“Sorry,” Diesel said, “you’re going to have to live off your fat for a few hours.”
I gave him a shot in the arm.
Diesel grinned. “Let me rephrase that.”
“Too late,” I told him. “You’re in big trouble.”
There was a flash of light in the sky, and then it was gone. We sat perfectly still, and two more flashes shot out of the pine forest.
“Those weren’t beams of light,” Diesel said. “They were tails from a rocket.”
We had our windows rolled down, listening for rain or the crackle of electricity. Nothing carried to us.
“Hard to tell exactly where the rocket originated,” Diesel said, “but I have an idea of the general area. I’ll go over the aerial maps again when we get home, and tomorrow we’ll do more off-?road.”
We found fast food just outside of Hammonton and collected bags of burgers, fries, onion rings, fried chicken, and doughnuts. Diesel took the Atlantic City Expressway and connected with the Jersey Turnpike, eating while he drove. Who says men can’t multitask?
I WOKE UP with a start. The phone was ringing. It was still dark. Someone must be dead, I thought. My grandmother or my father. Heart attack while they slept.
Diesel reached across me and got the phone.
“Yeah?” he said to the caller, listened for a moment, and handed the phone to me. “It’s Lula.”
“Lula? What time is it?”
Diesel looked at his watch. “It’s five a. m. ”
“I’m a sick person,” Lula said. “I got the flu back. I can’t stop sneezing. And I can hardly breathe. I’m just about breaking out in a rash. And I haven’t got any of my meds. Tank and I went out last night, and I left my purse in his car. He got everything. He got my decongestant and my antihistamine and my car keys.”
“And?”
“And he isn’t answering his phone. He sleeps like a dead man. I need a ride over there so I can get my purse. Or else I need to find some store open so I can buy drugs.”
“Why don’t you just call the Rangeman control room?”
“He don’t live in a Rangeman apartment anymore. He’s got his own place. It’s brand new. I haven’t even seen it yet.”
“Give me a couple minutes to wake up, and I’ll be right over.”
“You could call her a cab,” Diesel said. “And then you could stay in bed with me.”
If there was an argument that would get me on my feet, that was it. I rolled out of bed, stumbled into the bathroom, got dressed, and stumbled out to the lot. I stood for a moment inhaling the cold air, willing it to go to my brain. I sat my ass behind the wheel and drove on autopi lot to Lula’s house.
Lula rented the top floor of a very small house. Small living room, bedroom, bathroom, and a kitchenette. Lula fit the apartment like she fit her clothes. It was all a tight squeeze. She was sitting on the stoop, waiting for me, when I stopped at the curb.
“You could just drive me to the cemetery,” she said, slumping into the passenger seat. “It would save time.”
“I can’t believe you left your purse in his car. That purse is practically attached to your shoulder.”
“He picked me up, and we were gonna get some Chinese takeout and bring it back to his house on account of I’ve never been in his house. And we didn’t even get to Chang’s and I started getting sick. Came on me like BANG. So I told Tank I wanted to go home. By the time we got to my place, I was sneezing my head off, and I wasn’t thinking good. I don’t even remember getting out of the car.”
“This comes on you every time you see Tank.”
“It never used to.”
Lula’s hard-?working, low-?income neighborhood was bordered by a slackard, no-?income neighborhood. Since there were no legal drugs to be had in the no-?income neighborhood, I drove back toward Hamilton and Broad, where there were a couple all-?night con ve nience stores. I stopped at the first store with lights blazing, and Lula lurched out of the Jeep and went inside.
Lula was wearing big, pink, fluffy slippers, pink sweatpants, and a white down-?filled quilted coat. A red flannel nightgown hung two inches under the coat. Her hairstyle was yikes.