Stu trotted toward Harold, who was astride his Honda and trying to start it up. In his anger he had twisted the throttle all the way over and it was a good thing for him it was flooded, Stu thought; if it actually started up with that much throttle, it would rear back on its rear wheel like a unicycle and pile old Harold into the first tree and land on top of him.
"You stay away!" Harold screamed angrily at him, and his hand fell onto the butt of the gun again. Stu put his hand on top of Harold's, as if they were playing slapjack. He put his other hand on Harold's arm. Harold's eyes were very wide, and Stu believed he was only an inch or so from becoming dangerous. He wasn't just jealous of the girl, that had been a bad oversimplification on his part. His personal dignity was wrapped up in it, and his new image of himself as the girl's protector. God knew what kind of a f**kup he had been before all of this, with his wad of belly and his pointy-toed boots and his stuck-up way of talking. But underneath the new image was the belief that he was still a f**kup and always would be. Underneath was the certainty that there was no such thing as a fresh start. He would have reacted the same way to Bateman, or to a twelve-year-old kid. In any triangle situation he was going to see himself as the lowest point.
"Harold," he said, almost into Harold's ear.
"Let me go." His heavy body seemed light in its tension; he was thrumming like alive wire.
"Harold, are you sleeping with her?"
Harold's body gave a shivering jerk and Stu knew he was not.
"None of your business!"
"No. Except to get things out where we can see them. She's not mine, Harold. She's her own. I'm not going to try to take her away from you. I'm sorry to have to speak so blunt, but it's best for us to know where we stand. We're two and one now and if you go off, we're two and one again. No gain."
Harold said nothing, but his trembling hand subsided.
"I'll be just as plain as I have to," Stu went on, still speaking very nearly into Harold's ear (which was clotted with brown wax), and taking the trouble to speak very, very calmly. "You know and I know that there's no need for a man to be rapin women. Not if he knows what to do with his hand."
"That's - " Harold licked his lips and then looked over at the side of the road where Fran was still standing, hands cupping elbows, arms crossed just below her br**sts, watching them anxiously. "That's pretty disgusting."
"Well maybe it is and maybe it isn't, but when a man's around a woman who doesn't want him in bed, that man's got his choice. I pick the hand every time. I guess you do too since she's still with you of her own free will. I just want to speak plain, between you and me. I'm not here to squeeze you out like some bully at a country fair dance."
Harold's hand relaxed on the gun and he looked at Stu. "You mean that? I... you promise you won't tell?"
Stu nodded.
"I love her," Harold said hoarsely. "She doesn't love me, I know that, but I'm speaking plainly, like you said."
"That's best. I don't want to cut in. I just want to come along."
Compulsively, Harold repeated: "You promise?"
"Yeah, I do."
"All right."
He got slowly off the Honda. He and Stu walked back to Fran.
"He can come," Harold said. "And I..." He looked at Stu and said with difficult dignity, "I apologize for being such an ass**le."
"Hooray!" Fran said, and clapped her hands. "Now that that's settled, where are we going?"
In the end they went in the direction Fran and Harold had been headed in, west. Stu said he thought Glen Bateman would be glad to have them overnight, if they could reach Woodsville by dark - and he might agree to tag along with them in the morning (at this Harold began to glower again). Stu drove Fran's Honda, and she rode pillion behind Harold. They stopped in Twin Mountain for lunch and began the slow, cautious business of getting to know each other. Their accents sounded funny to Stu, the way they broadened their a's and dropped or modified their r's. He supposed he sounded just as funny to them, maybe funnier.
They ate in an abandoned lunchroom and Stu found his gaze was drawn again and again to Fran's face - her lively eyes, the small but determined set of her chin, the way that line formed between her eyes, indexing her emotions. He liked the way she looked and talked; he even liked the way her dark hair was drawn back from her temples. And that was the beginning of his knowing that he did want her, after all.
BOOK II ON THE BOARDER Chapter 43
JUNE 5 - SEPTEMBER 6, 1990
We come on the ship they call the
Mayflower
We come on the ship that sailed the
moon
We come in the age's most uncertain
hour
and sing an American tune
But it's all right, it's all right
You can't be forever blessed...
Paul Simon
Lookin hard for a drive-in
Searching for a parking space
Where hamburgers sizzle on an open grille night and day
Yes! Jukebox is jumpin with
records back in the U.S.A .
Well I'm so glad I'm living in the
U.S.A .
Anything you want we got it right
here in the U.S.A .
Chuck Berry
Chapter 43