Angels Fall

straight from it, and save her system from dealing with at least that much of it.
    "She wants to make potato salad with bottled dressing and no dill, let her. I quit." 
    And around to Joanie, Brody deduced. "That'll teach her."
    "Go along, make do, don't make waves, just so nobody notices. No attention here, please, go about your business."
    She waved her hands a little wildly, so he laid his own on the bowl of her glass to keep wine from sloshing onto him.
    "I'm tired of it. I'm tired of it all. Take a job I'm so overquahfied for I could do it blindfolded and one-handed, live in a dinky apartment over a diner. Wasting my time, that's all, just wasting it." He considered, took another slug of wine. Not just toasted, he thought. Wallowing. "You plan on bitching and moaning much longer? Because if that's all that's on the slate, I can leave you to it and get a couple more hours of work in."
    "Typical. Typical man. If it's not about you, it's not worth listening to. What the hell am I doing with you, anyway?"
    "Right now? You're getting drunk on my back porch, wallowing in it and annoying me." Her eyes might have been glassy, but they still had punch when they aimed at him. "You're selfish, self-absorbed and rude. The only thing you'll miss about me when I go is having a hot meal put in front of you So, screw you, Brody. Just screw you sideways. I'll go wallow elsewhere." She got to her feet, swaying a little as the wine sloshed in her head as unsteadily as it did in her glass. "I should've kept driving right through this excuse for a town. I should've told you to go to hell the first time you made a move on me. I should've told Mardson that was the woman I saw. I should've just said it was and forgotten about it. So that's just what I'm going to do." She took a few unsteady steps back toward the kitchen. "But not in that order. You first. Go to hell." She made it into the kitchen, reached for her purse. But he was quicker. "Hey." She made a grab for it.
    "That's mine."
    "You can have it back. Except for these." He took out her keys from the inside zipper, exactly where she d said she kept them. Mad, sick or otherwise, he noted, she kept her tidy ways. He pulled the car key off the ring, dropped the ring with the apartment keys on the table, then stuck the car key in his pocket. "Go wherever the hell you want, but you're not driving. You're going to have to walk."
    "Fine. I'll walk to Sheriff Does-His-Job Mardson, tell him what he wants to hear, then wash my hands of it. And you, and this place."
    She was halfway to the door when her stomach twisted like a wet rag between two opposing fists. Clutching it, she dashed to the bathroom.
    He went in behind her. He wasn't surprised she was dog-sick. In fact he thought it was for the best, the body's way of defending itself against the overindulgent idiocy of its owner. So he held her head, then shoved a wet cloth into her hand when it was over. 
    "Ready to sleep it off now?"
    She stayed where she was, the cloth pressed to her face. "Could you just leave me alone?"
    "Nothing I'd like better. I'll get to that in a minute." For now, he pulled her up. She managed a weak groan when he lifted her. "If you're going to puke again, tell me." She shook her head, closed her eyes so that her dark, damp lashes lay against her sheet-white skin. He carried her upstairs to put her on the bed. He tossed a blanket over her and, as a precaution, moved the bedroom wastebasket to the side of the bed.
    "Go to sleep"" was all he said before he walked out. Alone, she curled on her side and, shivering, pulled the blanket up to her chin. She'd just wait until she was warm and steady, she promised herself, then she'd go.
    But the bottom dropped out, and she fell through it into sleep.
    She dreamed of riding a Ferris wheel. Color and movement, and that quick, gut-dropping circle. At first, her screams were of laughter and delight.
    Whee!
    But it spun faster, faster, with the music blaring louder, louder. Delight became unease.  Slow down. Please? Can you slow it down?
    Faster still, faster until the screams she heard were sharp with terror. As the wheel rocked madly side to side, panic gripped her throat.
    It's not sale. I want to get off. Stop the wheel! Stop it and let me off!
    But the speed only picked up to a blur, and the music crashed around her. Then the wheel flew off, plunging her out of the lights and into the dark.

    HER EYES flashed open. Her fingers dug into the sheets and her own