“I don’t understand why Clarisse couldn’t come with you to pick me up,” Mother Fletcher whined. “What kind of a nutcase are you, to go off and leave her alone in a bar?”
“Clarisse told me to, Mother Fletcher,” Bob explained yet again, with a quiet smile. “She’s saving us a table. The place is really jumping, you’ll see.”
“Hmph. This better not be some cheap dive you’re taking us to. I won’t have my daughter treated that way. Clarisse deserved better than you, and she’s been a model wife. So all I can say is, this better not be some cheap dive.”
“Clarisse loved the place, Mother Fletcher. I think you will, too.”
Bob tuned out Louise Fletcher’s nagging as he drove. His spine straightened and he ran his fingers through the distinguished gray above his ears. Beyond the top of the next hill, he could see the living glow of the Zodiac. Somewhere beyond it, a daydream waited to become reality.