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CHAPTER ONE

WHICH IS MOSTLY ABOUT NAMES AND FAMILY RELATIONSHIPS

IT BEGINS, AS MOST THINGS BEGIN, WITH A SONG

In the beginning, after all, were the words, and they came with a tune That was how the world was made, how the void was divided, how the lands and the stars and the dreaods and the animals, how all of them came into the world

They were sung

The great beasts were sung into existence, after the Singer had done with the planets and the hills and the trees and the oceans and the lesser beasts The cliffs that bound existence were sung, and the hunting grounds, and the dark

Songs re can turn an e can last long after the events and the people in it are dust and dreas

There are other things you can do with songs They do not only make worlds or recreate existence Fat Charlie Nancy’s father, for exa theht out

Before Fat Charlie’s father had come into the bar, the bar was going to be an utter bust; but then the little old man had sashayed into the room, walked past the table of several blonde women with the fresh sunburns and s by the little e in the corner He had tipped his hat to thereen fedora, and leloves, and then he walked over to their table They giggled

“Are you enjoyin‘ yourselves, ladies?” he asked

They continued to giggle and told hiood time, thank you, and that they were here on vacation He said to theets better, just you wait

He was older than they were,froestures orth so The bar to be a good evening

There was karaoke There was dancing The old e, not once, that evening, but twice He had a fine voice, and an excellent smile, and feet that twinkled when he danced The first ti “What’s New Pussycat?” The second ti, he

ruined Fat Charlie’s life

FAT CHARLIE WAS ONLY EVER FAT FOR A HANDFUL OF YEARS, froe of ten, which hen hisshe was over and done with (and if the gentleument with it he could just stick it you knohere) it was her oat that she hadand she would be leaving in theay and he had better not try to follow, to the age of fourteen, when Fat Charlie grew a bit and exercised a little more He was not fat Truth to tell, he was not really even chubby, sies But the naum to the sole of a tennis shoe He would introduce himself as Charles or, in his early twenties, Chaz, or, in writing, as C Nancy, but it was no use: the na the new part of his life just as cockroaches invade the cracks and the world behind the fridge in a new kitchen, and like it or not—and he didn’t—he would be Fat Charlie again

It was, he knew, irrationally, because his father had given his names, they stuck

There was a dog who had lived in the house across the way, in the Florida street on which Fat Charlie had grown up It was a chestnut-colored boxer, long-legged and pointy-eared with a face that looked like the beast had, as a puppy, run face-first into a wall Its head was raised, its tail nub erect It was, un shows It had rosettes for Best of Breed and for Best in Class and even one rosetterejoiced in the name of Campbell’s Macinrory Arbuthnot the Seventh, and its owners, when they were feeling familiar, called it Kai This lasted until the day that Fat Charlie’s father, sitting out on their dilapidated porch swing, sipping his beer, noticed the dog as it ahbor’s yard, on a leash that ran from a palm tree to a fence post

“Hell of a goofy dog,” said Fat Charlie’s father “Like that friend of Donald Duck’s Hey Goofy”

And what once had been Best in Show suddenly slipped and shifted For Fat Charlie, it was as if he saw the dog through his father’s eyes, and darned if he wasn’t a pretty goofy dog, all things considered Almost rubbery

It didn’t take long for the name to spread up and down the street Caled with it, but they ued with a hurricane Total strangers would pat the once proud boxer’s head, and say, “Hello, Goofy How’s a boy?” The dog’s owners stopped entering hi shows soon after that They didn’t have the heart “Goofy-looking dog,” said the judges

Fat Charlie’s father’s nas stuck That was just hoas

That was far fro about Fat Charlie’s father

There had been, during the years that Fat Charlie was growing up, a nu about his father: his roving eye and equally as adventurous fingers, at least according to the young ladies of the area, ould complain to Fat Charlie’s arillos, which he called cheroots, which he s he touched; his fondness for a peculiar shuffling for only ever fashionable, Fat Charlie suspected, for half an hour in Harlenorance about current world affairs, combined with his apparent conviction that sitcoles of real people These, individually, as far as Fat Charlie was concerned, were none of theh each of the

The worst thing about Fat Charlie’s father was si

Of course, everyone’s parents are eoes with the territory The nature of parents is to e, just as it is the nature of children of a certain age to cringe with embarrassment, shame, and mortification should their parents so much as speak to them on the street