Arno’s one-joint-rebreathe-the-smoke experiment may not have worked in the fallout shelter, but here in the cramped and enclosed confines of the MG, the result appears to be more fruitful. Charles and Lucas the Honky Cracker finish the joint and space out in the fumy humid haze. Hard to imagine two people more similar and dissimilar. “Know what, Charles?” Lucas says.

“What’s that, my man?”

“You may be a dissociated Jehovah’s Witness —”

“Disassociated,” Charles corrects him. “If I was dissociated, we’d be having this rap at Creedmoor.”

“Uh, yeah, right. Anyway, like I was saying, I think you’ve still got religion, man.”

“Oh, yeah?” Charles chuckles. “What makes you say that?”

“Because tonight, in that office, you saved my ass. And you didn’t have to, man. Maybe you didn’t even want to. Maybe I don’t deserve it. But you did it because you knew it was the right thing to do.”

Charles looks off into the dark and then back. “Remember, it’s not a done deal yet. But we’ll see what we can do. And if that’s your way of saying thank you, white boy, then you’re welcome.”

“That is definitely my way of saying thank you. I mean it, man, from the bottom of my bourgeois white heart.”

Charles laughs. He says he’ll be in touch with the fake-address details soon, and unfolds himself from the MG. Lucas watches him stroll off into the dark. There goes someone who is sacrificing for the greater good. Someone who spends his days ministering to nutcases over at Creedmoor and his nights voluntarily advising rich white boys on how to avoid the draft.

What are you doing for the greater good? the bourgeois white boy asks himself.

No answer is forthcoming. Lucas starts the MG and steers out of the church lot. Stops at a traffic light. Feels himself smile. The albatross is taking flight. Lucas Lindbergh imagines the MG sprouting wings. In his mind, the traffic light turns green and he accelerates through the gears, hits takeoff velocity, the Spirit of Long Island lifts —

“Sweet ride, babe.” A voice comes from his left.

Lucas slowly turns his head. It’s a guy in a Stingray in the lane beside him. Stingray Man is grinning, but when he sees that Lucas isn’t a babe, his jaw drops. His face hardens. The light turns green, and it’s the Stingray that hits takeoff velocity, leaving rubber.

One small gaffe for Stingray Man, one annoying reminder for Lucas that we are what we drive.