“DOC WE WILL NEED A DEAD GUY AS SOON AS POSSIBLE.”

“Put it on the board—”

“There is not time for the board—”

“There is always time for the board that is how we know things have been done they go on the board and then they are crossed off the board and—”

“IT IS ON THE BOARD NOW, TEACHER PROCESS LADY WHO IS NO FUN—”

“Excellent I will take care of it—wait a particular dead guy or—”

“No no this is just housekeeping we will need a dead guy to be me I have just exploded Mr. Sharkey and also I feel the stirrings of a plan in my crime testes.”

“No.”

“No?”

“I say no to crime testes Price I am drawing a line. In fact I am actually drawing a line. Here—”

Doc writes a little column in black along one side of the HOMER board with no at the top and writes crime vagina and crime testes and then crime with square brackets and a variable n to mean any sexual or reproductive body part metaphorically invoked to indicate an instinctive reaction.

“Yeah Doc that’s fair okay okay but I feel a plan.”

“Good. Now re: exploding Sharkey—Calvanese will be unhappy—”

“I know yes there will be consequences but we will make nice later. But you see where—”

“I do, Jack.”

“We dump the dead guy and we let him be found as if we did not mean him to be found. Jack Price bled out and died. I am now BANJO TELEMARK—”

“O God—”

“No Doc it is genius do you not see the fog of crime the vistas of possibility the Kircheisen Art Fair the strategies and tactics of disguise the sheer brutal invitation to chaos Doc it is all there I AM BANJO AND HE IS ME AND WE ARE—”

“I will get you a dead guy.”

“Cool.”

“I wish to register my dismay.”

“Noted. Can you—can you make it look right?”

“Of course I can.”

Of course she can.

I am dating a woman who can.

Who can do anything.

Who will do anything.

Anything at all.

So that is all great but we are of course living in someone else’s house and at a certain point she was always going to come home.

—

“WHAT THE SHIT ARE YOU DOING HERE BITCH?”

Charlie says: “Oh fffudge.”

I am a little surprised by fffudge but okay.

“BITCH I WILL RIP OFF YOUR BITCH HEAD AND STICK IT IN YOUR SKINNY ASS! AND THEN I WILL FEED YOU TO MY FUCKING GOATS IN FUCKING PIECES AND THEN I WILL SELL THE GOATS TO FUCKING OLIGARCHS FOR TUSCAN-STYLE SHIN MEAT AND THEY WILL EAT YOU AND YOU WILL GO INTO THE SOIL SHAT OUT BY THE EXPLOITERS AND THE SLAVE OWNERS YOU FUCKING WHORE OF THE PATRIARCHY—”