Social Blunders by Tim Sandlin

Prescott is ready to hire a hit man.”
    “Why?”
    I shrugged again. “They think I want something from them.”
    “Do you?”
    “No.”
    The woman walking the cat came back from wherever they’d been. She—the woman—was duck toed and wore white sneakers with the kind of hose that only cover the ankles. The cat on the leash was mostly white with black markings. Three feet were white and one black. Like all cats, she reminded me of Alice, which put me dangerously close to depression.
    To fight the depression, I looked back at Gilia’s face. There was a small freckle or birthmark in that little dimple between the inside of her right eye and the bridge of her nose. I had an almost irresistible urge to touch it. Often I get irresistible urges to commit inappropriate acts, and if I don’t mount resistance, the urge can lead to a terrible social blunder.
    “You said five guys,” Gilia said.
    “The fifth was a black halfback named Jake. I haven’t spoken to him yet.”
    Gilia stopped leaning against the door and sat up. “Why did you leave the black one for last?”
    “I don’t know.” Why had I left the black one for last? Ever since I was thirteen and learned I had five possible fathers, I’d had the feeling he was the one. I suppose it came from some romantic notion that I was special—that the world-famous author with the tortured soul would always be an outsider. Different. Unique. I like to feel unique.
    “When are you going to see him?” Gilia asked.
    “This afternoon, I guess. Might as well hit them all now as later.”
    She touched my arm, below the elbow. It was the most surprising thing that had happened all day. “Can I come with you?”
    “Why would you want to do that?”
    Her tongue showed on her teeth again. She sat staring at me until I thought she’d forgotten the question, then she said, “I want to see the process.”
    “The process?”
    “I want to see you when you tell it.”
    That brought up so many questions I couldn’t ask any of them. There was nothing to do but drive the car.

9
    The drawback of living in the same place throughout your twenties and early thirties is you can’t have a new emotional adventure without being distracted by reminders of past emotional adventures. For example: I once tongue-jobbed an IRS representative on that very wooden merry-go-round where the kids had been playing.
    I’d gone into the IRS office to explain why a novelist’s entire life should be tax deductible because a novelist’s life is the raw material by which he creates his product, and isn’t that the definition of a tax-deductible expense? Made sense to me. But this semi-skinny GS-7 with diamond post earrings went bureaucrat on me. She sniffled, shuffled papers, and said in a smarty pants tone that even though Bucky and Samantha hit a movie on their trip to the Matterhorn, I still couldn’t deduct all the movies I’d paid for last year.
    “I’ll just bet you have a sexual fantasy you’ve never told anyone,” I said.
    Which is how I ended up on a whirling merry-go-round with my nose between the thighs of an IRS agent. Part of her fantasy was the merry-go-round had to be spinning real fast, so I was pushing like a maniac with my feet on the ground and my face in an awkward position. Her labia were neon purple and the left lip was lots bigger than the right, kind of like a banked turn on a bobsled chute. She tasted like peanut butter. To this day, I get that taste in my mouth whenever I pay income tax.
    ***
    I drove us across Lee to Freeman Mill Road, past Battery Warehouse, Bill Bailey Tires, Madame Xenia the personal psychic, two Oriental massage parlors with discreet parking in the rear, and Chick’s Private Investigations on the second floor above an AME Zion Church. Gilia didn’t say anything until we came even with Gillespie Golf Course, which is where Greensboro’s black people play.
    Most of the black golfers out that day carried their own clubs, although I did see two