Thanksgiving Read Online Free Page B

roll-’em-in-flourand-see-where-the-wet-spot-is type, know what I mean? So anyway, what with Liz and Deb I was getting laid pretty good, but I could tell right away that Luce was something special. Great body, but acted like she didn’t know it. We got dancing. Luce always loved to dance. You ever dance with her? Oh, I already asked that. Anyway, one thing led to another and we ended up back at her place. She had a nice little room in a funky old Victorian on Haight, just around the corner from the Free Clinic. Must be worth over a million now.’
    He smiled.
    ‘What I remember best about it is the way she took her clothes off. A lot of chicks were self-conscious about that part, even back then. They either wanted to be undressed during a scuffle on the sofa, or do a kind of amateur striptease routine, or else go into the bathroom and reappear magically naked. Luce just stood there and took off her clothes, completely casual and matter-of-fact, just like she was alone. Which just made it worse. I just about died there and then. No, actually I just about burst into tears. Dumb, huh? I mean, I’d been around the block a few times. I must have had forty or fifty women by then. Like they say, who’s counting? But when I saw Luce standing there nude, I felt humbled. I really did. Like when you hear some great piece of music or something. I thought, I don’t deserve this.’
    He laughed.
    ‘Then I thought, but hey, since it’s come my way I guess I’ll grab myself a piece of it anyway.’
    He looked at me.
    ‘You know the real problem with fucking? It’s not the Darwinian angle. You know, the peak experience that turns out to be a flashy sales pitch by your genes, like the casinos sending a private plane down to wherever to lure some high roller back to the tables and take him for everything he’s worth. That’s kind of depressing, once you get it, but it’s just a mind thing. You can work around that one. No, what always bugged me about the whole thing is you can’t look at them and fuck them at the same time. And believe me, Luce was worth looking at, back then. But of course next thing you’re squished up together playing hide the salami and frankly it could be anyone down there. I mean you get the occasional glimpse, of course, depending on the position and so forth, but it’s tough to really get the whole action in perspective, know what I mean? That’s one reason I got interested in the picture angle. Still sure you don’t want to take your coat off, Tone? No? Suit yourself, but I have to say you’re sweating like a pig. Kind of a strange expression, when you think about it. I’ve never seen a pig sweat. I’m not even sure they do sweat. Except maybe at the slaughterhouse.’
    During the drive, I had turned off the highway on to a dirt track which led up into a range of low, rounded bluffs, ending at a disused mine of some sort. There I took a rest break and got in some target practice, firing at an array of cereal boxes I’d picked up at a convenience store on the outskirts of the city. Lefty had told me that if that hypothetical intruder entered my home, the upper chest area was the place to go for. I measured a twenty-ounce Cheerios box against my own chest. It seemed about right.
    After about an hour, and a pack and a half of cartridges, I’d managed to demolish all but one of the boxes, each producing a satisfying shower of honey-coated wheat cereal all over the surrounding rock. By then the revolver, which had initially shocked me with its alien power, had settled down to become an extension of my arm, a hardened and potentially lethal prosthesis. I had no intention of killing Darryl Bob Allen, but I knew that this artificial limb wouldn’t have the slightest compunction about doing so.
    ‘What do you mean by the picture angle?’ I said.
    ‘Photos. Snapshots. Et cetera. Some even from back when we got together.’
    He grinned.
    ‘But of course a toney guy like you wouldn’t be interested in