Instead of running, though, or displaying the usual fear that follows a show of bravery, the kid turns to me and smiles. Just smiles right at me. Long and slow and without a flicker of emotion. Oh, I get it now, of course. He likes her. For God’s sake, this is turning into a farce, some European farce that undoubtedly ends with me locked out of my hotel room with my trousers down around my ankles. Not literally, of course, but you get the picture. A minute passes, then another. We perform the requisite standoff, then move away from each other simultaneously—he back to the shop and me to inspect his handiwork. I kneel down and look at my fender, really studying it now. It seems OK, but I’ll need to polish the whole car later; I mean, that’s obvious. She may’ve even put a slight ding in the paint—no doubt with her class ring or something—but I won’t know for sure until I buff the thing out.

As I’m deciding this, I slowly notice that a young girl on a Schwinn has stopped near me. She is sweaty and chewing on a strand of red licorice—one of those “Super Rope” things—with the wrapper still twisting and clinging to it. She is silent. Watching me. My eyes narrow, then I jump to my feet and make a little move toward her, raising my voice as I do.

“What the HELL are you looking at?! Get out of here!”

Her face twitches, eyes widening as her tiny brain tries to process the attack. It almost looks as if she’s going to say something in response, but she bursts into tears instead and hurriedly pedals off. I watch her go, satisfied with at least one normal human response today, then turn back to my Olds again and crouch down. Stroking its gleaming paint. Cooing softly into the wheel well and promising to wash this entire episode away when we get back to our little home.

Loose Change

It isn’t a circle. Not exactly that. More like a broken ring then, with another lighter X-ray of itself to one side. Both symbols seem to have been burned into the leather, but white-hot, so heated that they have left pale impressions of themselves rather than the charred, blackened versions one might expect. It is almost a brand of sorts, like those found on the hides of cattle in the Wild West of the nineteenth century, but upon inspection can be seen to come from within. The marks are on the inside.