[untitled]

     It was a wonder she hadn�t tripped yet, half of the parking lot already passed between her legs, boot tongues meeting insteps each time her feet hit pavement. A man pumping diesel into his truck watched, squat mouth scrunched to the side in anticipation for her inevitable fall. Franny threw a glare at him and slowed her pace deliberately, sticking her eyes on his flabby gut. Her old piano teacher came to mind � old, old, old piano teacher with a flap of fat that always bumped against her elbow as she played. Smelly, old condensed milk breath and sandpaper fingertips pressing her knuckles flat into C or B major. Tiny, black dog yapping. She jabbed her middle finger out at him, driving it straight into his belly if her arm had been twelve feet longer like he was a fleshy balloon begging to get popped.
     �F**k you, man, what you F*****G looking at?� Franny shrieked, pale, bottom of your shoe bubblegum hair falling in her eyes. Nobody swinging through for a bit of fuel wanted trouble � he�d broken the cardinal rule of keeping his head down, keeping his nose clean at the gas station. Who knew what kind of sick boyfriend a little thing like that might have, she told herself.
     After the fat fiend backed down, she dove at the front of a blue car. It was a trans am to her, pure muscle car, how could she be expected to go around with a guy who drove less that that, she�d say. But it was only a 1990�s p.o.s. in faded denim, Cass would admit to that in a second. He let her wail on the front of it, tiny fists coated in plastic rings pummeling the fender, but when she started kicking, he stepped in. �Hey, hey.�
     �I f*****g blew it man I blew it!� She pressed her face against the hood and groaned and wind-milled her polyester arms. �I BLEW it.�
     The public tantrums weren�t anything new to Cass or anyone else who�d spent more than an hour with Franny. Setting wasn�t something she concerned herself with; everything should happen everywhere. Still, he gave the horn a quick honk in response and earned himself a flinty pout of hard, glossed lips before she finally got in the car. Trans ams would�ve had leather, not this motel carpet s**t. It was all falling to pieces�
     �What happened?� They pulled out of the parking lot and onto a narrow road, half-alley, half-street, between twin rows of brick buildings. The gas station where Franny had taken her interview was twenty minutes� drive from the apartment complex both of their families lived in, but Cass could get there in five or fifty when he felt like it. Today they�d need fifty, if the girl�s silence was any indicator. �What happened?�
     �NOTHING.� Arms across her scant chest and face to the window, Franny whined out her answer and he almost wanted to ask her how old she was again.
     �What. Happened.�
     �NOTHING, okay, that�s the problem! Everything was fine, but the manager kept giving me this f*****g look,� she was hissing now like the tire she would�ve popped in her frustration.
     �What�re you telling your parents?� Cass didn�t care much, but he did care about whether he�d catch heat for not caring enough. He pushed in the car lighter.
     �Uh, nothing?� Sometimes he could be so stupid.