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It seems like people got interrupted a lot, so I documented them.
"The Major would—" Garraty began, and saw his mother wince. "You know what the Major would do, Mom."
"I wish Priscilla had killed me," McVries said. "At least that wouldn't have been—"
"Trivial," Garraty finished.
"Yes. I think—"
"Look, I want to doze a little if I can. You mind?"
"No. I'm sorry." McVries sounded stiff and offended.
"I'm sorry," Garraty said. "Look, don't take it to heart. It's really—"
"Trivial," McVries finished.
"Garraty, this is without a doubt—"
"—yeah, the most fucked—up state in the fifty—one," Garraty finished.
A nice watertight casket—"
"Just shut up!"
Please. Please. Pl—
His bowels contracted again,
Now if he could only—
He put his foot down in a puddle of water and started fully awake again.
"The rules say—"
"I know what the rules say."
McVries glanced at his watch. "2:20, Look, Ray, if you're going to—"
"God, is that all? I thought—"
"Look, if you keep thinking about the time, you're gonna go nuts ..."
"The hell I would. Sit there and eat while a bunch of starving—"
"Hardly starving, Ray. It just feels that way."
"Motherfucker! You!—"
"Now there's an interesting word. What made you use that word?"
"You've got no right to hate the Major. He didn't force you."
"Force me? FORCE me? He's KILLING me, that's all!"
"It's still not—"
"Shut up," Baker said curtly, and Garraty shut
"When he comes through again we'll gang up on him and drag him down and all unzip and drown him in—"
"That isn't what I want to do."
Why am—
The guns crashed in the darkness
"But—"
"But me no buts, Ray. Slow down and live."
"I brought along ninety—nine pennies. Every time someone buys a ticket, I put one of'em in the other pocket. And when—"
"That's gruesome!" Olson said.
And when you get like Fenter and Zuck—"
"Shut up," a bored voice said, and Garraty knew it was Stebbins.
"I said—" McVries began patiently.
"Maybe thirty miles from here."
"What's your name, huh? What's your name, what's your name, what's—"
"Ray." McVries was tugging at his sleeve.
"He's a loner, so what?" McVries said, and shrugged. "I think—"
"Hey," Olson broke in.
Insulted once more, Barkovitch moved on up the line and grabbed Collie Parker. "Did he ask you what—"
"Get out of here before I pull your fucking nose off and make you eat it," Collie Parker snarled
"My uncle. He was my uncle. My grandfather was a lawyer in Shreveport. He—"
"I don't give a shit," McVries said. "I don't give a shit if the old gentleman had three cocks, I just want to know who buried him so we can get on."
Abraham twisted his head around to join the conversation. "My grandfather never used a laxative in his life and he lived to be—"
"You kept records, I presume," Pearson said.
"Okay. My grandfather—"
"Look," Garraty said softly.
Why am I here? he asked himself desperately, and there was no answer, so he asked the question again: Why am—
The guns crashed in the darkness, and there was the unmistakable mailsack thud of a body falling on the concrete.
"Author of A Peach Is Not a Peach without a Pit and other works of—"
"Wait!" Olson cried out.
"I understand that," Garraty said. "I just—"
"Don't hurt me!" someone screamed. "Please don't hurt me!"
I just want to go into the next field and lay down and close my eyes. Just lay there on my back in the wheat—"
"They don't grow wheat in Maine," Garraty said. "It's hay."
"—in the hay, then. And compose myself a poem. While I go to sleep."
if your father was here, he'd put a stop to—"
"Well, he's not, is he?"
"My girlfriend is a Catholic and—"
"Come on!" McVries bellowed
I have to find out. I have to—"
"Just take it easy is all I'm saying.
"You want to try and make m—"
"No, I don't want to try and make you. Just shut up, you sonofabitch."
"Well, cheer up, Charlie! There's a brighter day com—"
"Leave him alone," Baker said quietly.
And my legs feel like they got harpoons in them all the way up to—"
McVries came up behind them. "Scramm's dying," he said bluntly.
"Hell, no! Who in hell would like a half a quart of warm soapsuds up your—"
"My little brother," Pearson said sadly.
"Don't be so fucking stupid!" Garraty yelled at him furiously. "You don't have the slightest idea what you're sa—"
"Everyone loses," McVries said
"Oh. You seen Cathy?"
"No," Garraty said uncomfortably. "I—"
"Here we come," McVries said.
— Parker is yelling when he's shot
"Come on, you guys! Come on! We can—"
"If you had it to do all over again—"
"Yeah, yeah, I'd still do it, but—"
"Hey!" The boy ahead of them, Pearson, pointed. "Sidewalks!"
"I ain't no killer!" Barkovitch screamed. "I'll dance on your grave, scarface! I'll—"
A chorus of angry shouts silenced him.
"You don't have the slightest idea what you're sa—"
"Everyone loses," McVries said.
"Your uncle," Abraham said heavily, "bores the tits off me. And might I also add that he—"
At that moment, Olson began begging one of the guards to let him rest.
"Yeah," Garraty babbled. "We're gonna be Mr. and Mrs. Norman Normal, four kids and a collie dog, his legs, he didn't have any legs, they ran over him, they can't run over a guy, that isn't in the rules, somebody ought to report that, somebody—"
"Two boys and two girls, that what you're gonna have?"
"Yeah, yeah, she's beautiful, I just wish I hadn't—"
"And the first kid will be Ray Junior and the dog'll have a dish with its name on it, right?"
"Well, if you didn't know, he's married, and—"
Barkovitch's eyes widened until it seemed they were in danger of falling out. "Married! MARRIED? ARE YOU TELLING ME THAT NUMBSKULL IS—"
"Shut up, you asshole! He'll hear you!"