If it isn't the Bobsy Twins, Godfrey slurs, coming out of Nick's. What brings you girls out like this? Dudley says, You stole Socco's cuckoo. I went to the pawn shop and found it there. Chester says, You Siamese assholes go tell Socco I'll be stealing more than clocks. He swishes back into the bar with what he considers a swagger. Ena ouzo ke ena nero, I order in Greek. Nick says, You're the boss, o filos mu, pouring a shot of ouzo for Chester and a shot of water for me--they look the same. After eight shots of water to Chester's eight of ouzo, I ask Nick to give him the bill when he comes to. Dudley's rosebud is now planted between Godfrey's fingers on his chest, a wishful premonition.

Let's walk, I suggest, but first I have to drain my lizard. When I return a man sits on the bumper of the same Ford his daddy drove from Oklahoma for The Grapes of Wrath. Furious buffing and spinning brushes whirl bubbles across the street. Mrs. Sparks is taking her time to mourn the loss of her mother-in-law. Dudley kicks a baseball skin as rigid as a sailcat. A bra, a sock--the extraordinary quality of lost things in streets.



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