“I hear you got a new job over at the airport terminal, Ginger. Life must be treating you good.”
“Just shut the f-ck up while we wait for Snowmanster, Marty.”
“Oooo. Touched a nerve, did I? Life *isn’t* treating you that well.”
“If I had a gun…” she seethed, not daring to glance in his direction, because looks could kill at this point. Plus there was Lemon to deal with. Always in the background: funny foot Lemon, always with the guffaws. She couldn’t ask about him because she wasn’t sure he was alive or dead. Life (and death) is so confusing in this land of 2. Just ask holey headed Kolya, who Marty kind of invented after all, Marty kind of made him up. “Penny Lane,” Ginger realized at some crossroads while they were still living together. “Arnold Layne”! The great 2n1 that started it all. Takes 2 to know. It all fell completely together before it all collapsed utterly apart, with him over there on the couch and she in her bed, sometimes with another after that. Tom the milkman, Ben the paperboy, er, man. Man, she meant there in her thoughts. 18: old enough, or so he said. Then Jake the butcher; the candlestick maker — she even forgot his actual name and he had come over more than once. Unlike One Time Feldon. She remembered his name because of the Oracle. Feldon — Fieldon. He was 30 but didn’t look a day over 10. And the fun they had that one time! “Water’s on!” he called from the bathroom at 5 in the morning. She’ll never forget that line. Then Marty came home early at 6 from one of his blasted solo tours and put a stop to all that. All she had was the once. But it might have been enough, because she had memories. And a hi-fi tape, ha. Yeah, they got back together. Before Ringold came along and drummed him out of the picture again, maybe for good this time. They hadn’t spoken since, but they had to divide the house. Hence the visit here, to the Illuminati once more. Whom Marty vowed that one time back in Spring ’64 that he would never revisit, till death do them part.
Sunklands 