And that’s when the decision really happens, once it’s already done and she decides not to correct it. That’s when she knows she doesn’t want to turn around. That’s when she knows she can’t think about it and she can’t stop driving because if she stops she’ll think about it and if she thinks about it then next thing she knows she’ll be on her way back home to break a window or she’ll be going straight to the hospital and looking for an extra apron and hair-net to borrow and then tomorrow, no.

It’s like credit. She knows all about living on credit and she makes the decision on credit. She knows it’ll really hit her later – days, weeks, months, years, hours, minutes. She’ll pay a little interest each day but she’ll learn to live with the debt, outstanding balance. She’s got nothing if not outstanding balance. If nothing else has ever really been hers, even if she’s putting this down on credit with who knows how steep an interest, shit, this is gonna be all hers. She ain’t gonna stumble anymore, uh-uh, she’s gonna wipeout, all on her own, yep, wipeout.

Pulling out around the far side of the parking lot, scaffolding runs all up and down the casino’s side. A man moves through it and whatever mission he may be on, Ronnie thinks it hard to believe he’s not simply playing through the repetitive piping all locked into each other, itself.

At the kitchen table, still in her robe, her night-sweats, she reached for her purse, grabbed her keys. The Ronnie-watching-Ronnie didn’t know what the sitting-Ronnie grabbing for her keys was doing. She looked calm. The Ronnie-watching-Ronnie was calm watching her. She felt no anxiety to find out what she was doing. She simply watched with curiosity, what’s she doing?