“We can’t do all of this at once,” the plastic surgeon warned Mrs. Mauney. “Implants and a face lift are two very different surgeries, and we’d need to space them apart, giving you plenty of time to heal.”

“How far apart?” she worried.

TWENTY-THREE

It did not occur to West until she was home and locking herself in for the night that she would have to set her alarm clock. Perhaps one of her few luxuries in life was not getting up on Sunday morning until her body felt like it, or Niles did. Then she took her time making coffee and reading the paper as she thought about her parents heading off to Dover Baptist Church, not far from the Chevon or from Pauline’s Beauty Shop, where her mother got her hair fixed every Saturday at ten in the morning. West always called her parents on Sunday, usually when they were sitting down to dinner and wishing her place wasn’t empty.

“Great,” she muttered to herself, grabbing a beer as Niles sat on the windowsill over the sink. “So now I’ve got to get up at eight-thirty. Can you believe that?”

She tried to figure out what Niles was staring at. From this section of Dilworth, West would have no reminders of the city she protected were it not for the top thirty stories of USBank rising brightly above West’s unfinished fence. Niles had gotten really peculiar lately, it struck West. He sat in the same spot every night, staring out, as if he were ET missing home.

“What are you looking at?” West ran her fingernails down Niles’s silky, ruddy spine, something that always made him purr.

He did not respond. He stared as if in a trance.

“Niles?” West was getting a bit worried. “What is it, baby? You not feeling well? Got a hairball? Mad at me again? That’s probably it, isn’t it?” She sighed, taking a swallow of beer. “I sure wish you’d try to be more understanding, Niles. I work hard, do everything I can to provide you a secure, nice home. You know I love you, don’t you? But you gotta try and cut me a little slack. I’m out there all the live-long day.” West pointed out the window. “And what? You’re here. This is your world, meaning your perspective isn’t as big as mine, okay? So you get pissed because I’m not here, too. This isn’t fair. I want you to give some serious thought to this. Got it?”

The words of the owner were chatter, the buzzing of insects, the drone of sounds drifting out of the radio on the table by the bed. Niles wasn’t listening as he stared out at the forlorn King Usbeecee staring back at him. Niles had been called. There was disaster looming in the land of the Usbeeceeans, and only Niles could help, because only Niles would listen. All others looked up to the mighty King and mocked him in their minds and among themselves, thinking the benevolent monarch could not hear. They, the people, had wanted His Majesty to come. They had wanted his child-care centers and frescos, his career opportunities, and his wealth. Then they had turned jealous of his omniscience, of his all-powerful and praiseworthy presence. Those here and from distant ports were lustful and plotting a takeover that only Niles could stop.