We stand on the corner in the summer night heat. The bugs gather in streetlight beams like darting fish in tide pools. The small and wiry guy steps into the street before us. His head is shaved and I catch the glint of a wild flame in his eye."Yo, Connie," he says, "You stick her?" Connie smiles sideways at him, cigarette hanging from his lip like a sad rope. "Ah, you know." The voice is tired. "Thattaboy," the wiry guy says and his teeth flash, silver rimmed, but his eyes see there is nothing here. "I see ya in the Punch Card," he says. Then quick/quick he saunters across the street with a strange limp toward a bar blooming with people on the sidewalk. Connie reads me. "Stay away from that guy. I fought him in the ring. He knows what I can do." Then, "Come on. Let's go." And we're off in the night, looking for the next thing.
