“We don’t give a shit about blacks,” Tattoo Man said. “It’s him.” He jabbed a finger at Lancaster. “We don’t like faggots.”

Lancaster’s jaw dropped. “What?”

“Get out of our bar, faggot.”

The blood drained from Lancaster’s face. “But-I assure you-” he sputtered.

This was trouble. Jenks sized up the rednecks. Both of them tensed for it. Sooner Cap had on a pair of heavy work boots, but Tattoo Man wore only soft sneakers. Jenks scanned their jeans for gun-shaped bulges or knives, but they looked clean. He didn’t like the way they held those pool cues.

DelPrego hopped off his stool, spoke to Sooner Cap. “He’s not a faggot.”

“Shut up, punk.”

“He’s no faggot, and I should know,” DelPrego said. “Because I’m the faggot, and I just love to suck big cock.”

Sooner Cap blinked, stepped back like he’d been struck.

“That’s right.” DelPrego licked his lips. “Man, I’d just love to have a big, sweaty pair of redneck balls on my chin right now. I get hot and horny just thinking about it.”

Sooner Cap realized he was being had. “How about I smash you right in your smart-ass little mouth?”

Lancaster gulped. “For the love of God, Wayne, let it go.”

Jenks tensed. Here it came.

DelPrego pointed. “Holy shit. What’s that behind you?”

Sooner Cap said, “You don’t think I’m going to fall for-”

DelPrego didn’t wait to see if he fell for it or not. He brought the uppercut fast, popped Sooner Cap on the point of his chin. The redneck’s head snapped back. He stumbled.

Tattoo Man swung the pool cue at Jenks, but Jenks ducked. The cue struck Lancaster in the face, swept him off the barstool like he was made of tissue. Lancaster yelled, blood spraying from his nose.

Jenks stomped hard with his heel on top of Tattoo Man’s left tennis shoe. His heel struck the foot hard. Jenks heard and felt the man’s bone snap. Tattoo Man screamed. Jenks double-punched him in the kidneys, and Tattoo Man bent, grabbed himself. Jenks swung hard, and his knuckles smacked just over Tattoo Man’s ear.

Tattoo Man fell over into a little heap, didn’t move.

Sooner Cap had DelPrego in a headlock. Jenks picked up Tattoo Man’s pool cue, swung hard, and broke the wood over Sooner Cap’s back. He let go of DelPrego, who turned and threw a quick punch into the redneck’s massive gut. Sooner Cap whuffed air and went to one knee.

“That’s enough!” the bartender barked. He held an aluminum baseball bat and banged it on the bar.

Sooner Cap started to get up. He was breathing hard. “You… fuckers.”

“Come on!” Jenks grabbed Lancaster under one arm, started for the door.

DelPrego took Lancaster’s other arm, burst out of the saloon and into the parking lot.

The redneck’s curses followed them. “You little faggots. Come back here again and you’re dead. You hear me? Dead!”

The three poets sat in a nearly deserted Wendy’s. Jenks ate a double cheeseburger and a Biggie fries. DelPrego held a small Frosty to the side of his head where his ear had swollen.

Lancaster sat with his head tilted back, crumpled and bloody napkins on the table in front of him. He’d torn little strips of napkin and had jammed them into his nostrils to stanch the blood flow. Once in a while he’d moan quietly and rub his temples.

“Shit, boy, where’d you learn to fight like that?” Jenks asked DelPrego. “You almost got your fucking self killed.”

“I watch a lot of Rockford Files reruns.”

“TV. Shit, that figures.”

“Do we qualify as tight now?” Lancaster asked, his stuffed nose making him hard to understand, the words coming out “Do be qualiby ad dight dow?”

Jenks laughed. “Almost.”

“Sure we are,” DelPrego said. “We’re a hell of a team. The brother, the white guy, and the faggot.”

He laughed and so did Jenks.

Lancaster groaned and very slowly lifted his middle finger.

eighteen

Morgan tried to roll over, but Ginny’s slab of thigh held him in place. He didn’t want to wake her. He lay still, staring at the ceiling, feeling empty and listless. The mad tumble with Ginny had been a good distraction after Annette had shrugged him off, but already Ginny’s hot skin pressed against him in bed. Oppressive.

And it wasn’t just Annette.

For a long time Morgan had been directionless. He’d realized it while working with the old man, Fred Jones. It was the first time he’d felt like a poet or a teacher in years. And he’d realized it again talking to Annette Grayson, telling her how he’d blown with the wind from one temporary job to another.

And then there was Annie Walsh. The dreams were getting worse. In the most recent, he could hear her clawing under the ground. His dream self tried to dig her out, pale hands ripping at the hard winter ground, digging without a shovel, fingernails hurt and bleeding.

Morgan shuddered.

Ginny’s breathing changed, and Morgan suspected she was awake. They both pretended to sleep.

After half an hour, Morgan figured something had to give. He opened his mouth, drew breath to speak, didn’t know what to say, and shut it again.

“What is it?” Ginny asked.

“I didn’t know if you were awake yet.”

“I’m awake.”

Morgan still didn’t know what to say.

Ginny said, “It’s like we have a secret together. Don’t you think that makes people close? It’s kind of a prefabricated intimacy. And I need this once in a while, to be close and naked with somebody I can trust. Maybe a weird kind of trust but it’s there, and I want you to feel it too.”

“I feel it.”

“It doesn’t seem like you do. I can’t handle boys my age. If they sleep with a girl once, they either think they own her or they want to throw her out like an empty beer can. I like that you’re older. I want us to be friends. I read your poetry book.”

“Which one? A Shot of Bourbon for the Soul?”

“The other one. The hat one.”

“In the Museum of Men’s Hats. That was my first one. It wasn’t very good.”

“I thought it was pretty good.”

“Thanks.”

“Are you working on anything now?”

Morgan squirmed, shifted away from her. “Not right now.”

“Writer’s block.”

“No.” It came out more harsh than he’d meant. “I just haven’t decided on anything yet.”

“I think you’re stuck.”

“What would you know about it?”

“I want you to be able to tell me.”

“It’s not anything for you to worry about.”

“This is part of it,” Ginny said. “I want us to tell each other things.”

“I don’t want to tell you.”

A shrug. “Got to tell somebody. Do you have anyone to talk to?”

“I’m not a talker.”

“That’s bad.”

“Yeah…” He didn’t know what he wanted to say. He’d been closed up, closed off, didn’t know how to say what was wrong. Maybe he didn’t even know because he couldn’t say it out loud. “What if I try, really try my best, and nothing comes?”

He’d never said that out loud before.

“We all get scared.” She twirled his chest hair.

That was all she said. Morgan suddenly felt tired again. He moved closer to her, put his head on the pillow. He felt lighter. He drifted. Sleep.

When he awoke, Ginny was gone. Morgan didn’t feel bad about it.

He walked around the cold house naked, looked into each room. He didn’t know what he was looking for, but he felt he was looking for something. An invisible need drew him. He wandered to his desk, opened the bottom drawer. An old accordion folder.

His poetry.

Halfhearted attempts at least a year old. He winced at the pages. Old themes and strategies mixed and matched and rehashed. It was painful to read but he made himself. He wrapped up the folder, put his head in his hands, and closed his eyes. It was worse than he remembered. Even his grad students were showing brighter sparks of originality.