House of Blues

stand it! You're all
disinherited—including you, Aphrodite." Meaning Skip.
    "Aphrodite," said Sheila. "Maybe we
should call her that instead of ‘Angel.' "
    Layne said, "How about Elsie? I had an aunt
named that."
    " I'm leaving." Dee-Dee stood up. "Wait
a minute, what am I doing? She's leaving."
    He pointed portentously at the wriggling furball. "I
mean it, Kenny. No dogs. Period."
    He sounded so intractable that even Skip felt herself
shrinking slightly. Worried, she glanced at Kenny. He was fighting
his disappointment, but it was winning. His face twisted, a horrible,
cracked half scream escaped his throat, and tears began to stream.
    To Skip's amazement, Steve stepped forward and put an
arm around the boy's shoulders. "It's okay, son. You can come to
my house and visit Napoleon. Anytime you want, honest."
    " Major grouch," said Sheila, almost in
wonder, as if she were witnessing a spectacle of some sort.
    Layne handed the dog to Jimmy Dee. "You can be
so heartless sometimes." He was fumbling in his pocket for
something.
    Dee-Dee stared at the tiny black and white face. "You
are pretty cute, you know that?" He patted her. She wagged her
tail and wiggled. He looked at Kenny, whose face had now taken on a
pathetic hopefulness. He handed her to him.
    "Okay, you can keep the damn dog."
    Both Kenny and Sheila began doing war whoops, which
terrified Angel so much she began yipping. The noise was so shrill
Skip was tempted to cover her ears, but she didn't want to take any
chances with Uncle Jimmy's largesse.
    "What is it, Layne?" asked Steve.
    Layne had now found a handkerchief and appeared to be
crying into it, moved to tears by the happy domestic scene. He
sneezed. "I think I'm allergic to her."
 

    16
    When they were alone, Steve found Skip's white
terry-cloth robe, pulled her T-shirt over her head, and held the robe
for her. "Let me take off your jeans."
    She stood still while he wriggled them off.
    "Now. Tell me about Jim."
    She felt her mouth go funny on her. When she could
control it, she said simply, "He died."
    " I'm sorry." He held her, not saying
anything, and it occurred to her that there were no suitable
platitudes when a policeman was killed. You couldn't say, "It
happens," or "Every cop knows the risks," or anything
else that would remind the officer you were trying to comfort of her
own mortality.
    Her fragility, Skip thought. Sometimes I think we're
all just hanging on by threads.
    "There's more," she said. "O'Rourke
blamed me for it in front of everybody."
    "So he's dead too, of course."
    She surprised herself by laughing. "Well, he is
in the hospital."
    She told the story with an exuberance that surprised
her, and when it was over, found herself wandering inevitably back to
her grief. She ended up crying in Steve's arms, inordinately grateful
that he was there.
    He pushed her back against the pillows and loosened
the belt of the robe, so that it fell away from her. "We're
alive," he said, and kissed her, and then kissed her breasts.
    He kissed her and stroked her a long time in a quiet,
sensuous way that was almost like a massage. She put a hand between
his legs, just to see what was happening, and found him hard. Her
mood changed in an instant from languorous to passionate.
    She unzipped him lazily,
thinking of ways to prolong the moment, but he was having none of it,
and as it happened, that suited her too. She wrapped her legs around
him as he buried himself in her, and in that moment life seemed so
sweet she actually felt she tasted it, like honey on her tongue.
    * * *
    The next morning she woke up feeling as depressed as
she ever had been in her life.
    As she got dressed, she realized she had no plan for
the day. She tried to think what to do.
    Jim had died and a new life—albeit a canine one—had
come to her. This was both the cruelty and the beauty of nature. She
could have gotten into "giveth and taketh away" if she'd
thought in those kind of terms.
    Something was nagging at her, nibbling at the edge of
her consciousness.
    Old stuff, new stuff, dead stuff, You're going
crazy, Skip baby. You didn't invent the life cycle, you know.
    So why can't you get it out of your mind?
    An image came into focus. A baby, from the photograph
Sugar had shown her. Sally.
    Skip's stomach turned over.
    Where is she?
    Is she with her mother?
    Where the hell is that kid?
    Carleton—who was quite a bit older than me—and
Carleton always said I was way too hard on Arthur—that he was
trapped.
    "Trapped by