Free Circuit Of Heaven by Dennis Danvers

smile?” He smiled then. He could have a good time. It was possible.
    “Not always. Sure you don’t want to change the ‘solemnly’ to ‘pompously’?”
    “I’ll keep it in reserve. So what do you do on the outside?”
    “Salvage. Old electronics mostly. CD players, VCRs, stuff like that. Lawrence and I find them, fix them up, trade them for stuff we need. I like digging up old CDs. You never know what you might find.”
    She pictured him digging through landfills looking for old rock and roll. “Your mom told me you like music.”
    “When did she tell you that?”
    “She talked quite a bit about her boy before you got there.”
    “That must’ve been something.” He took a drink, swirled the ice cubes around.
    “Maybe you’re too hard on her.”
    “Maybe.” His voice was grim.
    Justine had liked Nemo’s mom. She did tend to rattle on, but that was okay. Anybody’d be nervous with a son like Nemo coming to dinner. He probably deconstructed the lasagne. “So was she right about the music, or is she just wrong about everything?”
    There wasn’t a trace of a smile now. “I’d rather not talk about my parents.”
    She started to just let it go. She hardly knew him. It wasn’t any of her business. Then thought, what the hell. “I don’t think your parents are so bad, Nemo. How do you know you wouldn’t have done exactly what they did? You might see it differently thirty or forty years from now. Besides, they didn’t mean it to be permanent. Seems to me, you’re the one who’s made that decision.”
    “Is that how you feel about your parents? Forgive and forget?”
    She thought about it. She remembered many nights, lying in her bed thinking about her parents, wondering who they were. “Sometimes. I can’t really forget them—I don’t know who they are. I make up different ones. Sometimes, they’re shits. Sometimes they have no other choice. I forgive the nice ones—that’s easy. I’m working on the shits.”
    He finished his drink and set it down. “I better be going,” he said.
    “Come on, Nemo. Don’t run off. I promise to change the subject.” She reached out and touched the
Scotch
icon, held up her glass—still half full. “Keep me company till I finish my drink?”
    The hurricane lamp slid to one side, and another scotch rose out of the table. He didn’t laugh this time, but stared at the glass for a moment before he finally took it and the lamp slid back into place. He took a deep swallow.
    “So what kind of music do you like?” she asked him.
    He shook his head. “You’re really something, you know that? Lawrence has been trying to get me to talk about my parents for years, and it only took you five minutes.”
    “I thought we were talking about music.”
    “I’m changing the subject. To tell you the truth, Justine, sometimes I think that I’m staying out of the Bin just to prove my folks wrong. To prove they didn’t have to go in. Is that childish or what?”
    She laid her hands on his. “What do you think the rest of the time?”
    He looked around the room as if he were trying to memorize it. “That’s the hard part. Every time I see them in here I think they’ve made a terrible mistake. When I try to put my finger on it, to put it into words, I can’t. But it’s like they’re dying in here without even knowing it. They’re like people pretending to be my parents, but they’re really not.”
    She squeezed his hands. “Sounds like my folks.”
    He smiled. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I always get a little morbid when I visit my parents.”
    “What about when you meet girls?”
    “I don’t meet many girls.”
    She laughed and gave his hands a shake. “I would’ve guessed that. Now tell me what kind of music you like before I resort to torture.”
    He laughed with her, loosening up a little.
    “What kind of torture?”
    She arched an eyebrow, pretended to think about it. “How about I tie you up and never let you go?”
    He looked into her eyes. “I