Stop-and-go traffic on the strip. A high-mileage pickup with a Florida Gators bumper sticker rolled into town.
“Look at all the babes!” said Cody.
“We need to find a hotel room,” said Melvin Davenport.
“Which one do you like?”
“We just need to find something. All the signs I’m seeing say ‘No Vacancy.’”
“I ignore those.”
“This one,” said Melvin.
He pulled into the parking lot. Then pulled out.
“How about that one?” said Cody.
In and out again.
“Knew we should have gotten reservations,” said Melvin.
“That’s just the first two,” said Cody. “Here’s another…”
Ten motels later: “This isn’t good.”
“You worry too much,” said Cody. “Something will probably open up later tonight.”
“Who checks out at night?”
“Whoa!” said Cody. “Check that ass!”
“I’d rather check into a hotel.” They passed the Alligator Arms.
ALLIGATOR ARMS
Room 534.
Three kids sat on the floor around Serge.
“Never heard of that.”
“It’s true,” said Serge. “Major first-century schism between Paul and Peter. The apostles were divided. Should the new Messiah be just for the Jews, or should the gospel also be preached to Gentiles? Arguably the most critical turning point affecting life as we know it today.”
“How do you know all this stuff?”
“It’s history. How can you not be fascinated?”
“Serge?”
“Yeah?”
“What’s the matter?”
“What do you mean?”
“That look on your face.”
“Sorry. My mind drifted into negative country. Got cheated out of a trophy today.”
“When?”
“At the army obstacle course. Remember? You were there.”
“Oh, you mean when they threw you in the ocean instead?”
“I guess that’s second place. And I wanted it so bad. I’ve never won a trophy for anything my whole life. Been eating at me ever since Little League, and this morning it was so close I could taste it-”
They heard a violent slam against the outside of the motel room door. Then loud talking. Something shattered on the ground. Another crash against the door.
The students jumped. “What the heck’s that?”
Serge stood. “It’s how Coleman always enters a room.”
“You mean the guy from the stage?”
The door flew open and banged against the wall.
Coleman stumbled in, followed by a dozen students from across the eastern United States.
Serge stared bug-eyed at Coleman’s arms, overflowing with trophies. “Where’d you get all those?”
“What a great day!” Coleman walked past Serge and began lining gold statues atop the TV cabinet. “This one’s for the belly flop, this is for dirty dancing, here’s the chugging contest, goldfish eating-but they were only those little crackers because of animal rights people-and this is for the fat-guy sunburn, and… I don’t remember this one. I was pretty fucked up. They just handed it to me. And I got this big mother with these three chicks…”
Serge walked away and plopped down next to the church youth.
One of them raised a hand. “So what happened to the schism?”
“Paul prevailed and sent a bunch of junk mail to the Galatians.”
“Wow.”
Other side of the room: Coleman and a dozen helpers spread rolling papers across the coffee table. They picked apart buds from a half O-Z.
Coleman sprinkled liberally along Job 1.5s. “It’s called the Seventh Son of the Seventh Son.”
“Why’s that?”
He licked a gummed seal. “You smoke forty-nine joints, then tear open the roaches and use the contents to roll seven more joints. Then you smoke those and use the last seven roaches to twist up one kick-ass doobie with such concentrated resin it’ll blow your eyeballs out.”
“Wow.”
Someone tugged Serge’s sleeve on the other side of the room. “Are you okay?”
“I can’t believe he has a bigger congregation.”
Coleman: “… Works every time. We should try it tonight.”
“Sounds like an urban myth,” said one of the students. “Where’d you hear about it?”
“On a Keys radio station,” said Coleman. “I would have doubted, too. But you have to know the Keys-anything’s possible. Then me and my friends tried it ourselves and pay dirt!”
“How’d you do it?”
“Know how police stake out certain bars at closing time for DUIs?”
They nodded.
“Coleman,” Serge yelled from across the room, “that stupid story’s on the Internet.”
“If it wasn’t true before, it is now. Me and my friends did it, remember?”
“Sadly.”
“Never mind him.” Coleman turned back to his ring of acolytes. “My gang was tying one on at this funky Key West dive on Simonton. Almost closing time, and Johnny Law is parked across the street as usual. So my wingman, Bonzo, staggers into the parking lot, falling down, dropping his keys, getting up, tripping over the curb, crashing into garbage cans-while the rest of us leave the bar and drive away until the parking lot’s empty except for one last car.”
“Bonzo’s?”
“Correcto-mundo. And as soon as Bonzo starts the engine and moves an inch, blue lights everywhere. Cop gives him the Breathalyzer and he blows a zero. Then a field sobriety test. Walks a straight line, touches his nose, says the alphabet backward and forward.”
“Doesn’t make sense.”
“That’s what the cop thought. He says, ‘You were falling-down drunk a minute ago and now you’re sober as a judge. What’s going on?’”
“Bonzo says, ‘All my friends drove away without getting DUIs. Tonight I was the designated decoy.’”
INTERSTATE 95
A station wagon with New Hampshire plates blew through early-evening traffic.
Continuous snowbanks began showing small breaks until the breaks became larger than the frozen stretches. Another state line went under the headlights. Beers popped.
A crumpled speeding ticket hit the floor. “Let Virginia try to find me.”
The car stopped.
Slamming doors awoke Andy McKenna in the backseat. He looked around the nightscape. Cars pulling in,
