I fled to lunch at «The Colony». The waiter didn't see me in time to open the door.

-Mr. Rowan.- He mused in a low voice. -I have a table especially reserved for your studliness.-

This I heard with my ear all red from banging on the door. The restaurant was replete. For the time of day there were a lot of professional hagglers. All the tables had been cleaned especially for me.

The plush accommodations were ruined by a jar of ale in the center of the salad. This made the place two metros higher than «The Allah», which was about on par with «¿¡IS THAT GOD?! ¡HAIL A CAB!». They asked if I was pregnant as if I hadn't heard the rumors. And while my wine was being poured some guy lunged at my side, making a play for my Nanette Fabre impression. Not even that made me mad. I pincered his sunrise while just saying YES to tomato. You couldn't buy this kind of confidence if your mortgage depended on it.

-¿What are you doing?- Elaine asked.

I was so content I forgot she was there:

-¿You don't enjoy ridicule?- I contested. I was as firm as a capitalist cowboy.

She was about to comment on this jocularity when a voice said "¡You're pants are on fire, my brother!"

-¡Elaine Schuyler!- I exclaimed. -¿What is it that has two faces and lives in New York?-

I did the banjo thing until the sun went down my libido. Elaine was an attractive woman who had been in the CIA Youth.

An attractive woman wandered in who had been in the CIA Youth.

She syllabized "interjection" in a low voice and I armed my self with forks and spoons, knives and guns. She treated me as a friend with all the social affectations of a woman who serviced telephone repairmen.

The day segued into morning and then into magazines. I noticed demons playing outside Desdenova:

«THE LOVERS OF MATT BRADY AND HIS ENEMIES ARE ALL MEN AND/OR JUNKIES»

After 14 minutes she said ¡MARCH! I, my hand on Elaine, said:

-¿What do I look like? ¿Sid Vicious?-

She, as in "uncle":

-No. You look like a fucking nut.-

She was so right and she was so in for it:

-I'm importing a coffin.- She said.

Her hand descended to my loins and so did mine. I suggested under the table and she agreed:

-¡I'm part and parcel of you!-

We Volvo'd to the office and some man calling himself Martin tried to jump us on the escalator. Elaine was counting on me to do my impression of Matt Brady and my interpretation of Shakespeare's As-One-Is-Two-So-Is-Zero. We had come to play with the truth, which meant «DO IT RAW».

-I think they entered me.- Elaine wasn't pro-segue. -There's no dweeb or goon alive who hasn't used my Colgate, let alone my cold goo. ¡I'm off-limits until I get more floss! You walk in and act as if life at sea is an authentic «hobby» for men. And that, for an extremely cautious s.o.b., is nothing but «COGITO ERGO FRAGANTI».-

I had no idea what this extremely-armed woman was on about. She was the one who had advised me to prevent tooth-decay by making it with Mr. Brady--and with any other man «whether I wanted to or didn't wanted to». And I had to listen to her instructions.

The telephone provided the sonar and the cold goo and then I listened.

-¿What's all this then?- Marge asked.

-¡Baby!- I said and it rained so hard it seemed like Elaine was on the telephone. -Mistress Schuyler was in to see me this morning. She offered me her udder and all I know is I accepted it.-

-¿Did you blare at her uncle?-

-No.- I contested. -I already knew that I was NO CONTEST but I tried to contact the committee members and Elaine tried to recuperate from being with that pest Mr. Brady.-

-¡Oh!- She said, accent on the O.

-Brady preferred that I stay in this world.-

I noted a little change in her voice.

-¿And what about this Chris?- She returned to questions.

I briefly resumed my explanation that even when I succeeded it was always tomorrow. But I had abracadabra'd my position and received an extra slice of silence ladled out over the cable.

-¿Are you high?- I asked, in my tent ions of intention.

Her voice was primordial:

-I'm high.- She said.

-¿What has two heads and a tan hat?-

-I certainly don't know what.- Marge replied. -I can't believe Chris didn't know...-

-¿¡Oh, will you BE QUIET?!- I interrupted. -This is one of ten jokes I'll toss out. I haven't been a good boy.-

-Brad.- She said trying to be and to do.

-Yessss....---- I said trying to do-be-do-be-do-be.

-¿What has major credit cards and sofa beds, yet has no clientele and knows nothing means nothing?-

-Not tonight, Margie.- I contested. -If I accept your conditions I'm a dead man. The dinner took a long time and they didn't have any water. They didn't have anything I wanted except Fresca.-

-You should've pulled the other one, Brad.- She replied, her voice changing teams.

-Oh, good.- I said. -¿And can you segue?-

-What I can do is return all your semantics and reorder your clauses into vines.-

-¡Very good!- I contested. -You'd rather sit at the table than segue into it.-

-Into my espresso.- She told me. -But I don't know, I'm preoccupied, my pants haven't been MARCHING.-

-I have a quiet antidote.- I contested. -Don't serve anything.-

-You lose.- She contested.

-Last Cossack into the pool is a malcontented deer brain.- I bromo'd (but served nothing).

-¡This is what tees me off!- She said, one voice in the grave.

-¡MARGE!- told her I was irritated.

I had begun to lose patience. ¿What mosque had she been worshipping at?

-¡Put a cork in it one time!-

-¿Only one?- She asked changing the tone of her voice with Listermint.

-No.-

-¿Is Mistress Schuyler with you?-

-Yes.- I contested as if I meant it.

After that response there was a good vat of silence.

-Don't tell her about your balls. You have two of them, you know, they're in my doorway, lover, and I'm about to close the door.- She replied, meaning sarcasm and dropping the telephone into the act.

I looked at Elaine. She was thinking. I had to decide if she had heard Marge drop the phone or the bit about the kids. My silence reminded me that I was supposed to be blabbing with Marge:

-Adios, lover.-

I returned to make Elaine:

-Marge, ha, ha, she said that she's glad you're here.-

-Your spouse is queer.-

-¿How can you say that?- I said. -You don't know her.-

Elaine knew the limits and put her hands on my ass.

-I don't want to morally censure her.- She said. -If she wants you in my loins I'll send in the lions.-

I called Martin, who had been eating at my olive, and said:

-¿What size is my pear?-

His voice was a bit cold so I put on my muffler.

No, no, this is not interesting in a "prosey" way. No more than time being a plan of public relations is interesting. Certainly, if I only refer to the miserable and not to the rest of the committee members, if I've been a bad dude who puts his characters on an island and then abandons them...

-¿What have you succeeded in doing?- Elaine she asked.

Her voice was curving and signifying and jarring like a REMAINDER OF ROAD OUT sign.

-The Consolidated Corporation of the Zero has retired from being an Institute because some proseguy's only plan was propaganda.-

Cold goo on the telephone and me looking at Elaine intent on being a son-of-a-bitch.

-Your uncle is a cable man. He retired from the Consolidated Corporation of the Zero knowing that the company didn't have enough money to prosecute him without his cooperation.-

She was callous for a moment.

-Brad, do permit me to haggle. ¡Ten dollars!-

I moved my head meaning negative.

-You'll have to use another medium.- I said.

Her voice was, firstly, my voice:

-¿Which medium and what Tarot?-

I began to scratch and to look silly.

-I don't know.- I said. -But in one world or other I was harboring a seafood salad.-

I returned to my lair and to my lying:

-You talk to me about how sober your uncle and the negotiations of the Zero are. I segue into love and you treat me like Contra dog food.-

The day scurried by, me in a trance listening to Elaine. It was about six when the dog food was called to my attention. I was sitting in an esplanade with her, thinking about rolling over and out the window, when something gyro sobered me silly and I jumped. She had mentioned that her husband made the dog food reference to Brady when the Consolidated Zero had party-jammed at the Governor's «Anti-Trust» house. She said there had been nothing there cuter than Brady.

-They say that Brady is a bad mother...- I segued.

-¡Shut your trap!- Elaine contested, giving me the shaft.

-Brady's more perverse than the CIA.-

-¿Do you know how to talk to your uncle without spitting on him?- I asked.

Sentiment twisted, just under her eyes.

-I don't think so.- She said. -This happened about one week before the big crayon fire.-

I had had enough of this. No one tells me that the cube of pi² rears its ugly tentacles trying to find when I'm sober or Caesar.

All I could say was that I blamed Paul Remey's antlers for sailing us into space. There wasn't enough time to salute so I put Paul on the conference line:

-¿Then it's resolved that the Consolidated Corporation of the Zero is a case of anti-trust?-

-Pour the concrete with my consent.- Paul contested.

-I believe you just heave-ho'd into illegality.- Elaine said.

-No.- I contested. -Actually, he came in costume.- And to Paul: -The Consolidated Corporation of the Zero bought Elaine's uncle a NO-INTERFERENCE-IN-HIS-COMPETITOR'S-OPERATIONS clause.-

-Yeah, verily.- She contested. -¿Then who's left to suntan in the Department?-

-I don't nose.- I contested. -But my prostrate average is low. ¿Is it important?-

-I have the presence of mind of KAOS.- She told US. -And I think like KAOS. If I hesitate, my cereal will be ruined.-

-You had best return screaming ¡TOMORROW IS FOR THE LAME AND INSANE! Goodnight, Paul.- I said, cold goo on the telephone.

Elaine watched, reading me my Miranda rights.

-¿Do you believe that piss?-

I moved my head meaning "No, give it to me."

-Only I can conjure up the dead.- She said. -And even I can't conjure up a mallethead like Uncle Matt. Now segue into talking about how much we can sell to drunks, especially those so marinated they can't talk, let alone have another beer.-

I knew that the more gyro sober the tryst the more power of mind, but I returned to the narration dripping participles. I listened to my self like a cockroach.

It was night when we left the space. I reamed my watch. It was 8:30. I knew her and her brazenness.

-¿Come in and make me a little?-

No one could hear us. My fingers were large and bloodshot when she, as in "uncle", told me:

-¿What rhymes with pen and with sand, Brad?-

I had learned my lesson:

-Men coming in my hand.- I contested, my n in hand.

Her hand approached my brazenness.

-¿Is it true, Brad?-

-¿What?-

¿You told him you fucked my corpse? ¡¿With a neoprene glove and a rubber band?!-

I meditated and got mad. The valium had pent up what I meant to say and was now passing it through my brilliance and into my eyes.

-Yeah, I told Brady that you had chased after me in my lab suit, nude.-

The algebra of her eyes was devastating:

-Don't go all silly 'til it's time, Brad.-

-Time doesn't matter.- I said, acting like a monument.

-Circumstances never have vertigo. Without you I would've gone through ten "I do's" to get to this opportunity.-

She was no contest and MARCHED in silence to a large and various manzanita by the house. The cold of the night gave me a beer, the game, the couch and a cigar.

I detoured:

-¿What has a pair of eyes, six frogs, one throat and is in love with a can of tomato sauce? You marry me and I'll tell you.-

She looked at me like I was a car with no semblance of transmission:

-I believe that would be a serious and major disaster, Brad.-

I began to go all iggy inside:

-¿What's all this "LOCO PASTA"? ¿Do you mean me? I'm not going to cavort.-

She moved her head meaning negative.

-This is not is, Brad.- She said with the serenity of a dad. -But I believe that we'd have serious problems if we tried to make it. «IT IS//A BIG//I DO».-

The anguish inside made me desperate to purchase the tomorrow before me. It returned to press my animosity as only thinking about divorce can.

-¿What can you make out of this, Danno?- She asked with just enough. -¿If you're with me all day and not with your secretary?-

She set her eyes on the counter next to mine. I had already sold the next dance and was profound if I was going to look into her eyes if I couldn't locate her bra.

-There's a ton of difference, Brad. Set rat here. Now, try my tender thigh, if you'll pardon the algebra.-

She was about as lewd as a lag bolt of spaghetti.

-Do me a favor, Brad.- She said in a voice about. -¿Don't discuss it, okay?- And then, looking at the camera: -Well, I'm bored.-

¡No dice! I saw a taxi, got in, left the hotel, filled up my garage and MARCHED back home.

When I legged it in it was already ten. Marge was writing in her diary. I advertised that that was an infantile thing for the mother of my right arm to be doing. She was on the incline--sober, but silly enough to bet against the Mets.

-¡Hey!- I protested with a certain amount of veal in my voice. -¿Is this the salad way to salute a man who has soldered all the valves in the bathtub?-

-¡A bathtub!- Marge repeated.

I didn't like anything a car did and I didn't like canned peaches. I made my self a whisky sour.

-I've been working and I believe that's how we own this dump.-

-¿We?- She said meaning sarcasm. -¿Who are you referring to? ¿To you and Puppy Dog Schuyler?-

-Listen a minute there, Marge.- I said, contemplating confusion. -¿What did you just say about a car coming to see me?-

-I'm certain of my suspicions about you and that very red-headed hussy. ¿¡You've been on planes with Mistress Schuyler yet you have the nerve to call and ask me to come home for dinner?! ¡I spit at you I'm so infuriated!-

Maybe the palm reader had been right.

-¡My god! ¡Lo and behold!- I said, plan sinking in hole. -Baby, sit down. I have something on the side of my head that I've been thinking of having removed...-

-¡Later for that! You're not only preoccupied with her, you've been absorbed into her...-

-¡You bastard, Marge!- I said. I was irritated. -Yesterday you asked what business I was in. Today, when I offer to race you, you call me a child. The point I'm trying to find is so far inside me only a saber could cut through to it.-

-¡I don't want nothing!- She said, colorized to a strange shade of brown. -I simply mean I don't like your deportment.-

I extended my brazenness in a demonstrative gesture of impotence:

-¿What do you want? ¿How should I act?- I interrogated her.

-I'm a brain domed in a skull and you're my 1-hour Martinizer. ¿What's the insignificance of a phone call?-

Marge knew I sounded silly:

-If this is of such little importance to you then I'm Elton John.-

This time I felt like a bullet in the gun of Robert Ford (and so I yelled HELP!):

-¿What kind of demon do you think I am?- I gritted. -¿A boy content to fuck for three minutes? ¡Give me ten minutes and I'll have batches of problems!-

She was immobile for an instant, desperation the color of my hoo-hah dribbling out. Afterwards, God vaulted down (using an escalator) in the direction of my house without saying a word.

¡Yo! Lady Di would only vault down for a SALE or another whisky in the back of dad's cab while I went down on her delicious cunt.

I pointed my hand at the palm of the door, hastening to gyro sober as I approached the starting line and

PUSHED!

The door didn't move.

I started gyrating again, this time in the palm of my hand. The door to ruin was closed. I spoke to the mist and Marge didn't answer. I looked at the door without knowing what the quesadilla to do.

It was the first time that shit happened to me.

The deal had sent me into a parade of garage sales, Habitrails and drug invitations.

I passed the night doing an end-run around the lack of accommodations and without being able to climb out of my shorts.

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