Banana Man tells the man he went to an Ivy League business school and that his wife used to joke that she picked the wrong guy because three of his classmates are billionaires.

She keeps asking what he does even though it’s obvious he’s exhausting all of the permutations of the nouns and gerunds he’s already listed on his profile, rehashing clipped versions of what he’s already typed in their email exchanges. She says that the bucket of Coors Light bottles on the table between them makes her feel like she’s in an interview (“Is there a clipboard in your hands I can’t see?”) so he moves next to her in the haggis-smelling dim of the Scottish sports bar that looks like pretty much any other sports bar, that he chose because her social preferences included “low-key scenarios with a twist.”At least here, just behind the open front doors rimmed with sharp-smelling cedar (he remembers carving wood like this into ninja stars at summer camp for an impending war with a rival cabin that never came), he has a clear view of their respective vehicles – her moped with the duct-taped engine and yanked-off fuel cap, his fixed-gear Schwinn – safely shackled together to a light pole near the edge of the curb.

Charlene had been waiting a long time. She considered patience to be one of her best qualities, however, and she did not like to complain. She was drinking the last of the good brandy in a purple flower-patterned teacup. It was a fine day for celebration, she thought.

I was disoriented, out-of-body, capable of anything—of killing myself. But that’s not what scared me most. What scared me most was that I knew in my swimming brain that I would do it again.

When I came home from the barber’s shop with a bandage on my hand, she asked what had happened. I was embarrassed to admit I’d put a hand up to signify where to stop cutting, but the blind man had simply snipped on, my finger merely an obstacle to his scissors. But, her love for me trumps my oddness, her way of coming to me in silken garb, her skin drenched in sweat, the fine hairs on her upper lip moist. 

My hands shook while taking the key. I pictured a room with candles lit, scattered around the bed for that ambient effect. There were rose petals, too, sprinkled around the floor and bedding. I bet it even had a skylight, so that you could look up at the stars after sex, then contemplate the meaning of life. It was going to be the most perfect moment. 

Aunt Mona’s on Facebook. She wanted to keep up with her family and she took a computer class at the local community college, and everyone in the class signed up so she did too. That was six months ago and now she was hooked on the damn thing. Today was her niece Gretchen’s birthday (not that she needed a silly old website to tell her that!), and the pressure had been building for weeks. Mona had to write on Gretchen’s wall. She didn’t want to be too over-the-top or clingy, or any of the bad things that aunts can be. But she also didn’t want to be common or lame or write something with an obligatory, cold air, Happy Birthday, Gretchen. Ick. And should she text her in addition to writing on her wall, or should she just write on her wall? Life was more complicated all the time with the damn computers and the smartphones and the Facebook.

Aunt Mona’s on Facebook. She wanted to keep up with her family and she took a computer class at the local community college, and everyone in the class signed up so she did too. That was six months ago and now she was hooked on the damn thing. Today was her niece Gretchen’s birthday (not that she needed a silly old website to tell her that!), and the pressure had been building for weeks. Mona had to write on Gretchen’s wall. She didn’t want to be too over-the-top or clingy, or any of the bad things that aunts can be. But she also didn’t want to be common or lame or write something with an obligatory, cold air, Happy Birthday, Gretchen. Ick. And should she text her in addition to writing on her wall, or should she just write on her wall? Life was more complicated all the time with the damn computers and the smartphones and the Facebook. 

When I lost my job as head waiter of the Surfing Whale, I was so desperate for cash that I put my car on Craigslist. Put it up for dirt cheap. Two-thousand bucks. The thing was only four years old and hadn’t even sniffed 20,000 miles yet. A Jaguar. For two-thousand bucks.

Ol’ Tom and I met years ago, back when we were both shot-nosed shits playing bad ass and trying to hold up the central store. We spent many a night in jail together then. When we stole the horses and the warrant went out, we just about sealed our doom. But hell if we weren’t happy about it. We crossed the border out of Arizona that year and hid out down in Mexico. We used our own wanted posters for target practice which we believed made us very tough.