Executioner's Song, The - Norman Mailer [97]
It was crucial to put it across to people that you didn't go to a store and pull things from the counter, but took a good look at the object you were going to buy and inquired of it. There were all sorts of answers: the object could say, "Go away," or "Please steal me." It could even ask to be bought. The objects had as much concern about themselves as anyone else. Gary just went plink, plink, plunk, got her Midol, got her toothbrush, got her the hell out of there. He wasn't drinking beer. Boy, he was uptight.
Now they were driving in Pleasant Grove again. "I don't want to go home. I want to stay out all night," she said.
"That's cool," he said.
Julie had to stay in the hospital one more night, so Craig Taylor was still alone. He was just putting the kids to sleep, when Gary knocked on the door and introduced this girl as Nicole's sister, April. They looked odd. Not drunk, but the girl was in bad shape. Paranoid. She couldn't sit down. Walked around Craig like he was a barrel or something.
Gary came out of the bathroom, and asked did he still have the gun. Craig said, Yeah. Gary asked to borrow it back. Plus a few shells. "Oh, yeah," said Craig. "Well, it's yours, I'll give it to you."
Added, "Why do you want it?" Gary didn't give any answer. Finally he said, "I'd like it." Craig didn't exactly have a good feeling as he passed the shells. Gary seemed awful emotionless. "Gary, I can't refuse you," Craig said, "it's your gun," but he took a good last look. It was a gold-trigger Browning Automatic with a black metal barrel, nice wood handle.
"I don't want to go home," said April when they were in the truck again. "Hell," said Gary, "I'll keep you out all night." He drove to Val Conlin's to sign the papers. On the way, April realized they hadn't gone to the K-Mart after all. She still didn't have the guitar string. It got too complicated to ask again. She felt like she was fighting spider webs.
When they came into V.J. Motors, April said aloud, "Hey, that's a show for free." Gary and this fellow Val kept looking at car keys like old magicians studying old dried herbs, weird! She wandered around and the room distorted. Warp was in the atmosphere. So she sat down in a corner. That way you could hold the thing together. They came over, but she didn't know what they were talking about. Just said, "You're the witness. Look at this." Signing a paper.
Rusty Christiansen was bored. By the time they could get Gary out, it would be nine-thirty. She wouldn't be home till a quarter of ten. The interest still had to be calculated, and the payments worked out. They kept going out to the lot to take numbers off the car and the truck. Once in a while, this little girl April in the corner said something in a big voice.
For that matter, Val's voice was pretty good, too. "I'm going to take a chance," said Val, "because you've been good with me. But goddamn it, Gary, you better pay." "Right," said Gary. "Okay," said Val, "I'm going to take a chance."
Gary went to transfer some clothes from the Mustang to the truck, and while he was gone, Val looked at the little broad in the corner and said, "Hey, what are you on?" She looked at him like she had just come in from the next century, and then she honked, "Whawhaaowha . . . "
Val thought, Whee, she's plain out there in orbit. The girl looked at him steadily and said, "Sometimes I'm not even a girl."
She began to cry.
When Gary returned, Val said, "If you don't pay me that first four hundred in two days, I'll take the truck back so goddamn fast you won't even know you had wheels, Pardner. You won't have the truck and you won't have the Mustang. Gary, you don't have that money you walk, understand?" "Understand," said Gary, "no problem. Okay." He signed the last papers and Val turned the truck over.
When they got in, Gary told April, "Let's go." They drove around looking for Nicole. "Use your radar," Gary said. She didn't want to tell him