The Old Man and the Boy

She was too excited to worry much about town, about the people or anything else. Most days she took the boat out, stripped off her clothes, shrieking for the September cold,. and jumped in, pretending there was no need for lungs until there was. She cooked the feasts in the dark shift, the radio only half-womaned, the beam dusty, and then carted out the leftovers in the morning. Some dark shifts turning the radio to barely a hum, she wished she was the type to go sit in the pub. There were two other people in the cab of the truck: A boy with a face as smooth as a child's; another girl still staring straight