“God, Crow. That’s terrible. I don’t even know what to say.” Gimp leans across my lap to rummage through the console for his shot glass and scissors.

“Me neither.” I take another sip of tea, this time managing to swallow it without making a scene. “Allie’s on her way home, too. Her mother finally died.”

“Well, Little Mary Sunshine, so much for polite stoner small talk. You’re only slightly less depressing than neo-con newspapers and government-run education.” He drops a fat green bud into the shot glass, and starts chopping it with a methodical tenderness, watching the scissor blades pinch and pierce the whole sticky mass into crumbs and slivers. Talking to it, practically. “Death, eh? Shitty reason to come home.”

“Death’s the only reason to come back to this shithole,” I say, staring out the window. The sun has hoisted itself higher into the sky, putting the run on the remnants of early morning mist. There’s not a breath of wind. The water is dead calm, an acquiescent mirror for the sky’s vanity. All that showy light and colour and vastness.

“Shithole?” Willy’s voice cracks with feigned offence. “Nah, b’ye, this here’s a good place to live.”

“I need a good place to die,” I mumble, returning my attention to the enclosed comfort of the truck. “Remember my cat Whipper?”

“That the one the coyotes ate, or the one that played the piano?” he asks.

“No, he was orange.” I give his bad arm a flirty shove at the precise moment he begins to shake the carefully chopped pot into the rolling paper he has cupped in the other hand. But Gimp doesn’t drop so much as a crumb. And his eyes never leave the narrow sphere of the task at hand. He hasn’t looked at me since I said the word tumours.

“Whipper had a tumour in his gut,” I say. “The day after we found out, he ran away. A week later, I found him right there on the wharf, sprawled out on the edge overlooking the water. Dead as a doorknob. That cat did the same thing I’m doing. Haulin’ ass home. Looking for a good place to curl up and die.”

“Flawed analogy.” He shakes his head but keeps his eyes fixed on the delicate mechanics of his one-handed joint rolling. “You’re doing the opposite. Whipper left home. Went somewhere different. Somewhere lonely. Where the people who loved him wouldn’t see him go all twitchy. You’re the reverse Whipper.”

“Dammit,” I say. “I am. Well, better chop that story out of the blockbuster memoir I’m writing. Wanna party like it’s 1995 with me in the meantime? I’ll make you a chapter.” I glance at him, toss my hair, grin, and start leaning in toward him.

“Ah, Christ!” Gimp jumps in his seat. “I gotta go! I hired that Edwards kid to work mornings at the garage, but don’t trust him enough to give him keys. Betcha he’s been standing outside with his thumb up his arse and his brain in neutral for the last fifteen minutes. Wouldn’t just break in like anybody with half a brain would do. Kids today. Want a ride back to your ma’s?”