Iâd be willing to let him take a tube for two weeks, after which, if he was satisfied, we could meet back at the health club, two weeks from today, I said, we could meet right there and he could pay me. I asked him to write down his name. I gave him his tube and penlight and shook hands with him, I could see in his eyes, Juan-George, that he was an honest man, I could see that when the cream worked for him he would be back in two weeks to pay me, two weeks was not long in the scheme of things, I thought, what difference did it make if some of the money took a little longer to trickle in, people waited two weeks for their paychecks, didnât they? Once he had gotten his free trial, the woman who had walked up, the young woman who had been waiting to the side so patiently, sheâd set her handbag on the table, ready to get her wallet out perhaps, and had now pulled it off the table, she asked whether Iâd be willing to do the same thing for her. I couldnât see why not. And then, according to what Iâll call Oppen Porterâs corollary to Roger Macaronaâs ideas about the ideal number of cars in the drive-thru line, other people stepped up to the counter, other people interested in the properties of the antioxidant cream, other people who wondered whether Iâd be willing to offer the same free trial deal to them, one after the other, in an unbroken stream of customers, or potential customers, I should say, until there was nothing left on the table but Paulâs standing cardboard sign and my list of names.
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If I knew then what I know now, I wouldnât have gone back to Paulâs apartment building that day, and so I wouldnât have found myself standing on the sidewalk looking into a car windshield at a crumpled fast-food place bag with Paulâs hand-drawn map on it. How strange, I thought, I remember thinking, that Paulâs map should be staring at me from the dashboard of a car parked in front of Paulâs building. How strange that that car should be the same kind as Aunt Lizâs. How strange, and then it dawned on me, that Aunt Liz herself should be getting out of that car and walking toward me with an unhappy look on her face. What the heck did I think I was doing, she wanted to know, why the heck was I here instead of at the fastfood place, she wanted to know, Roger Macarona called her when I didnât show up to work and she had been looking for me ever since, she had almost called the police, she said that twice, the police. Sheâd had to cancel a whole slew of notary public appointments, which were her bread and butter, to wander the valley looking for me, first along the bus lines, then everywhere between her house and the fast-food place, and finally, luckily, sheâd looked through my things, she looked around my room, and found, sitting on the dresser, this map, she held up Paulâs map, finally here of all places. All of this was very serious, she said, she was very disappointed that I had somehow found time to see the one person she had expressly forbidden me to see, for my own good, that man Paul. I didnât deny it, I donât believe in lying, thereâs enough to keep track of already in this world, but I also didnât admit it, I didnât say anything, I just got into the car, I was shocked, I think, I was shocked and stunned and I kept quiet, to express how I was feeling I moved the seat back as far as it would go, I moved the seat back to what was a comfortable position for me but which would require Aunt Liz to turn around completely if she wanted to talk to my face. We rode in silence for a while, and then Aunt Liz cleared her throat. Here it comes, I thought. But the first thing she did was apologize, I hadnât expected that, she started by saying that she was sorry she hadnât thought of my feelings before, that she hadnât thought about how lonely I would be in Panorama City.
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It was perfectly
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If I knew then what I know now, I wouldnât have gone back to Paulâs apartment building that day, and so I wouldnât have found myself standing on the sidewalk looking into a car windshield at a crumpled fast-food place bag with Paulâs hand-drawn map on it. How strange, I thought, I remember thinking, that Paulâs map should be staring at me from the dashboard of a car parked in front of Paulâs building. How strange that that car should be the same kind as Aunt Lizâs. How strange, and then it dawned on me, that Aunt Liz herself should be getting out of that car and walking toward me with an unhappy look on her face. What the heck did I think I was doing, she wanted to know, why the heck was I here instead of at the fastfood place, she wanted to know, Roger Macarona called her when I didnât show up to work and she had been looking for me ever since, she had almost called the police, she said that twice, the police. Sheâd had to cancel a whole slew of notary public appointments, which were her bread and butter, to wander the valley looking for me, first along the bus lines, then everywhere between her house and the fast-food place, and finally, luckily, sheâd looked through my things, she looked around my room, and found, sitting on the dresser, this map, she held up Paulâs map, finally here of all places. All of this was very serious, she said, she was very disappointed that I had somehow found time to see the one person she had expressly forbidden me to see, for my own good, that man Paul. I didnât deny it, I donât believe in lying, thereâs enough to keep track of already in this world, but I also didnât admit it, I didnât say anything, I just got into the car, I was shocked, I think, I was shocked and stunned and I kept quiet, to express how I was feeling I moved the seat back as far as it would go, I moved the seat back to what was a comfortable position for me but which would require Aunt Liz to turn around completely if she wanted to talk to my face. We rode in silence for a while, and then Aunt Liz cleared her throat. Here it comes, I thought. But the first thing she did was apologize, I hadnât expected that, she started by saying that she was sorry she hadnât thought of my feelings before, that she hadnât thought about how lonely I would be in Panorama City.
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It was perfectly
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