Women

42

Two mornings later, at 4 am, somebody beat on the door.

"Who is it?"

"It's a redheaded floozie."

I let Tammie in. She sat down and I opened a couple of beers.

"I've got bad breath, I have these two bad teeth. You can't kiss me."

"All right."

We talked. Well, I listened. Tammie was on speed. I listened and looked at her long red hair and when she was preoccupied I looked and looked at that body. It was bursting out of her clothing, begging to get out. She talked on and on. I didn't touch her.

At 6 am Tammie gave me her address and phone number.

"I've got to go," she said.

"I'll walk you to your car."

It was a bright red Camaro, completely wrecked. The front was smashed in, one side was ripped open and the windows were gone. Inside were rags and shirts and Kleenex boxes and newspapers and milk cartons and Coke bottles and wire and rope and paper napkins and magazines and paper cups and shoes and bent colored drinking straws. This mass of stuff was piled above seat level and covered the seats. Only the driver's area had a little clear space.

Tammie stuck her head out the window and we kissed.

Then she tore away from the curb and by the time she reached the corner she was doing 45. She did hit the brakes and the Camaro bobbed up and down, up and down. I walked back inside.

I went to bed and thought about her hair. I'd never known a real redhead. It was fire.

Like lightning from heaven, I thought.

Somehow her face didn't seem to be as hard anymore…