Coyote blue

association tonight. They'll vote you back in. You can keep your apartment, but I want your guarantee that this is over."
    "Okay."
    "I hope you know I've lost all respect for you as a professional, Sam. The doctor says I'm going to walk with a limp for the rest of my life."
    "There was a crooked man who had a crooked -"
    "You broke my legs! My house is destroyed."
    Sam peeked into the bedroom where Coyote was attacking the Sistine Chapel with a helicopter gunship. "Josh, I don't know what you're talking about, but I'm glad you came to your senses."
    "Fuck you. I'm using up years of collected dirt to get your apartment back."
    " Townhouse ," Sam corrected. "Not apartment ."
    "Don't fuck with me, Sam. I'm in a cast up to my nipples and a sadistic nurse has been force-feeding me green Jell-O for an hour. Just tell me it's over."
    "It's over," Sam said.
    The phone clicked. Sam walked back into the bedroom. "What did you do to Spagnola?"
    Coyote was rolling on the bed in exaggerated body English to tilt the gunship. "These birds are eating my tail rotor. I can't control it."
    "Uh-oh, St. Francis released the doves of death. You're dead meat." Sam took a cigarette from the pack on the dresser and offered one to Coyote. "What did you do to Spagnola?"
    "You said you wanted your old life back."
    "So you broke Spagnola's legs?"
    "It was a trick."
    "You can't just go around breaking people's legs like some Mafioso fairy godmother."
    The gunship spun out of control and crashed on the mezzanine. Coyote threw the joystick at the screen and turned to Sam. "How can I win if you keep talking to me? You whine like an old woman. I got you your house back!"
    "I wouldn't have lost it if you had left me alone. Be logical."
    "What gods do you know that are logical? Name two."
    "Never mind," Sam said. He went to the closet and pulled his clothing out for the day.
    Coyote said, "Do you have a light?"
    "No."
    "No? After I stole fire from the sun and gave it to your people?"
    "Why, Coyote? Why did you do that?" Sam turned to point out the lighter on the dresser, but the trickster was gone.
    ~* * *~
    Calliope's upbringing in the Eastern religions, with their emphasis on living in the now – of acting, not thinking – had left her totally unprepared to do battle with the future. She'd tried to ignore it, even after Grubb was born, but it had become more and more difficult to function on karmic autopilot. Now, Sam had entered her life and she felt like she had something to lose. The future had a name. She wondered what she had done to manifest the curse of a nice guy.
    "It feels wonderful, but I want more," Calliope said.
    "I don't get it," Nina said. They were cleaning up the kitchen. Grubb was scooting around on the linoleum at their feet, tasting the baseboards, a table leg, a slow-moving bug.
    "I've always felt separate from men, even during sex. It's like there's this part of me that watches them and I'm not really involved. But it wasn't that way with Sam. It was like we were really together, no barriers. I wasn't watching him, I was with him. When we were finished I lay there watching the pulse on his neck, and it was like we had gone to some other world together. I wanted more."
    "So you're saying you're a hosebeast."
    "Not like that. It was just that I want to feel that way all the time. I want my whole life to feel – complete."
    "I'm sorry, Calliope, I don't get it. I'm happy if Yiffer doesn't pass out before we finish."
    "I guess it's not a sexual thing. It's a spiritual thing. Like there's a part of life that I can touch but I can't live in."
    "Maybe we just need to find a house where your ex doesn't live downstairs."
    "That was pretty awful. I couldn't believe Sam didn't just leave."
    Nina threw a dish towel at Calliope and missed. "You had a little good luck for a change, accept it. Not every guy has to be a creep like Lonnie."
    "I'm a little afraid to leave Grubb with him when I go to work today."
    "Lonnie won't hurt Grubb. He was just pissed that you were with someone else. Men are like that. Even when they don't want you, they don't want anyone else to have you."
    "Nina, do you think there's something wrong with me?"
    "No, you're just not very good at worrying. You'll get the hang of it."
    ~* * *~
    "I've got to get back to the house," Lonnie said to Cheryl, who was pouring peroxide on his damaged chest. She wiped away the foam with a tissue, then poked the wound with a broken black fingernail.
    "Ouch! What are you doing,