Free Good People by Robert Lopez Page B

snake.
    There she was in the bathroom, wearing overalls and a bandanna. The lid of the toilet tank was resting on the bowl and she was hunched over, with her arms submerged in the very cold water, fingers manipulating the rusted chain, growing numb.
    I got the plumber’s tape you wanted.
    What did you say to me?
    Still, both are satisfied with the arrangement, their respective roles.
    The one driving says, I don’t know, man. He is aggressively changing lanes whenever there is an opportunity to pass a slower car like he is in a race. The one in the passenger seat doesn’t like it that he comes right up behind the car directly in front of them, leaving only a few inches between back and front bumpers, tailgatingthis way for a few seconds, before changing lanes to pass. He thinks about telling the one who is driving to relax, asking him, Where’s the fire? but he says nothing. Instead, he looks out the window and peers into the cars they are passing.
    A few months ago, the one in the passenger seat walked into a supply closet at the office. He was looking for a colored binder but found the one now in the driver’s seat leaning back while a young girl was kneeling in front of him. The one in the passenger seat couldn’t tell who the young girl was, but she most likely worked in another department. The one in the driver’s seat looked at the one in the passenger’s seat and winked.
    This is the first time they’ve been in each other’s company since it happened.
    The meeting is about a new account and who is going to be responsible for it. The one driving insisted on driving to the meeting, though the one in the passenger seat offered to drive, as well. The one driving told the one in the passenger seat not to worry about it, though the one in the passenger seat wasn’t worried. Now that they are actually in the car, the one in the passenger seat is concerned they will get into an accident. He wouldn’t want to die this way, in a car accident, next to the one who is driving. He doesn’t mind that they are associates at work, one can’t help such athing, one cannot pick one’s colleagues, after all, but he wouldn’t want to be associated in death with the one driving. The one in the passenger seat wouldn’t mind dying in some other kind of accident, something he was responsible for himself, with his own hands on the wheel, at his own hand even, but not like this, not next to the one who is driving. About this, he is concerned, but he isn’t actually worried. Both of them, however, are worried about the meeting. They are worried about what to order for lunch. Both contracted food poisoning from this restaurant and both missed work because of it. The one driving had bad clams and the one in the passenger seat had bad chicken salad.
    The one driving woke twice in the middle of the night, once at 1:30 and again at 3:30. He scared his wife on both occasions because when he throws up, he throws up violently, screaming the poison out of him. It sounds like someone being tortured, perhaps with a cattle prod or thumb screws. Or maybe it sounds like an animal dying from a gut shot, he doesn’t know. He’s never heard anyone tortured and he’s never seen an animal die from a gut shot, though this is what he imagines. He also doesn’t know why he throws up this way or if other people do it the same way. He has never heard his wife throw up, and for this he is grateful. He does not like to think of his wife in regard to her bodily functions. The first time she told him about her period,he said, I get this way around blood. In this case, this way meant queasy, it meant he didn’t want to know about it. He said it had to do with his father, that once he saw him get punched in the face in a street fight, saw his father drop to the pavement after he was hit, blood pouring out of his nose. He didn’t like it that he was sick in front of her.
    The one in