I smile and nod, lost as how to deal with her in this mess of delusion. I wince as she grabs me by the shoulders, staring at me with insane intensity. “Oh, Crow,” she cackles, “Horatio said you’d be stumped!”

But there’s Gimp to the rescue again. He tells her, with all the sincerity in the world, that King Horatio needs her to stay here and sing to him until the time is right. He tells her that she should only listen to the whispers that are helpful and beautiful and kind and wise. He tells her that we all love her. She hugs us both, telling Willy that she’ll take good care of King Horatio if we take good care of each other. Then, in the middle of her green and yellow madness, a clear violet-blue flare forms. Stable, calm, and real. Like a flash of lucidity, born of my own tumour-induced delusion.

“Give my baby a kiss for me,” Char says. “And tell Peggy thank you for doing her best.”

Then, the lucid flare disappears and Char jumps headlong into an animated series of generic lunacy: illuminati are running the entertainment industry, 9/11 was a conspiracy, capitalist devils are poisoning us, and corporations are wrecking the planet. Crazy talk.

She shuts up all of a sudden, smiles, twirls, and dances away from us with a dismissive wave. But just before the nurse lets us out, she charges back down the hall toward us, stopping short at a hollering distance.

“Crow! Good news, bad news!” Char’s arms and dreadlocks flail around like the limbs of a psychotic octopus as she rushes toward me. “There’s a brand new misfortune a-brewing,” she says in an ominous almost chant. “With your cortex on a caper, you can carpe diem, rainbow warrior.” A broad smile suddenly splits across her face, and I jump when her clammy hands grip my cheeks as she yells “Seeeees the day!” before she plants a rough, sloppy kiss on my lips and twirls away. Then, she turns back, the smile replaced by an earnestness that I’ve never seen on Char’s face before. “Oh, and tell Allie to watch what she eats over Christmas. Sharp daisies can’t release the past. Love flows better than blood. So tell her I’m sorry, too.” Then she vanishes behind a giant tattooed bald man. And we disappear back out into the real world, where it’s snowing like a bastard.

This isn’t pretty snow. This is tiny little pills pelting down, stinging, bouncing, accumulating quickly. The grey-white immovable bully of a sky fires a bazillion tight little spit balls at us, and the sidekick wind roars in taunting laughter, driving them even more sideways. Still, Gimp manages to get a joint lit before we reach the truck, making the walk through the hospital parking lot more amusing than Char’s cryptic craziness and this asshole weather stunt, combined.

Behind the derelict old bank building looks like a place where bad things happen. The windows are boarded up. The cornerstone, eroded and crumbling. Ample evidence that artistically inclined chaps like “Sk8r H8r,” “Dickwad,” and “FCKTHAPOLICE” come straight here after they lift a can of spray paint from the hardware store. And bad things do happen here. At least they did the last time I was here with Weasel Tobin.