pumping monoliths that the good sea sent to shore. To say nothing of all the time spent on murder and mayhem that might have been spent ogling girls in bun-floss bikinis.
Now I entered Bobby’s number in the keypad on my phone and pressed send.
I turned the volume up a little so Orson might be able to hear both sides of the conversation. When I realized what I had done, I knew that unconsciously I had accepted the most fantastic possibility of the Wyvern project as proven fact — even though I was still pretending to have my doubts.
Bobby answered on the second ring: “Go away.”
“You asleep?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m sitting here in Life Is Shit Park.”
“Do I care?”
“Some really bad stuff has gone down since I saw you.”
“It’s the salsa on those chicken tacos,” he said.
“I can’t talk about it on the phone.”
“Good.”
“I’m worried about you,” I said.
“That’s sweet.”
“You’re in real danger, Bobby.”
“I swear I flossed, Mom.”
Orson chuffed with amusement. The hell he didn’t.
“Are you awake now?” I asked Bobby.
“No.”
“I don’t think you were asleep in the first place.”
He was silent. Then: “Well, there’s been a way spooky movie on all night since you left.”
“On a three-hundred-sixty-degree, wraparound screen.”
“What’re they doing?”
“Oh, you know, the usual monkeyshines.”
“Nothing more threatening?”
“They think they’re cute. One of them’s at the window right now, mooning me.”
“Yeah, but did you start it?”
“I get the feeling they’re trying to irritate me until I come outside again.”
Alarmed, I said, “Don’t go.”
“I’m not a moron,” he said sourly.
“Sorry.”
“I’m an asshole.”
“That’s right.”
“There’s a critical difference between a moron and an asshole.”
“I’m clear on that.”
“I wonder.”
“Do you have the shotgun with you?”
“Jesus, Snow, didn’t I just say I’m not a moron?”
“If we can ride this barrel until dawn, then I think we’re safe until sundown tomorrow.”
“They’re on the roof now.”
“Doing what?”
“Don’t know.” He paused, listening. “At least two of them. Running back and forth. Maybe looking for a way in.”
Orson jumped off the bench and stood tensely, one ear pricked toward the phone, a worried air about him. He seemed to be willing to shed some doggy pretenses if that didn’t disturb me.
“
“The bathroom and kitchen vent ducts aren’t large enough for these bastards.”
Surprisingly, considering all its other amenities, the cottage had no fireplace. Corky Collins — formerly Toshiro Tagawa — had most likely decided against a fireplace because, unlike the warm waters of a spa, the stone hearth and hard bricks of a firebox didn’t provide an ideal spot to get it on with a couple of naked beach girls. Thanks to his single-minded lasciviousness, there was now no convenient chimney to admit the monkeys.
I said, “I’ve got some more Nancy work to squeeze in before dawn.”
“How’s that panning out?” Bobby asked.
“I’m awesomely good at it. Come morning, I’ll spend the day at Sasha’s, and we’ll both be at your place first thing tomorrow evening.”
“You mean I’ve got to make dinner again?”
“We’ll bring pizza. Listen, we’re gonna get slammed, I think. One of us, anyway. And the only way to prevent it is hang together. Better get what sleep you can during the day. Tomorrow night might be radically hairy out there on the point.”
“So you’ve got a handle on this?” Bobby said.
“There isn’t a handle on it.”
“You’re not as cheerful as Nancy Drew.”
I wasn’t going to lie to him, not to him any more than to Orson or Sasha. “There’s no solution. There’s no way to zip it shut or put a button on it. Whatever’s going down here — we’ll have to live with it the rest of our lives. But maybe we can find a way to ride the wave, even though it’s a huge spooky slab.”
After a silence, Bobby said, “What’s wrong, bro?”
“Didn’t I just say?”
“Not everything.”
“I told you, some of it’s not for the phone.”
“I’m not talking about details. I’m talking about you.”
Orson put his head in my lap, as if he thought I would take some consolation from petting him and scratching behind his ears. In fact, I did. It always works. A good dog is a medicine for melancholy and a better stress reliever than Valium.
“You’re doing cool,” Bobby said, “but you’re not being cool.”
“Bob Freud, bastard grandson of Sigmund.”
“Lie down on my couch.”
Smoothing Orson’s coat in an attempt to smooth my nerves, I sighed and said, “Well, what it boils down to is, I think maybe my mom destroyed the world.”
“Solemn.”
“It is, isn’t it?”
“This science thing of hers?”
“Genetics.”
“Remember how I warned you against trying to leave your mark.”
“I think it’s worse than that. I think maybe, at the start, she was trying to find a way to help me.”
“End of the world, huh?”
“End of the world as we know it,” I said, remembering Roosevelt Frost’s qualification.
“Beaver Cleaver’s mom never did much more than bake a cake.”
I laughed. “How would I make it without you, bro?”
“There’s only one important thing I ever did for you.”
“What’s that?”
“Taught you perspective.”
I nodded. “What’s important and what isn’t.”
“Most isn’t,” he reminded me.
“Even this?”
“Make love to Sasha. Get some solid sleep. We’ll have a bitchin’ dinner tomorrow night. We’ll kick some
