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Show 135 Andrew across from them with knees crossed and bouncing and going a-yaw, yaw, yaw everytime Stanley and David did. Uncle Jon passed warm Pepsi Cola in short fat glasses around the room, though I had moved into the echelon of adult drinking so Bush came in and gave me chocolate and sweet wine along with my beer even though she had whiskey and chocolate with Rsd who himself had brought a bottle of Cutty Sark scotch for Jon, which made Jon look up and down at the bottle a bunch of times and say, "hmm, well, thank you, Red," all in the Christmas spirit, he must have figured Red wouldn't try to knock him off on Christmas especially with his ribs still all taped up and kaxa besides it was Red who picked him up at the hospital and brought him back to Bush's. Red was surely an enigma for Jon, kaxa£ being a Protestant and all yet continually behaving like such a Christian. I'm sure he might even have tried to regard Red as some kind of human being if Red converted or stopped trying to kill him. Finally we got the mess call and got to leave David Strong and his card tricks and Stanley and David saying "a-yaw, yaw, yaw, " and go into the kitchen and eat. Jon and Aun-foSylvia did dishes at the sink while Bush carted food to the iax table and said "It's so nice to have everybody here for my last Christmas," x which made Helen blush and Neda giggle, so all that was £xgxx figurable enough. "It doesn't matter," said Bush. "It's been the last Christmas for years." "Don't say that," said Helen. Bush raised her eye upward. "It's always the last Christmas. It's always the last day- Every night I go to bed I wonder if I'm going to wake up. When you watch yourself rotting away everyday, it doesn't matter, xxxxxxxaxaaxxxaxxxxaxaxxxxaxxxxxxyax One day you're here, the next you're not." Bush got the whiskey bottle. "Red," she said, "have some more whiskey, I am." Red had moved into his first stage of drunk, which was quiet. Stage two was jovial and you could keep him that way if you got lucky. Bush poured Helen and me some sweet port and we toasted, Neda, Joseph and Andrew with warm Pepsi. "To my last Christmas," said Bush. Jon and Aunt xx Sylvia didn't toast, Jon wriggled the ice |