Miss Wyoming Read Online Free Page B

lane, where she heaved a plastic bag of her week's garbage into a stranger's trash can. She tried to think of a place to go. She chose Indiana.



Chapter Three
    In the hospital John woke up long enough to hear the doctor tell a nurse that his lungs were plugged up with «about five cans of cream-of-mushroom soup,» followed by, «Christ, he looks awful. I've eaten steaks healthier than this guy. He's down to what,
sixteen
T cells? He looks familiar. Movie guy?»
    «Johnson. He did
Bel Air PI.
»
    «No way. What else?»
    «Bel Air PI 2.»
    «Oh yeah — that was one of the few sequels better than the original.»
    «Yeah, sure, but did you see
The Wild Land
?»
    «Nope. Never heard of it.»
    «Join the club. Didn't even go to video. I think it went, like, straight to Malaysia.»
    «Wait — didn't this guy do
The Other Side of Hate
?»
    «Guilty. It went straight to in-flight. They might as well have shipped the dailies directly up to the Boeing factory.»
    «He deserves Holy Retribution for that one. I flew across the country about eight times one year and that movie was like a curse on my life. It haunted me no matter what flight or which direction I was flying in.»
    «At least it paid for Fun Boy's toy box. Check the rope burns on the wrists and ankles.»
    The doctor and nurse inspected his body like it was a skimpy Christmas tree. «Well, like I say, whatever floats your boat. Time to Hoover out the lungs again. And monitor his CNS for the wobblies. This guy's pill soup. Christ, whatta mess. He's like the undead Sno-Kone that is Walt Disney.»
    The nurse turned on a suction tube, but turned it off when John made a noise. «Didnaw go vee-oh.»
    «He's saying something. What's he saying?»
    «Didnaw go vee-oh.»
    «It sounds like mush. Listen harder …»
    «I think he's saying, “It didn't go straight to video.” »
    «What didn't?»
    «Wile Lann.»
    «The Wild Land.»
    «Yoo azzhoe.»
    «Well, Doctor, I think he just called
you
a prince.»
    That it was something bacterial, and not, say, an overdose of five different prescription drugs mixed with cognac and two Slimfast strawberry shakes that nearly killed him was a fact not lost on him, regardless of what his medical team thought.

    The night he died was to have been a typical Thursday evening: out of the house around 11P .M., party with a friend of Ivan's who was coming in from New York, some guy with a hot play for sale — maybe take him up to Melody's for a quick hug or two. But John woke up around midafternoon feeling achy and nauseous, his thinking foggy, and he mistook this to be a bad reaction to the previous evening's methamphetamine, Serax and bondage. After all, a leather hood had chafed his Adam's apple. He seemed to recall a rope he pulled too hard. There was a sore at the base of his penis —
ouch
— was the skin surface broken? And the Vasarely ashtray as-expensive-as-a-new-small-car had been cleaved into three valueless chunks.
    Kay finished cleaning the kitchen and Saran-wrapped his lunch around sunset. He heard her car exit the driveway. A pulse of seasickness surged, and his breathing grew limp. He dragged his torso to the shower stall to vomit, afterward grabbing and chewing a stray Serax tablet lying beneath the sink's kick. He stripped while leaning crumpled against the slate tiles, then ignited the hot water faucet and felt what little food he'd had that day — seaweed, basmati rice, grapefruit, algae drink and six Kit Kats. Rinsing off his skin, he blacked out.
    When he came to, the water dowsing him was nearly cold and the sky outside had gone fully dark. He turned off the faucet. He was shivering and realized he was merely sick — sick! He hadn't been sick in decades, but his heart leapt with the knowledge that it wasn't drugs or excessive living that had his jaws chattering like a tree full of birds. He reached for the wall phone beside the toilet to slap the speakerphone button with his palm, triggering a dial tone that sliced the silence