"Maybe," he said, "if you've no objection to the strange things you say happen."

"I like strange things." She reached out and touched his hair. "That's real, isn't it--the streak?"

"Yes."

"At first I thought--you were a little weird."

"... And now you know it?"

She laughed.

"I suppose so. Someone said you're still in school? That right?"

"It is."

"You going to stay with music when you get out?"

He shrugged.

"Hard to say."

"You've got a future, I'd think. Ever record anything?"

"No."

"I had a record. Didn't do well."

"Sorry."

"The breaks... Maybe bad timing. Maybe not, too. I don't know. I'd really like to try something with you. See how it sounds. If it works, I know a guy..."

"My material?"

"Yeah."

He nodded.

"Okay. After the show, let's go somewhere and try a few."

"My place isn't far. We can walk"

"Fine."

He took a sip of beer, glanced over and saw that the man on the floor was beginning to stir. In the distance, he heard the sound of a siren. He heard someone ask, "Where's the gun?"

"It's a funny feeling I get when I hear you," she resumed, "as though the world were a little bit out of kilter."

"Maybe it is."

"... As though you tear a little hole through it and I can see a piece of something else on the other side."

"If I could only tear one big enough I'd step through."

"You sound like my ex-husband."

"Was he a musician?"

"No. He was a physicist who liked poetry."

"What became of him?"

"He's out on the Coast in a commune. Arts and crafts, gardening... Stuff like that."

"He up and leave, or he ask you to go with?"

"He asked, but I didn't want pig shit on my heels."

Dan nodded.

"I'll have to watch where I step if I ever step through."