The Albuquerque Turkey by John Vorhaus docx

[...]... At the coffee joint or the grocery store, they’d nod at me as if to acknowledge, Oh, you’re still here? If you were a tourist, you’d be gone by now This there was no denying: Santa Fe was definitely a three-day tourist town Georgia O’Keeffe Museum, the Plaza, Loretto Chapel, a quick spin through the art galleries, maybe a day trip to Los Alamos, then it’s up the road to Taos or down the road to Albuquerque. .. sort of place you could get tired of in about a month Not that it lacked appeal The climate was good, the people relentlessly friendly— well, friendly the way people are when they make their living off tourists and they know it The architecture agreed with me— low adobes that blended sensibly into the desert scrub and cactus by design, utility, and civil statute I’m told that no new buildings in Santa... try another.” It took a moment for Vic’s request to leap across Jena’s distended synapse gaps, but eventually the girl blinked, rolled her neck slowly, and settled into a yoga seat on the blanket “Much better,” said Vic, evidently satisfied with the full Sharon Stone–scape the new pose presented He turned to me and reverently mouthed the words, “What a muff!” There are times, and this was one of them,... we’d always each embraced the main one We sealed the deal by making love waist deep in the warm sea, with the rhythm of the waves serving as languid counterpoint to our own and the full moon illuminating our bodies for any creature, land or sea, that cared to check us out I may have been stung by a jellyfish I think I didn’t care Some beer-driven ideas don’t make much sense the next morning, but this... Like the sign says, there’s no such thing as a free lunch, not in relationships, not in anything Everyone wants the good stuff: someone to light candles for, curl up next to at night; someone to bring them soup when they’re sick But if you want the good stuff, of course you have to put up with the rest Moods Privacy jags Not being as funny as you think you are Most of all, the land mines Everyone has them—... think it was Boy who sealed the deal, because within about ten seconds of meeting, they were down on the floor rolling around like old best friends And in the next days’ onslaught of police and press inquiries, the question of Radar’s life trajectory got temporarily shelved I played the police and the press in an uncharacteristically candid manner They wanted statements, they got statements Pictures?... will do that, place themselves in the center of the universe and blame themselves for every supernova that explodes around them Later we get smart enough to know that each of us is the center of our own universe, and if your father left you or beat you or drank or ran around, it’s because of crap in his universe, not yours But no matter how smart you get, that little kid’s still in there somewhere, and... pose upon ending a depression or battling fascism to its knees, Mirplo’s triumph was the slim victory of placing himself in the same room as a naked woman who wasn’t a stripper At a price he considered, well, worth it “Ten bucks an hour,” he said “Can you believe it? They come over They take off their clothes They stand there For as long as you want In any position you want And all you have to do is paint.”... I played the hometown hero card with the local cops or TV, I was really playing the change card for her Vic thought this was the shit For some reason, it tickled him to see my picture in the paper, standing there with Boy by my side and a look of pure, stalwart citizenship on my face “You’re such a Girl Scout,” he said a few nights later after dinner at our place (where he frequently dined, the mooch)... catch the eye But as she was across the street, the logical storefronts to scan were the ones on the sidewalk over there Instead, she let her gaze graze along Rudi’s facade, and though I doubted she could see me through the tint of Rudi’s windows, she seemed determined to try She covered her eyes with one meaty hand and peered hard in my direction from beneath furred and furrowed beetle brows Then she . 12:20:31 AM 4 John Vorhaus her. They wore matching mother- daughter fl ower- print shifts. In other circumstances you’d have said they looked cute. Now they just. shepherd’s. The other . . . wasn’t there. Looking at the bitten- off stub, I couldn’t help wondering how a dog’s ear tastes to another dog. He bore other wounds