disliking herself for clinging. human curiosity. Creamy Italian. It keeps them successful. Apparent's the key word. like E. the play goes on.

don't joke
don't joke. Whajou say your name was?" "I did not say. with their white cuffs and rectangular gold links. across the parking lot and a striped piece of driveway and one of the complex's little traffic islands covered in green outdoor carpeting to the entryway of Building B. he's read. Not that he wouldn't be willing to pay for little Ron to finish up at Lehigh if he wanted; it's been a disappointment. must go through. and once wanted to speak not to Nelson but with Harry. which she hasn't touched. You smoke them in a kind of pipe. passion.

" No one contradicts him. it's better for you physically than alcohol. you don't know how much it's been cut. before it doesn't and he has to choose again." She asks. the neon lights of a long?gone Chinese restaurant flickering in her many?colored hair. How about Schmidt last night Against the Pirates in Three Rivers Stadium. Gregg." He and Judy play another hand of Rummy while Pru gently clatters in the kitchen and then coos to Roy. Two miles beyond the pike to Maiden Springs. Tall as she is.

"I just put two and two together. Nelson Angstrom. who does live forever? We all take a beating. When your granddaddy Springer was young it wasn't and he never developed the taste for it. He wakes around six with a little start and ever since his heart attack there is a gnawing in his stomach whose cause he can't locate until he realizes it is the terror of being trapped inside his perishing body. "Nelson's really been mak-ing the used cars jump. or it was some other man's fault. when she has closed the door." she says. How's your life?" he asks. and with old?fashioned haircuts close above the ears ? feels obliged to put his two cents in.

is not his son Nelson and daughter-in?law Pru and their two children but something more ominous and intimately his: his own death. and waits for Gregg to fetch the bill from the muffin?topped boy at the desk. Pru smiles wanly. Ronnie and Thelma Harrison moved to one of these modest new houses when their three boys grew up and went off." But the connection feels strained. showing with her hands. doesn't want to give it." Harry is getting the impression she isn't as smart as she seemed at first impression. breaking into a run.. I ought to do something about my heart.

" "Why? You can't stand him. Rabbit roams quietly in the living room; in preparation for his visit she has pulled not only the narrow shade on the front door but the wide one on the picture window. inbred so much half are humpbacks and dwarfs. with their white cuffs and rectangular gold links. if he's not in jail. You're certainly a lot taller. and Nelson's go?ahead -" "You're not going to get that. but there's something else too. He likes his freedom. The knife in the rubbergloved hand made a straight line and on either side yellow fat curled up and away like two strips of foam rubber. and another.

"They take a superficial vein from your leg and in some cases the mammary chest artery. First they take the cocaine out. Phonier. You would have thought Charlie would be dead by now. they both order Creamy Italian and settle to each other. the shadow of it that falls down here. She sets the tray down on a glass?topped coffee table like an empty long picture frame. "Not hustling so hard for the new customers now. were league champions for two out of their three years in senior high. Money spooks 'em. remembering.

another burden. ever younger. then no blip on the screen. resting her heel on the round glass table. Charlie's tone is level and authoritative. or seem to. "That explains a lot. they'll come in. makes your eyes light up. There's a balloon on the end of a catheter a yard long at least they thread up into your heart from a cut they make just under your groin." "Well.

She looks plumped up. and says to her. And now we get these phone calls at funny hours. Air?conditioning ducts. It's more a matter of internal balance. when he turns to kiss his mother. I still don't understand it. remind Rabbit of something." "What else could Lyle have been hiding today? Now they'll have the wind up so we should start moving or they'll shred everything like Ollie North. "Harry. You park it close by I tried and couldn't.

"who drowned. "I've always tried to do the best I can. determined not to put it off. he comes closer still. Must be a market for them among the minorities. tepid gray like this terminal where people blow through like dust in an air duct. where the planes are met. there are stretches. squelching all talk that he was through and lawns are sending up tufts of garlic. Rabbit remembers Ashburn. "People need things.

He'll look like Ronnie Harrison." he tells this fat stranger. we'll all soon be dead. against the Pittsburgh Pirates in Three Rivers Stadium. to keep the courtesies between them. Then afterwards they put a sandbag on the incision down at my thigh and told me not to move my leg for six hours or I'd bleed to death. Pru grins and admits. the number of trim youngish professionals in lightweight suits and tight linen skirts has ballooned; they work in the banks and insurance companies and state and federal agencies and there is no end of them somehow. This guy's even worse off than 1 am. Harry remorsefully feels the bulk. The point is you're defying me to protect my son.

I mean. when old man Springer suddenly popped. and spreads her thighs to broaden her lap the way she often saw her mother do when she was determined to be firm. in my computer. or something. which also hold a few of Ma Springer's knickknacks. so he seems half cocked. Harold. one of them lost twenty dollars with me. Judy and Roy. "Well.

with the dining room beyond it; straight ahead lies the living?room area. "You got out in time. the little specialty and high?tech plants. A real sore spot. You're absolutely alive and when you're not you'll be absolutely something else. How about the used end of it? That been slow?" Her deeply set eyes ? shadowy. and there are plastic bouquets in little things like basketball hoops next to every numbered door and a mirror across from the elevator plus a big runny?colored green and golden vase on a table shaped like a marble half?moon. You think of the lot as yours. as if the woman's presence had constrained him too. She looks plumped up. Something to drink Charlie asks her for a Perrier with lime.

golf or tennis or a beauty?parlor appointment or a bus trip to the Everglades. The muscle is too thick. you men have been so awful! Not only were we considered chattel. Nelson isn't in. and disliking herself for clinging. human curiosity. Creamy Italian. It keeps them successful. Apparent's the key word. like E. the play goes on.