”

“Sure I do.” Actually I’d forgotten all about him. My heart was beating hard enough to make my eyeballs feel like they were pulsing in their sockets. My tongue tasted like an old piece of carpet, and when he handed me the coin, I almost dropped it.

He gave me a final critical look. “The jeans are okay for now, but you ought to stop at Mason’s Menswear on upper Main Street and get some slacks before you head north. Pendletons or khaki twill is fine for everyday. Ban-Lon for dress.”

“Ban-Lon?”

“Just ask, they’ll know. You’ll also need to get some dress shirts. Eventually a suit. Also some ties and a tie clip. Buy yourself a hat, too. Not a baseball cap, a nice summer straw.”

There were tears leaking from the corners of his eyes. This frightened me more thoroughly than anything he’d said.

“Al? What’s wrong?”

“I’m just scared, same as you are. No need for an emotional parting scene, though. If you’re coming back, you’ll be here in two minutes no matter how long you stay in ’58. Just time enough for me to start the coffeemaker. If it works out, we’ll have a nice cup together, and you can tell me all about it.”

If. What a big word.

“You could say a prayer, too. There’d be time for that, wouldn’t there?”

“Sure. I’ll be praying that it goes nice and smooth. Don’t get so dazed by where you are that you forget you’re dealing with a dangerous man. More dangerous than Oswald, maybe.”

“I’ll be careful.”

“Okay. Keep your mouth shut as much as you can until you pick up the lingo and the feel of the place. Go slow. Don’t make waves.”

I tried to smile, but I’m not sure I made it. The briefcase felt very heavy, as if it were filled with rocks instead of money and bogus ID. I thought I might faint. And yet, God help me, part of me still wanted to go. Couldn’t wait to go. I wanted to see the USA in my Chevrolet; America was asking me to call.

Al held out his thin and trembling hand. “Good luck, Jake. God bless.”

“George, you mean.”

“George, right. Now get going. As they say back then, it’s time for you to split the scene.”

I turned and walked slowly into the pantry, moving like a man trying to locate the top of a staircase with the lights out.

On my third step, I found it.

 

PART 2
The Janitor’s Father

 

CHAPTER 5

1

I walked along the side of the drying shed, just like before. I ducked under the chain with the NO ADMITTANCE BEYOND THIS POINT sign hanging from it, just like before. I walked around the corner of the big green-painted cube of a building just like before, and then something smacked into me. I’m not particularly heavy for my height, but I’ve got some meat on my bones—“You won’t blow away in a high wind,” my father used to say—and still the Yellow Card Man almost knocked me over. It was like being attacked by a black overcoat full of flapping birds. He was yelling something, but I was too startled (not scared, exactly, it was all too quick for that) to have any idea what it was.

I pushed him away and he stumbled back against the drying shed with his coat swirling around his legs. There was a bonk sound when the back of his head struck the metal, and his filthy fedora tumbled to the ground. He followed it down, not in a tumble but in a kind of accordion collapse. I was sorry for what I’d done even before my heart had a chance to settle into a more normal rhythm, and sorrier still when he picked up his hat and began brushing at it with one dirty hand. The hat was never going to be clean again, and, in all probability, neither was he.

“Are you okay?” I asked, but when I bent down to touch his shoulder, he went scuttering away from me along the side of the shed, pushing with his hands and sliding on his butt. I’d say he looked like a crippled spider, but he didn’t. He looked like what he was: a wino with a brain that was damp going on wet. A man who might be as close to death as Al Templeton was, because in this fifty-plus-years-ago America there were probably no charity-supported shelters or rehabs for guys like him. The VA might take him if he’d ever worn the uniform, but who would take him to the VA? Nobody, probably, although someone—a mill foreman would be the most likely—might call the cops on him. They’d put him in the drunk tank for twenty-four or forty-eight hours. If he didn’t die of DT-induced convulsions while he was in there, they’d turn him loose to start the next cycle. I found myself wishing my ex-wife was here—she could find an AA meeting and take him to it. Only Christy wouldn’t be born for another twenty-one years.

I put the briefcase between my feet and held my hands out to show him they were empty, but he cringed even further down the side of the drying shed. Spittle gleamed on his stubbly chin. I looked around to be sure we weren’t attracting attention, saw that we had this part of the millyard to ourselves, and tried again. “I only pushed you because you startled me.”

“Who the fuck are you?” he asked, his voice cracking through about five different registers. If I hadn’t heard the question on my last visit, I wouldn’t have had any idea what he was asking… and although the slur was the same, wasn’t the inflection a little different this time? I wasn’t sure, but I thought so. He’s harmless, but he’s not like anyone else, Al had said. It’s like he knows something. Al thought it was because he happened to be sunning himself near the rabbit-hole at 11:58 in the morning on September 9, 1958, and was susceptible to its influence. The way you can produce static on a TV screen if you run a mixer close to it. Maybe that was it. Or, hell, maybe it was just the booze.

“Nobody important,” I said in my most soothing voice. “Nobody you need to concern yourself with. My name’s George. What’s yours?”

“Motherfucker!” he snarled, and scrambled yet further from me. If that was his name, it was certainly an unusual one. “You’re not supposed to be here!”

“Don’t worry, I’m leaving,” I said. I picked up the briefcase to demonstrate my sincerity, and he hunched his thin shoulders all the way up to his ears, as if he expected me to hurl it at him. He was like a dog that’s been beaten so often it expects no other treatment. “No harm and no foul, okay?”

“Get out, bastard-ball! Go back to where you came from and leave me alone!”

“It’s a deal.” I was still recovering from the startle he’d given me, and the residual adrenaline mixed badly with the pity I felt—not to mention the exasperation. The same exasperation I’d felt with Christy when I came home to discover she was drunk-going-on-shitfaced again in spite of all her promises to straighten up, fly right, and quit the booze once and for all. The combination of emotions added to the heat of this late summer midday was making me feel a little sick to my stomach. Probably not the best way to start a rescue mission.

I thought of the Kennebec Fruit and how good that root beer had been; I could see the gasp of vapor from the ice cream freezer as Frank Anicetti Senior pulled out the big mug. Also, it had been blessedly cool in there. I started in that direction with no further ado, my new (but carefully aged around the edges) briefcase banging against the side of my knee.

“Hey! Hey, you, whatsyaface!”

I turned. The wino was struggling to his feet, using the side of the drying shed as a support. He had snagged his hat and was holding it crushed against his midsection. Now he began to fumble at it. “I got a yellow card from the greenfront, so gimme a buck, motherfucker. Today’s double-money day.”

We were back on message. That was comforting. Nonetheless, I took pains not to approach him too closely. I didn’t want to scare him again or provoke another attack. I stopped six feet away and held out my hand. The coin Al had given me gleamed on my palm. “I can’t spare a buck, but here’s half a rock.”

He hesitated, now holding his hat in his left hand. “You better not want a suck-job.”

“Tempting, but I think I can resist.”

“Huh?” He looked from the fifty-cent piece to my face, then back down at the money again. He raised his right hand to wipe the slick of drool off his chin, and I saw another difference from before. Nothing earth-shattering, but enough to make me wonder about the solidity of Al’s claim that each time was a complete reset.

“I don’t care if you take it or leave it, but make up your mind,” I said. “I’ve got things to do.”

He snatched the coin, then cowered back against the drying shed again. His eyes were large and wet. The slick of drool had reappeared on his chin. There’s really nothing in the world that can match the glamour of a late-stage alcoholic; I can’t think why Jim Beam, Seagram’s, and Mike’s Hard Lemonade don’t use them in their magazine ads. Drink Beam and see a better class of bugs.

“Who are you? What are you doing here?”

“A job, I hope. Listen, have you tried AA for that little problem you’ve got with the boo—”

“Fuck off, Jimla!”

I had no idea what a jimla might be, the fuck off part came through loud and clear. I headed for the gate, expecting him to hurl more questions after me. He hadn’t before, but this encounter had been markedly different.

Because he wasn’t the Yellow Card Man, not this time. When he raised his hand to wipe his chin, the card clutched in it had no longer been yellow.

This time it was a dirty but still bright orange.

2

I threaded my way through the mill parking lot, once again tapping the trunk of the white-over-red Plymouth Fury for good luck. I was certainly going to need all of that I could get. I crossed the train tracks, once again hearing the wuff-chuff of a train, only this time it sounded a little more distant, because this time my encounter with the Yellow Card Man—who was now the Orange Card Man—had taken a bit longer. The air stank of mill effluent as it had before, and the same inter-city bus snored past. Because I was a little late this time, I couldn’t read the route sign, but I remembered what it said: LEWISTON EXPRESS. I wondered idly how many times Al had seen that same bus, with the same passengers looking out the windows.

I hurried across the street, waving away the blue cloud of bus exhaust as best I could. The rockabilly rebel was at his post outside the door, and I wondered briefly what he’d say if I stole his line. But in a way that would be as mean as terrorizing the drying shed wino on purpose; if you stole the secret language belonging to kids like this, they didn’t have much left. This one couldn’t even go back and pound on the Xbox. So I just nodded.

He nodded back. “Hi-ho, Daddy-O.”

I went inside. The bell jingled. I went past the discount comic books and straight to the soda fountain where Frank Anicetti Senior was standing. “What can I do for you today, my friend?”

For a moment I was stumped, because that wasn’t what he’d said before. Then I realized it wouldn’t be. Last time I’d grabbed a newspaper out of the rack. This time I hadn’t. Maybe each trip back to 1958 reset the odometer back to all zeros (with the exception of the Yellow Card Man), but the first time you varied something, everything was up for grabs. The idea was both scary and liberating.

“I could use a root beer,” I said.

“And I can use the custom, so we’ve got a meeting of the minds. Five-or ten-cent beer?”

“Ten, I guess.”

“Well, I think you guess right.”

The frost-coated mug came out of the freezer. He used the handle of the wooden spoon to scrape off the foam. He filled it to the top and set it in front of me. All just like before.

“That’s a dime, plus one for the governor.”

I handed over one of Al’s vintage dollars, and while Frank 1.0 made change, I looked over my shoulder and saw the former Yellow Card Man standing outside the liquor store—the greenfront—and swaying from side to side. He made me think of a Hindu fakir I’d seen in some old movie, tooting a horn to coax a cobra out of a wicker basket. And, coming up the sidewalk, right on schedule, was Anicetti the Younger.

I turned back, sipped my root beer, and sighed. “This hits the spot.”

“Yep, nothing like a cold beer on a hot day. Not from around here, are you?”

“No, Wisconsin.” I held out my hand. “George Amberson.”

He shook it as the bell over the door jangled. “Frank Anicetti. And there comes my boy. Frank Junior. Say hello to Mr. Amberson from Wisconsin, Frankie.”

“Hello, sir.” He gave me a smile and a nod, then turned to his dad. “Titus has got the truck up on the lift. Says it’ll be ready by five.”

“Well, that’s good.” I waited for Anicetti 1.0 to light a cigarette and wasn’t disappointed. He inhaled, then turned back to me. “Are you traveling on business or for pleasure?”

For a moment I didn’t respond, but not because I was stumped for an answer. What was throwing me was the way this scene kept diverging from and then returning to the original script. In any case, Anicetti didn’t seem to notice.

“Either way, you picked the right time to come. Most of the summer people are gone, and when that happens we all relax. You want a scoop of vanilla ice cream in your beer? Usually it’s five cents extra, but on Tuesdays I reduce the price to a nickel.”

“You wore that one out ten years ago, Pop,” Frank Junior said amiably.

“Thanks, but this is fine,” I said. “I’m on business, actually. A real estate closing up in… Sabattus? I think that’s it. Do you know that town?”

“Only my whole life,” Frank said. He jetted smoke from his nostrils, then gave me a shrewd look. “Long way to come for a real estate closing.”

I returned a smile that was supposed to communicate if you knew what I know. It must have gotten across, because he tipped me a wink. The bell over the door jingled and the fruit-shopping ladies came in. The DRINK CHEER-UP COFFEE wall clock read 12:28. Apparently the part of the script where Frank Junior and I discussed the Shirley Jackson story had been cut from this draft. I finished my root beer in three long swallows, and as I did, a cramp tightened my bowels. In novels characters rarely have to go potty, but in real life, mental stress often provokes a physical reaction.

“Say, you don’t happen to have a men’s room, do you?”

“Sorry, no,” Frank Senior said. “Keep meaning to put one in, but in the summer we’re too busy and in the winter there never seems to be enough cash for the renovations.”

“You can go around the corner to Titus,” Frank Junior said. He was scooping ice cream into a metal cylinder, getting ready to make himself a milkshake. He hadn’t done that before, and I thought with some unease about the so-called butterfly effect. I thought I was watching that butterfly unfurl its wings right before my eyes. We were changing the world. Only in small ways—infinitesimal ways—but yes, we were changing it.

“Mister?”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “Had a senior moment.”

He looked puzzled, then laughed. “Never heard that one before, but it’s pretty good.” Because it was, he might repeat it the next time he lost his own train of thought. And a phrase that otherwise wouldn’t enter the bright flow of American slanguage until the seventies or eighties would make an early debut. You couldn’t say a premature debut, exactly, because on this time-stream it would be right on schedule.

“Titus Chevron is around the corner on your right,” Anicetti Senior said. “If it’s… uh… urgent, you’re welcome to use our bathroom upstairs.”

“No, I’m fine,” I said, and although I’d already looked at the wall clock, I took an ostentatious glance at my Bulova on the cool Speidel band. It was a good thing they couldn’t see the face, because I’d forgotten to reset it and it was still on 2011 time. “But I’ve got to be going. Errands to run. Unless I’m very lucky, they’ll tie me up for more than a day. Can you recommend a good motel around here?”

“Do you mean a motor court?” Anicetti Senior asked. He butted his cigarette in one of the WINSTON TASTES GOOD ashtrays that lined the counter.

“Yes.” This time my smile felt foolish rather than in-the-know… and my bowels cramped again. If I didn’t take care of that problem soon, it was going to develop into an authentic 911 situation. “Motels are what we call them in Wisconsin.”

“Well I’d say the Tamarack Motor Court, about five miles up 196 on your way to Lewiston,” Anicetti Senior said. “It’s near the drive-in movie.”

“Thanks for the tip,” I said, getting up.

“You bet. And if you want to get trimmed up before any of your meetings, try Baumer’s Barber Shop. He does a real fine job.”

“Thanks. Another good tip.”

“Tips are free, root beers are sold American. Enjoy your time in Maine, Mr. Amberson. And Frankie? You drink that milkshake and get on back to school.”

“You bet, Pop.” This time it was Junior who tipped a wink in my direction.

“Frank?” one of the ladies called in a yoo-hoo voice. “Are these oranges fresh?”

“As fresh as your smile, Leola,” he replied, and the ladies tee-hee’d. I’m not trying to be cute here; they actually tee-hee’d.

I passed them, murmuring “Ladies” as I went by. The bell jingled and I went out into the world that had existed before my birth. But this time instead of crossing the street to the courtyard where the rabbit-hole was, I walked deeper into that world. Across the street, the wino in the long black coat was gesticulating at the tunic-wearing clerk. The card he was waving might be orange instead of yellow, but otherwise he was back on script.

I took that as a good sign.

3

Titus Chevron was beyond the Red & White Supermarket, where Al had bought the same supplies for his diner over and over again. According to the sign in the window, lobster was going for sixty-nine cents a pound. Across from the market, standing on a patch of ground that was vacant in 2011, was a big maroon barn with the doors standing open and all sorts of used furniture on display—cribs, cane rockers, and overstuffed easy chairs of the “Dad’s relaxin’” type seemed in particularly abundant supply. The sign over the door read THE JOLLY WHITE ELEPHANT. An additional sign, this one an A-frame propped to catch the eye of folks on the road to Lewiston, made the audacious claim that IF WE DON’T HAVE IT, YOU DON’T NEED IT. A fellow I took to be the proprietor was sitting in one of the rocking chairs, smoking a pipe and looking across at me. He wore a strap-style tee-shirt and baggy brown slacks. He also wore a goatee, which I thought equally audacious for this particular island in the time-stream. His hair, although combed back and held in place with some sort of grease, curled down to the nape of his neck and made me think of some old rock-and-roll video I’d seen: Jerry Lee Lewis jumping on his piano as he sang “Great Balls of Fire.” The proprietor of the Jolly White Elephant probably had a reputation as the town beatnik.

I tipped a finger to him. He gave me the faintest of nods and went on puffing his pipe.

At the Chevron (where regular was selling for 19.9 cents a gallon and “super” was a penny more), a man in blue coveralls and a strenuous crewcut was working on a truck—the Anicettis’, I presumed—that was up on the lift.

“Mr. Titus?”

He glanced over his shoulder. “Ayuh?”

“Mr. Anicetti said I could use your restroom?”

“Key’s inside the front door.” Doe-ah.

“Thank you.”

The key was attached to a wooden paddle with MEN printed on it. The other key had GIRLS printed on the paddle. My ex-wife would have shit a brick at that, I thought, and not without glee.

The restroom was clean but smoky-smelling. There was an urn-style ashtray beside the commode. From the number of butts studding it, I would guess a good many visitors to this tidy little room enjoyed puffing as they pooped.

When I came out, I saw two dozen or so used cars in a small lot next to the station. A line of colored pennants fluttered above them in a light breeze. Cars that would have sold for thousands—as classics, no less—in 2011 were priced at seventy-five and a hundred dollars. A Caddy that looked in nearly mint condition was going for eight hundred. The sign over the little sales booth (inside, a gum-chewing, ponytailed cutie was absorbed in Photoplay) read: ALL THESE CARS RUN GOOD AND COME WITH THE BILL TITUS GUARENTEE WE SERVICE WHAT WE SELL!

I hung the key up, thanked Titus (who grunted without turning from the truck on the lift), and started back toward Main Street, thinking it would be a good idea to get my hair cut before visiting the bank. That made me remember the goatee-wearing beatnik, and on impulse I crossed the street to the used furniture emporium.

“Morning,” I said.

“Well, it’s actually afternoon, but whatever makes you happy.” He puffed his pipe, and that light late-summer breeze brought me a whiff of Cherry Blend. Also a memory of my grandfather, who used to smoke it when I was a kid. He sometimes blew it in my ear to quell the earache, a treatment that was probably not AMA-approved.

“Do you sell suitcases?”

“Oh, I got a few in my kick. No more’n two hundred, I’d say. Walk all the way to the back and look on your right.”

“If I buy one, could I leave it here for a couple of hours, while I do some shopping?”

“I’m open until five,” he said, and turned his face up into the sun. “After that you’re on your own.”

4

I traded two of Al’s vintage dollars for a leather valise, left it behind the beatnik’s counter, then walked up to Main Street with my briefcase banging my leg. I glanced into the greenfront and saw the clerk sitting beside the cash register and reading a newspaper. There was no sign of my pal in the black overcoat.

It would have been hard to get lost in the shopping district; it was only a block long. Three of four storefronts up from the Kennebec Fruit, I came to Baumer’s Barber Shop. A red-and-white barber pole twirled in the window. Next to it was a political poster featuring Edmund Muskie. I remembered him as a tired, slope-shouldered old man, but this version of him looked almost too young to vote, let alone get elected to anything. The poster read, SEND ED MUSKIE TO THE U.S. SENATE, VOTE DEMOCRAT! Someone had put a bright white band around the bottom. Hand-printed on it was THEY SAID IT COULDN’T BE DONE IN MAINE BUT WE DID IT! NEXT UP: HUMPHREY IN 1960!

Inside, two old parties were sitting against the wall while an equally old third party got his tonsure trimmed. Both of the waiting men were puffing like choo-choos. So was the barber (Baumer, I assumed), with one eye squinted against the rising smoke as he clipped. All four studied me in a way I was familiar with: the not-quite-mistrustful look of appraisal that Christy once called the Yankee Glare. It was nice to know that some things hadn’t changed.

“I’m from out of town, but I’m a friend,” I told them. “Voted the straight Democratic ticket my whole life.” I raised my hand in a so-help-me-God gesture.

Baumer grunted with amusement. Ash tumbled from his cigarette. He brushed it absently off his smock and onto the floor, where there were several crushed butts among the cut hair. “Harold there’s a Republican. You want to watch out he don’t bitecha.”

“He ain’t got the choppers for it nummore,” one of the others said, and they all cackled.

“Where you from, mister?” Harold the Republican asked.

“Wisconsin.” I picked up a copy of Man’s Adventure to forestall further conversation. On the cover, a subhuman Asian gent with a whip in one gloved hand was approaching a blonde lovely tied to a post. The story that went with it was called JAP SEX-SLAVES OF THE PACIFIC. The barbershop’s smell was a sweet and completely wonderful mixture of talcum powder, pomade, and cigarette smoke. By the time Baumer motioned me to the chair, I was deep into the sex-slaves story. It wasn’t as exciting as the cover.

“Been doin some traveling, Mr. Wisconsin?” he asked as he settled a white rayon cloth over my front and wrapped a paper collar around my neck.

“Quite a lot,” I said truthfully.

“Well, you’re in God’s country now. How short do you want it?”

“Short enough so I don’t look like”—a hippie, I almost finished, but Baumer wouldn’t know what that was—“like a beatnik.”

“Let it get a little out of control, I guess.” He began to clip. “Leave it much longer and you’d look like that faggot who runs the Jolly White Elephant.”

“I wouldn’t want that,” I said.

“Nosir, he’s a sight, that one.” That-un.

When Baumer finished, he powdered the back of my neck, asked me if I wanted Vitalis, Brylcreem, or Wildroot Cream Oil, and charged me forty cents.

I call that a deal.

5

My thousand-dollar deposit at the Hometown Trust raised no eyebrows. The freshly barbered look probably helped, but I think it was mostly being in a cash-and-carry society where credit cards were still in their infancy… and probably regarded with some suspicion by thrifty Yankees. A severely pretty teller with her hair done up in tight rolls and a cameo at her throat counted my money, entered the amount in a ledger, then called over the assistant manager, who counted it again, checked the ledger, and then wrote out a receipt that showed both the deposit and the total in my new checking account.

“If you don’t mind me saying so, that’s a mighty big amount to be carrying in checking, Mr. Amberson. Would you like to open a savings account? We’re currently offering three percent interest, compounded quarterly.” He widened his eyes to show me what a wonderful deal this was. He looked like that old-time Cuban bandleader, Xavier Cugat.

“Thanks, but I’ve got a fair amount of business to transact.” I lowered my voice. “Real estate closing. Or so I hope.”

“Good luck,” he said, lowering his own to the same confidential pitch. “Lorraine will fix you up with checks. Fifty enough to go on with?”

“Fifty would be fine.”

“Later on, we can have some printed with your name and your address.” He raised his eyebrows, turning it into a question.

“I expect to be in Derry. I’ll be in touch.”

“Fine. I’m at Drexel eight four-seven-seven-seven.”

I had no idea what he was talking about until he slid a business card through the window. Gregory Dusen, Assistant Manager, was engraved on it, and DRexel 8-4777.

Lorraine got my checks and a faux alligator checkbook to put them in. I thanked her and dropped them into my briefcase. At the door I paused for a look back. A couple of the tellers were working adding machines, but otherwise the transactions were all of the pen-and-elbow-grease variety. It occurred to me that, with a few exceptions, Charles Dickens would have felt at home here. It also occurred to me that living in the past was a little like living underwater and breathing through a tube.

6

I got the clothes Al had recommended at Mason’s Menswear, and the clerk told me yes, they would be more than happy to take a check, providing it was drawn on a local bank. Thanks to Lorraine, I could oblige in that regard.

Back at the Jolly White Elephant, the beatnik watched silently as I transferred the contents of three shopping bags to my new valise. When I snapped it shut, he finally offered an opinion. “Funny way to shop, man.”

“I guess so,” I said. “But it’s a funny old world, isn’t it?”

He cracked a smile at that. “In my opinion, that’s a big you-bet. Slip me some skin, Jackson.” He extended his hand, palm up.

For a moment it was like trying to figure out what the word Drexel attached to some numbers was all about. Then I remembered Dragstrip Girl, and understood the beatnik was offering the fifties version of a fist-bump. I dragged my palm across his, feeling the warmth and the sweat, thinking again: This is real. This is happening.