“If you keep screaming,” says Mimi, “someone is going to call the police.”

“Don’t care!”

“Then we better get you into your underpants.”

I’m bent over the sink, holding on to the edges, my knuckles white from the exertion, and Mimi starts singing “Ten Little Ducks,” the song we sang to Nathan whenever he was upset.

Eugene and the Other Demons join in on the chorus.

When she gets down to three ducks, she stops. “Any better?”

The cramps are still coming in waves, but they’re not as fierce now. “A little.”

“Try singing,” she says.

“I don’t want to sing.”

“Not even if it helps?”

I’m awash in sweat from the pain. Mimi gets a towel and drapes it over my back.

“Come on,” she says, “Three little ducks . . .”

I STAYED IN TAHLEQUAH overnight, checked out some of the bars, with the same results. The next afternoon, I caught a ride to Oklahoma City, where I got stuck at an on-ramp for the rest of the day, until a guy in a station wagon picked me up.

A salesman. Floyd something. Auto parts.

“Where you headed?”

Clinton.

“Clinton?”

Clinton.

“Hell, son, nobody goes to Clinton ’cept peckerheads and salesmen. You got business there?”

Maybe.

“Hour thirty. More if I have to stop. Prostate. You wouldn’t know about that.”

Guess not.

“Atlanta to Las Vegas,” Floyd told me. “If it’s auto parts, my name’s on it.”

Floyd had a bottle of Old Fitzgerald in the glovebox, a carton of Camels on the back seat.

“Help yourself,” he told me. “You work for a living or you just on the wander?”

Visiting family.

“Used to live down south in Ardmore. Second wife. Got kin all over the state. Turn over a stone, and there’s a cousin.”

We pulled off the interstate at El Reno. “Too bad we’re not close to a Furr’s. Salisbury steak, fried okra, lemon meringue pie. Damn.”

Floyd drove into town and parked across the street from a small white stucco building with red awnings.

“Robert’s Grill,” he said. “You ever had an onion burger?”

The grill was stuck on a main corner. No interior to speak of. Counter seating only. We found a couple of stools where we could see the burgers being cooked.

I asked Floyd if he had ever run across a Melvin Blackbird.

“Your daddy? How’d you get Blackbird for a first name?”

The onion burger was pretty good. Floyd had a burger and a Coney dog with chili and slaw.

“Man’s got to keep up his strength. You want to tag along and watch me work? Car parts ain’t a bad career.”

We got to Clinton after lunch.

“None of my business, but I’m not sure you chasing after your old man is all that smart.”

Don’t disagree.

“Lot of people do things for no good reason, but once they’re done, well, that’s it.”