Third World by Louis Shalako

as pretty as a peach, not that anybody
around here had seen too many of those lately.
    He supposed he’d better sneak into town
and get himself a new shirt. Tomorrow would be best, for he wanted
to avoid small talk if he could—that meant pretty much anybody he
might meet.
    Hank couldn’t help his feelings, and
May-October marriages had worked before. The trouble lay in how to
get into one.
    It wasn’t the money, it was only a
couple of dollars admission, and ten cents a beer after
that.
    The real problem would be when they
entered the door and all those people would turn to look and see
who it was. There would be Hank and Polly.
    His guts fluttered inside awful fierce
whenever he thought about it, which was often even though he was on
his second big net by this time. The work was slow, but there
wasn’t much else to do so he kept at it.
    Poor old Hank was full of surprises
these days. Wait until old Red heard about this!
    He’d be fit to be tied.
     
     
     

Chapter Ten
     
    Hank Needed a
Shirt
     
     
    As it happened, Hank needed more than
just a shirt, and he also had the impression Abe Peltham knew a
little more than he was letting on. In all honesty, it probably had
been nine or ten years since Hank had bought a shirt, and Peltham
wasn’t exactly stupid. None of Hank’s relations had died or
anything like that or surely Abe would have heard.
    He wasn’t particularly honest either,
judging by the prices.
    “ Ten dollars for the shirt,
and fifty cents for the hair gel.”
    He probably made that stuff up in the
back room. Hank unscrewed the lid as Abe looked on. He had a sniff.
It didn’t smell like lard or anything, it was all right, or so he
guessed. He had no idea of what he was doing.
    Hank wanted one or two things for his
kitchen, and the bill went a little higher. Hank resolved to get
the hell out of there.
    Finally he scraped up the nerve to ask
for aftershave, which Abe cheerfully pointed out on the public
shelves in the store proper. It must have been sitting there for
years and Hank had never noticed it. He knew where the beans were
and everything.
    Peltham must have been hard up for
making change the way his eyes lit up when Hank pulled out a small
roll and a few coins. He didn’t ask too many questions and for that
Hank was grateful.
    Courting was good for business, that
would explain it.
    Red wasn’t around it seemed, so Hank
rode home and settled in with a bottle of Old Chester, the whiskey
they brewed up in Capital City. He had a few more days to wait and
a lot on his mind, not the least of which was that he wasn’t
getting any younger.
    Polly preyed on his mind, that was for
sure. He was afraid to want her too badly in case she wouldn’t want
him. While his mind recoiled from the thought, he had to take it
into account at some level. She had every reason to say no to a
proposal of marriage, and probably would.
    To say that Hank was sick with fear
would be accurate. He had this fantastic dream of him and Polly and
three boys and a couple of girls…unbelievable. Hank just couldn’t
help it.
    For some reason, thoughts of his
mother, and his father, and he had two sisters and a brother out
there somewhere, occupied his mind a substantial portion of the
time. There was a bittersweet sadness when he remembered what it
was to be a kid, and growing up, and to be part of a family and
all. His mom and dad were dead, but he sometimes wondered if any of
the others had done anything interesting. Adults at the time of
departure, his siblings had stayed on Earth. The tearful scene in
the departure lounge, with everyone crying and clinging to one
another was still strong in his memory. For his parents, successful
enough people in their own way, it was the culmination of the dream
of a lifetime. Departure was the worst day of his life…so
far.
    The thoughts brought nothing but
sadness.
    He’d never see his brother and sisters
again of course, although that hadn’t been his highest priority at
the time.