At last I peeled myself out of the chair and went to get my car. It was dark outside but still hot. Bluish lights cast a shaky pall on everything like a black and white negative. The parking lot was half full. Traffic was solid on Vermont. Koreans in expensive clothes and big cars. Black and latin families shoved in junked station wagons or scorched pickup trucks on the way to markets to spend their crummy paychecks. My car was where I had parked it but was listing to the left. A flat front tire. I changed it, getting grease all over my white pants. At the gas station, they told me they couldn’t fix it. The tire was history. It had a deep stab wound in it. Like an ice pick.

I looked around the gas station. I didn’t want to go home. The man who had followed me was out to get me. I didn’t want him to know where I lived. Had Monica Fullbright sent him after me? Was he looking for Cathy Vega? I could go to the club Cathy Vega’s roommate was at, catch the first set and try to get lost among the black leather doomies who liked to flaunt their pale, wasted night selves at the Scream, but I wanted to be somewhere where it would be easier to watch for the man. He must have picked me up originally when I left Cathy’s apartment building. Until I had time to run his license and find out who he was, I didn’t want to see him again. With blue paper towels I rubbed angrily at the black stains on my pants, but all it did was smear them more. There was a spot of grease on my Maude Frizon sandals. Finally I decided to go back to the office. There was no point in trying to hide that from my latin tail if he’d been hired by Monica Fullbright. And at least I could catch up on some work I’d been ignoring.