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Show •76 myself already as an Arizona land-king. "Dance," I said to myself as I pushed Thorneberry's broom down the aisles. "Dance, Buck, dance. Take vour steps and wave your arms and wiggle your ass because that's what Life is about, and who wants to be a lonesome bitter wallflower forever? Dance, Buck, dance!" But I soon found out that the orchestra wasn't playing my tune. Of that more later. The end of Thorneberry * s story was this: Wayne's joy in life was a 1937 Chevrolet truck; he found it in a junkyard, rescued it, overhauled and reupholstered it and painted it a brilliant chrome yellow. Twice a week I washed it, and once a month I Simonized every painted part. Whenever the VFW or the American Legion had a parade Wayne hung plastic pom-poms from the boom, taped artificial flowers to the fenders, found high-school girls willing to stand on the back in shorts and halters and drove it in the parade himself, sandwiched between antique fire-engines and the fat men who do comic close-order drill on motor-scooters. Flowers, pom-poms, girlish breasts and Thorneberry's stomach all jiggled and joggled over the bumpy streets, bands played fierce military music and admiring fathers on the sidewalks held up their little kids to see. Those moments were the high points of Thorneberry's life. In the end, when it all got to be too much for me, I |
