“I’ll bet,” I said.

Jack looked hurt. He stood outside the car and put his hand on the door next to me. “Look, Joe,” he said. “Back there, last night, I thought about it and I figure I was only kidding about being gay.”

“Sure,” I said.

“You don’t think I’m really gay, do you, Joe?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I honestly don’t know what happened to you.”

“I don’t know either,” said Jack. “But I know I’m not gay.”

“So you’re not gay,” I said. “I’ll see you later.”

“I’m not!” he said again. But I was already driving away.

Ellen was at the loft waiting for me when I got there. She was still pissed off about the plant and about how I had gone off without telling her. Then she was hot about Jack and how he had made fun of the plant. And the place was filthy with beer bottles and cigarette ashes and socks and dirt all over, and she was hot about that too.

“Don’t worry about Jack,” I told her. “He’s leaving before next weekend or else I’m leaving.”

“What happened?”

“Nothing,” I said. “We just can’t make it together any more.”

“I could’ve told you that three months ago when he put Kay down. He’s turning into a real nut.”

“That’s not all,” I said. “He’s turning into something else too.”

“What?”

“Never mind,” I said. “He’s leaving anyway.” Then I pulled her down on my lap and we fooled around some before we hit the sack. Being with her again was really good after a night in the woods with Jack. But I was sleepy and I could tell that I wasn’t too good for her then. Ellen is a tolerant girl, though. And, I guess, a lot more understanding than Katie. She knew there would be better times coming; so afterwards she let me sleep without asking me more about where I’d been or what had happened between Jack and me. I dreamed about her too while I was sleeping. And I dreamed about Jack. I dreamed that I was back to feeling sorry for him again and I was back in the cabin and letting him get in the bunk with me because he kept telling me that it was cold on the floor because the fire had gone out and the moose head was about to fall down on him. He was still getting in the bed and talking about how cold it was on the floor and how glad he was that he didn’t have to sleep there when I woke up and he was still talking, but in a different voice now. I heard him saying: “Bitch! Bitch!” and it wasn’t part of the dream.