Winter Stroll

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She sneaks out behind the hotel and lights a cigarette. George knows she smokes, but he has drawn the line at watching her do it-so she has to be stealthy and quick. If she’s gone for more than ten minutes he sends out a search party, which is usually comprised of himself and his Jack Russell terrier, Rudy, but also sometimes one or more of the women who work in the shop making hats. George thinks Mitzi is going to hurt herself. Or, possibly, run off and have an affair on him, the way she did on her husband, Kelley.

An affair is unthinkable in Mitzi’s condition. Hurting herself seems redundant; she is already suffering from the maximum amount of pain a person can experience.

Bart Bart Bart Bart Bart.

George says he understands, but he’s never had a child, so how could he possibly?

Nicotine is poison. And yet, since Bart has gone missing, cigarettes are one of two things that make Mitzi feel better. The other is alcohol. Mitzi has become partial to a sipping tequila called Casa Dragones that is packaged in a slender, elegant turquoise box and costs eighty-five dollars a bottle at the one high-end liquor store in Lenox that sells it.

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