A Horse Named Sorrow by Trebor Healey Page A

That’d finish it. He might even push me away, repulsed by my presumption. I breathed deep to calm my beating heart. He was like the deer in my sights and I couldn’t shoot.
    I stared at my shoes, scuffed black clownish-looking things I’d found at Community Thrift, and I must have been looking down at them when he spotted me. I’d stopped my head halfway up when I saw he’d discovered me, and I eyed him from under my brows, with my chin still almost touching my chest. That was probably what made him laugh, which momentarily made me blush, and then made my face erupt into a smile that almost hurt, it stretched my face so.
    He walked over, pushing through the drinking crowd.
    â€œWell, if it ain’t Mr. Blake, the station master,” he beamed.
    â€œHey Jimmy,” I answered back, my heart bouncing off my sternum like a rubber ball, the dog in me wanting to jump up barking and lick his face. I knew better.
    â€œHow you been?” And his hand went to my shoulder and shook it lightly.
    â€œUh, okay, I guess. How about you?”
    I was still sitting down, and he bent his knees to crouch down in front of me, grabbing my hand as he did and kissing it, like he had on the platform.
    My lashes fluttered, my heart and stomach leapt, my legs and arms tingled, my throat caught. Don’t do this, you dog. He kissed me on the lips next, and I leaned into the kiss.
    â€œI’m glad I found ya,” he said.
    Found me? I wanted to say, … but you knew where I was all along, Jimmy . I didn’t dare. And I was never going to admit I’d been looking for him . “Here I am.” I raised my eyebrows. In the background the music throbbed—Soft Cell: “Tainted Love.”
    â€œAren’t you gonna ask me where I’ve been?” Jimmy said then.
    I gave him a long, hard look, my eyes bluer than ever, no doubt. “California?” He guffawed and cuffed me on the shoulder. “Okay,” I said demurely, “Where you been, Jimmy?”
    â€œBuilding a foundation,” he said obliquely. Short answer. And then the long. How he’d finally reached Sam and Julie—friends of friends he’d been calling for weeks—that very morning I’d run out for coffee and bagels. And then there’d just been so much to do.
    â€œBut why didn’t you leave a note, Jimmy?”
    â€œI’m a poet.” And he stood back up.
    â€œUh, what does that mean?” And I stood up then too.
    â€œI left the bike, didn’t I?”
    I screwed up my brows.
    He put his arm on my shoulder then. A lit match. “You didn’t think I’d come back for it?”
    My shoulders and brows went up.
    â€œI thought you knew it was like the most important thing. I figured I could trust it with you, and that you knew of course I’d come back for it.” His big smile, his fangs a little bit too pronounced.
    Gulp. I smiled shyly. Then I hugged him full force and he hugged me back the same way.
    â€œCome see my new place,” he invited.
    My brows went up again.
    But before I could inquire, he’d grabbed my hand and, pulling me to my feet, we weaved through the smokers, squirmed through the patio door, parted the drinkers and the dancers as the music enveloped us, jostling our way toward the exit, past the haystack bouncers and the big knot of folks at the entrance, before stumbling onto the sidewalk, out among the smoking modern primitives and garish clubsters in skinny ties and kelly green slacks. The fog was everywhere, sifting down like a floury mist—so heavy that you could barely see a block ahead of you.
    He yanked me by the arm and he ran me like a dog all the way down Harrison Street, and then along under the overhead freeway, sometimes grinning, or laughing when cabs blasted their horns because we never stopped at corners until we hit the Mission District and had to on account of serious traffic. By then we were sweating, the hot