Charlie Pine Marten and the rifle I had for sale. Truthfully, I wasn’t thinking about the rifle all that much at
that point. Maybe my friend would know what to do about the boys and the old woman. But before I shut
the truck off, the old woman said through a cough that she had to get back to Charlie’s right now, as her stuff
was there. As though I had forgot what she already told me. And what’s up with her stuff that’s so important,
I asked myself. But I did like she said, backing out of the prime parking spot, slip-sliding out to the highway,
and then, following her directions, turning up a little road that runs along an old housing project with frame
houses set every which way, some of them with chain link fences and others without, but almost all of them
with rusty cars and falling down antennae and sagging clotheslines. I didn’t see any people, but there were
plenty of folks home because chimneys were huffing black smoke as though they was burning old tires to
keep warm. Which you never know what it might be that they use in their stoves, most of these folks being so
poor. The casino was supposed to change all that, but I don’t know if it mad