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innocent, the pure of heart.”
    “You and I, Rainie, run on heavy fuels.”
    “So what’s up? To what do I owe the honour of this telephone call?”
    “I don’t know. Just wanted to say hello, I guess.”
    “You didn’t.”
    “Huh?”
    “You didn’t say hello.”
    “Oh. Hey, I know why I called. Fact-checking. Name your favourite episode of
The Twilight Zone.”
    “I know you want me to say the what-the-fuck ‘The Eye of the Beholder,’ because it was my favourite when I was thirteen and feeling more than a trifle hideous, but you know, I have managed to acquire a small modicum of self-esteem. So, I’m going to think about it for a moment and in the meantime I’m going to ask you, why have you not called me in a year?”
    “It hasn’t been a year.”
    “It’s been a while, Phil. It’s been at least a few months.”
    “Has it? It never seems like it to me, because I hear you all the time, I mean, I listen to your show.”
    “I had to read in the newspapers about what happened to Milligan.”
    “Milligan happened to Milligan.”
    “Is that your official stance?”
    “Hmm?”
    “I’m just wondering if that’s a position you’ve taken for reasons of legality, you know, distancing yourself from the event, or if somehow that’s what you believe.”
    “I’m not following. What is what I somehow believe?”
    “That you had nothing to do with it.”
    “Milligan was unstable.”
    “In the land of the crippled, the one-legged man is king.”
    “You’ve been drinking.”
    “
You’ve
been drinking.”
    “Touché.”
    “It was just so odd. I mean, it was exactly like in that stupid movie, you know. ‘The Cross and the Bullet.’”
    “‘The Bullet and the Cross.’”
    “I got goosebumps and could practically hear the spooky Theramin thing, a-woo-oo …”
    “Could we change the subject?”
    “What are you going to do now?”
    “I’m finally going to write that novel.”
    “Oh, yeah. I remember you mentioning that once. You were about
eight.”
    “Right.”
    “About what?”
    “What?”
    “What’s the book about?”
    “About… me.”
    “Uh-huh. What about you?”
    “Lots of things. My life. You see, something happened when I was a boy …”
    “Right. You felt me up.”
    “No, not that, there was this
incident
… I felt you up?”
    “You were demonstrating wrestling manoeuvres. You were showing me moves by Sweet Daddy Siki and Whipper Billy Watson. You took the opportunity to grab my left tit. At least, that’s what you thought. You actually had hold of some foam rubber and a wad of toilet paper, but you popped a boner just the same, and you stopped the wrestling demonstration abruptly.”
    “I don’t remember any of this.”
    “Well, I suspected it never made the highlight film. So, Phil. When were you going to tell me about your marriage breaking up?”
    “Oh, I don’t know. In a couple of minutes, I guess. I thought what might happen was that I’d say I’m writing a book, and you’d ask why, and I’d say how I wanted to explain to people—to Currer and Ellis, anyway—who I am. Why I am the way I am. And you’d ask me why I wanted to do that, and then I thought I’d slip in the whole marriage breaking up thing. How did you hear about it?”
    “Fuck, are you thick. Ronnie told me, asshole.”
    “You must not think very highly of me.”
    “Did you ever notice, Phil, that the more personal, the more
intimate
a conversation becomes, the way you talk gets poncier and poncier?”
    “I hadn’t noticed, actually.”
    “There!”
    “Okay, you heard about it from Ronnie, therefore—”
    “Therefore I want to hear your side of the story.”
    “Oh.”
    “Why don’t you come over for dinner sometime?”
    “Sure. I’m not sure when would be the best night. I have the kids for a couple of days.”
    “Sunday night?”
    “What?”
    “Sunday night. We’ll have dinner. We’ll talk. I’ll listen to your side of the story. If you play your cards right, I’ll