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the sidewalk. Ford and Mark slung them over their shoulders and began hiking up the street, reading names under their feet. Will Rogers, Andy Griffith, Carol Burnett…Someone selling celebrity maps was playing the Kinks on a tape deck…James Cagney, Dean Martin, Betty Grable…past the Kodak Theater, approaching another movie house with dirty impressions in the concrete.
    “…You can see all the stars as you walk down Hollywood Boulevard…”
    “Ford, I think that’s Grauman’s Chinese.”
    “I’m getting photos.” He set his duffel down and pulled out a camera.
    “Check the hand prints,” said Mark. “Crosby, Harlow, Elizabeth Taylor…”
    “Look this way,” said Ford. “I’ll take your picture.”
    A female voice: “Would you like to be in the picture, too?”
    The guys turned. It was like a Beach Boys song, a California vision from a travel brochure. Long, straight, sun-bleached blond hair. More sun bringing out the freckles in her perfect tan. A smile from a teeth-whitening ad. Cutoff shorts and a Dodgers jersey tied in a knot above the navel.
    “Sure,” said Ford, handing her the camera. “It’s all set. Just press this.”
    “This?”
    “No, the other button.”
    “Okay.”
    The two buddies stood on Taylor’s prints and put their arms around each other’s shoulders.
    “Say ‘cheese’!”
    “Cheese!”
    Ford took his arm off Mark’s shoulder. “What’s she doing?”
    “I think that’s called running away with your camera.”
     
     
     

2
     
TAMPA
     
     
    Atoilet flushed in a grimy motel room along Tampa’s Nebraska Avenue. Serge emerged from the bathroom.
    Coleman was sitting cross-legged on the bed, scratching his feet.
    “Serge. I think I have athlete’s foot.”
    Serge walked over to the TV set. “Then stop scratching. It only makes it worse.”
    “I know. But you can’t help it. And if you’re toasted—they really got you.”
    Serge inserted a DVD in the personal player that he always took with him on the road.
    “Serge, it itches.”
    The DVD started. The night skyline of Tampa appeared over water. “Use foot cream.”
    “Don’t have any.” Scratch.
    “Then go pee on your feet.”
    “What!”
    “Pee on your feet,” said Serge. “Kills athlete’s foot.”
    “Like hell,” said Coleman, holding the flame of a Bic lighter near his toes. “You’re just trying to trick me into doing something stupid.”
    “If you don’t believe me, look it up on the Internet. Human urine has natural enzymes that knock out athlete’s foot like that!”—he slapped his hands together—“Also works on jellyfish stings. You have to know these things if you’re going to live here. I have to go to the bathroom.” Serge paused the movie and went around the corner.
    Coleman scratched. A toilet flushed. Serge came back.
    “Serge…”
    “What?”
    “I don’t think I can pee.”
    “Give it time.” Serge reached in a suitcase and began fiddling with a small electronic gadget.
    “But you can go anytime you want,” said Coleman. “Matter of fact you’ve been going all the time lately.”
    Serge punched buttons on the gadget. “I’m on a new regimen. Drinking ninety-six glasses of water a day.”
    “Why?”
    “Purify my body. It’s a temple.” Serge pressed more buttons.
    “But don’t they just say to drink eight glasses a day?”
    “That’s why I drink ninety-six. It’s how you get ahead in this world.”
    “Can’t you make yourself sick?”
    “Don’t worry. I’m also taking diuretics.”
    “What for?”
    “I was getting sick.” He activated the gadget’s backlight.
    Coleman looked at the device in Serge’s hands. “Your new iPod?”
    “This thing’s amazing. Holds ten thousand songs. But I’m only up to eight hundred. I can’t stop thinking about it. The next thing I know, I’ve spent ten hours rearranging playlists and downloading show tunes.” Serge got up and headed for the bathroom, pressing buttons and working the patented