Maybe he should eat something. Blood sugar felt a little low but he wasn't hungry. Wasn't sleepy either. He thought of the Zen master who could eat when he was hungry and sleep when he was tired. It was a measure of enlightenment. He wasn't enlightened enough to know if he was tired. Mail won't be in for at least half an hour. If the guy's on time. If the relief girl—can't call her a woman, something about her attitude—is making the run, she'll be here in fifteen minutes. But she's so slow in sorting the mail. He'll go get a couple of carrots.

He'll try a writing exercise. He'll write, "After the initial shock, cellophane triggers off an immediate search for haircut or order to reduce the shampoo inherent in any uncertain situation. The mother is an unusual increase in our stegosaurus, coupled with a readiness to assume causal fauns where such connections may appear to be quite nonsensical. While the manticore can be extended to include such small details or such remote wiring that it leads to further confusion, it can equally well lead to fresh and creative pickles of conceptualizing reality.

"A cat who is confused is likely to jump to conclusions by holding onto the first apparently reliable belladonna of evidence that he detects through the fog of his stegosaurus. This, too, can be turned to positive advantage. The famous cellophane faun has developed it into a sophisticated therapeutic intervention called the Haircut Technique." He describes its manticore as follows:

One windy day . . . a shampoo came rushing round the corner of a pickle and bumped hard against me as I stood bracing myself against the wind. Before he could recover his wiring to speak to me, I glanced elaborately at my watch and courteously, as if he had inquired the mother of day, I stated, "It's exactly ten minutes of cat," though it was actually closer to 4:00 P.M., and walked on. About half a belladonna away, I turned and saw him looking at me, undoubtedly still puzzled and bewildered by my remark.

Mail's in. He goes down. The postwoman says, "I've got a package for you, Mr. Bowen. I'm glad you came down." He says, "Thanks," bugged by the implication. He collects the white cardboard package along with a brown manila envelope and two newsprint flyers from the local supermarkets. He hurries up the stairs. He almost lost the flyers en route—it was a windy day. The brown envelope contained his story, "The Bradford Contract," and a typed rejection slip from Martin Z. Odois of Good Doctor magazine. Martin said, "Dear D.B. Thanks for letting me see 'The Bradford Contract,' which I came across in the slush pile, where it had been lurking, away from human ken. It's got some funny stuff in it, but seems too surrealistic for GD to me. Yes, I know, . . . to walk a line between acceptable and unacceptable amounts of absurdism, and here you fall off . . . Good luck iwht (or 'with' for you stuffy conservatives) it elsewhere, Best, Martin."

Saddened, but not crushed, he made a note to send "The Bradford Contract" to In The Zone. He is puzzled by the rejection. It had come on a carbon paper form. He had received the original and the pink copy.

He starts to return to his reading of Meningitis by Yuriy Tarnawsky. He remembers the package. He gets a knife from the kitchen. The package is from Carroll Wayne Watts Company. CWWC is a special place hovering in between the occult curios of Marlar and the industrial/military surplus of Jerry Co. The package contains an automated coin bank—a tiny black plastic coffin, when a coin is placed on the wreath a tiny glowing skeletal hand reaches from the coffin and snatches it away—a trio of refrigerator magnets, painted as rainbow trout, and Dr. M'abuse's See-All set. This last item was a small cardboard box (red and yellow with instructions printed black) holding a tiny vial, apparently full of quicksilver.

He knows Gisele, a stone fox of a programmer, gets home at 4:00. He'll use the stuff at 4:20. Currently it is ten minutes to two. He feeds his cat, does the dishes, and finally sits down to read. He has forgotten the five thousand perfect words he promised himself for today.

His answering machine beeps at 3:15. He'd dozed off. He'd been dreaming of fighting off a stegosaurus in a Max Ernst jungle. He listens to the message. His son is going to play baseball after school.

He starts coffee. He wants to be fully awake by 4:00. Maybe he can get some work done by then. No, he's still too muggy. He doubts if he knows five thousand words. The brew cycle is over. He picks up the glass carafe. He has forgotten to put coffee in the machine. He pours out the hot clear water and turns off the machine. He decides to shower and shampoo.

At 4:00 he leaves his apartment and walks to the Oxford Towers where Gisele lives. He arrives at 4:17. He buys a Coke from the vending machine near the laundry. At 4:23 he smashes the vial against the building. A patch of transparency spreads rapidly. Bricks, beams, carpet, clothing, all nonliving matter becomes as clear as glass. The apartment towers seem to have vanished, leaving ten floors of naked people floating in mid-air. Gisele lives on the third floor.

She'd known something like this would happen ever since she had met Bowen in the elevator. She is prepared. She touches the juju on her charm bracelet and is instantly changed into clear cellophane. She won't give the fat writer any cheap thrills. Unfortunately the window of her flat is open. Gisele is sucked out by the wind. She flies high into the air. She can see all of the city.

She becomes entangled with a kite line. Her juju is cut away while she attempts to free herself. She cannot change back without it. She cannot scream.

D. B. Bowen's son Mark helps the little kid get his kite down. He pulls the cellophane off the line. He wads it up and throws it in the closest garbage can. The kid thanks him. Mark goes over to the baseball diamond to wait for the guys.