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don’t know any of his friends. There’s something wrong with that boy.”
    â€œHe’s fifteen, that’s what’s wrong with him.” Tom chuckled. Bobby was a little surly, but what teenage boy wasn’t?
    â€œI don’t see what’s funny about it. And Ivy’s so prissy.” Patty frowned. “They’re so different.”
    â€œWhy don’t you leave that? I’ll do it.”
    Patty peeled off the gloves and draped them over the faucet. She turned in his arms and kissed him. She tasted pleasantly of coffee and toast. “I hate you working these hours. We’re all out of kilter. We never do anything together.”
    â€œWhat can I do? Work’s work.”
    â€œYou leave in the middle of the night. It always feels like you’re sneaking out. And I hate waking up to an empty bed. You know that. I get lonely.”
    â€œIt’s work, Patty.”
    â€œSo you said. Isn’t there anything else?”
    â€œWe’ve been through this. When the warm weather comes I can try and get logging work, or maybe landscaping, but if I do we lose the benefits I get with Pollack’s.”
    â€œLogging’s no good. You’d be off in a camp. Why do you say logging?”
    â€œI’m just laying out the options. There’s Kroeler’s, they might be hiring, I heard.”
    â€œA paint factory? All those chemicals? Oh, that’s a
fine
idea. I don’t want you logging, Tom. It’s too dangerous. Look at Greg Keane.” Greg Keane’s right arm was crushed and had to be amputated after a steel bind-wire snapped on one of the trucks and he got caught when the load shifted.
    â€œAccidents happen everywhere, Patty. You grew up on a farm. You know that.” Forklifts, highway accidents, machinery—an endless possibility of industrial accidents. He often wondered how the world looked to white-collar workers, who had board room barracudas to fear, rather than tractors and folding cultivators and chainsaws.
    Patty pulled away and shuffled through a pile of unopened bills on the counter. “That fucking commune could hardly be called a farm. Where are my keys?”
    â€œOn the hook by the door.”
    â€œI’m going to be late.”
    He walked her to the door and grabbed her elbow as she stepped out, pulling her back to him. “Don’t worry so much, babe. We’re doing fine.”
    â€œAre we?” Her face searched his. “At least you like your job. I hate mine.”
    â€œSince when? I thought you wanted to work.”
    â€œI wanted to get out of this house. But Wilton’s? Jesus, what a bore.”
    â€œWell, I don’t know . . . quit then.” He ran his hands through his hair. “We got by before you worked. We’ll get by again.”
    â€œGetting by. What a life.”
    â€œI’m doing the best I can.”
    She put her small hand up to the side of his face. “You need a shave,” she said, and kissed him good-bye.
    He stood on the porch, with his hands deep in his pants pockets, watching her drive off. The old Chevy, bought second-hand six years ago, rattled and shook, then settled. Patty waved and he waved back. He kept his eyes on the car as it moved down the street. In all the years since he’d first seen her, there was this one constant thing: he loved her so much it scared him, for the world was harsh and jagged. Rascal came out onto the porch and stood there wagging his long tail. The dog whined and cocked his head. Barked sharply, inquiringly. Tom bent down and scratched his ear. The dog leaned into his leg and whined again.
    â€œThey forgot to feed you, huh? Well, I can fix that, I guess.” He went back into the house and closed the door behind him. On the silent television, the roadrunner had just tricked the coyote into stepping off a high mesa and his legs spun frantically for a few seconds before he looked balefully at the viewer and then