She curls in the nook of my arm, her hips soft against mine, And her skin like silk beneath my touch. Copper tassels of cornfield dance in the sunset And a breeze ripples the birches overhead. Far off I hear muffled thuds, catch a glint of silver in the sky. Then a plume of smoke, a second, a third. She lifts her head. “Our village?” No, what would they want with our village? “I don’t remember nothing about no fucking cars, man! That was the worst day of my life! I remember the body— fuck, I’ll never forget the body. Worst nightmare you could ever have, finding a stiff in your own lot. I was so freaked, I don’t remember nothing else.” Green’s small mid-morning break had now extended into his lunch hour, and he knew the clock was ticking on his freedom. He had traced the parking lot attendant to a small clapboard shanty on a narrow, crowded back street of Mechanicsville. The young man had called in sick to recover from the upset of yesterday, and he ushered Green into the dingy living room, kicking newspapers and clothes aside to make a passage.
