but it’s also his bottom lip, his rotating bones, and how he seems taller, 5’6”, but the torso seems longer, the yards of arched torso, the two front teeth like hard candy, a rope chain with a cross pendant, Yahshua, and his body hair: eight braids, straight back, between Stone’s thighs eight braids, the eyelashes, the goatee, sideburns, underarm hair—Paul Hunter imploring him to sing like he’s in the choir again, from his gut, in three takes, and at three he learned to play keys, hitting the closed fist against his chest, a black background hitting a nipple, the winged tattoo, how we forgot he wasn’t mythical, throwing panties and not really listening, and how he hated all of that.

A DRY DROWNING, SPAGHETTI ALLE VONGOLE

place clams in a pan without water, a dry drowning, 1 kilogram for 4 people, wait until they open, but don’t add salt, clams still have the sea in them so take them out of their shells, or keep them inside, if you want, throw them in the hot pan with garlic, extra virgin olive oil, red pepper, parsley, 7 cherry tomatoes, and white wine, let the white wine evaporate, put a handful or 320 grams of pasta in boiling water, place the pasta gently into the pan with the clams, stir together, add some pasta water, it’s full of amido, full of starch, it will create something, serve, eat immediately, otherwise it should be thrown away

WET SAND USED AS AN ABRASIVE ELEMENT

The rumor spread. It was discussed so often that it became known. We couldn’t help this; it’s just something that happens when things are passed around. We ignored it. We drove to the orthodontist’s office.

The orthodontist knew about the rumor. The orthodontist liked to hum and to whistle while he worked, and he did not look at us with any respect. The brackets were glued, one by one, and the wires pulled through like thread, and the double click. In the orthodontist’s office a model airplane was set close to the instruments, for the purpose of distracting the siblings of his patients. The orthodontist had wanted to be a pilot. The receptionist knew about the rumor.

Afterwards, we went to the beach. Glory was at the beach. We sat with Glory; we spoke about the rumor with Glory. We showed Glory our braces. Glory already knew all about the rumor but allowed us to explain. Glory looked at us while we spoke. Glory didn’t believe the rumor to be true, or wasn’t concerned with it. When Glory spoke we didn’t look at Glory, we looked at the sand or at our wrists. Glory’s nose was running, but we didn’t see, we weren’t looking.

After we had finished discussing the rumor we were quiet. In the quiet we looked at Glory, her beautiful nose wiped clean, and at the mine trucks moving on the sand behind us.