The key slips into the ignition like a finger dipping into chocolate. Smooth and effortless. The man cranks it to the right and closes his eyes. Praying, or something very similar to that kind of religious gesture. Nothing. Shit. He figured that it was worth trying again, just in case he’d flooded the thing or whatever—this was one of the ideas his father had given him years ago, back when he used to listen to other people’s advice. If you flood a car, wait a few minutes and try it again. But of course he hadn’t flooded it—this probably wasn’t even possible any longer, what with all the newfangled contraptions these car companies (especially European ones) were putting under the hood these days—he was just getting desperate and so he’d given it another go. For a moment—just that first second when his tendency is always to blame someone or something else—he feels like doing damage to the car. Hurting it in some way. Jabbing his Montblanc pen (from a different wife on a different Christmas) through the soft black convertible top and pulling on it with all his might. Like a soldier might have done in the olden days, ripping his saber through the flimsy tents of some Gypsies as his buddies were off shooting people and burning their camp to the ground. Something like that. His mind continues to wander across thoughts like these for a moment—he envisions taking part in some sort of massacre in the forests of Russia or in that cultural revolution over there in China—before a knocking sound makes him lurch to one side. Holding his hands up near his face, he turns and looks toward the passenger window and into the eyes of a young woman. No more than thirty, smiling in at him. Without thinking, he reaches out to buzz down the window but gets nothing in return. Powerless. He curses to himself and scrambles outside, catching his knee on the edge of the door as he goes. Ouch.

“Hi,” says the girl as she offers up another smile. More like a grin, but it’s hard to see out here in the dark. The man grins in return and tries to speak while his mind races back to an hour before as he was watching this same gal hold herself upside down on a pole for a protracted length of time. Her breasts somehow defying gravity and pointing straight out toward him in the crowd. Honest to God, directly at him.

“Oh, hi, hello,” the man finally manages to say. Stuttering a bit over the hello of it all. “You’re from … I mean, I think I saw you. Earlier. Like, inside.”

“Yeah, just finished up. My shift.”

“You don’t stay until closing?”

“Nah, I got a kid, so I try and get home at midnight. My mom watches her until then.”