Bicycle Girl

Before leaving Blunno’s Rare Books, I bought a signed copy of Jimmy James Carter’s Prayers of Eden. Then I walked out onto the sidewalk. I’d only been in the bookstore for about twenty minutes. But there, right in front of me, I saw a woman trying to steal my bike. She was blonde, tall, boots, legwarmers–probably in her early thirties. She looked more than a bit like Stevie Nicks. And she had both hands on the handlebars of my bike.

"Damn…," I said. I hurled Prayers of Eden at her head. A corner of the book hit her behind the left ear. She let go of the bike; it fell back against the telephone pole where I’d parked it.

"Oww," she yelled. She pressed her hand to her ear.

I jumped in front of her. "Stevie Nicks would never go stealing somebody’s bike like that."

"WHAT?" Her eyes flashed at me, wide as saucers. She looked startled.

I put my hands on her shoulders. I looked into her dark eyes. "Hey, you can’t go `round stealing my bike–my big metal thing. How’m I gonna get around town? Say I have to–"

"Hey…" She shook me off. "Get the hell away from me."

"Look, Stevie, honey, you can’t go around stealing other people’s stuff. What’s wrong with you?"

"What’s wrong with ME?"

I took her arm. "Oh, baby, don’t get upset. Everything’s cool. It’s not like I’m gonna call the cops or anything. But lookit–"

"Get the hell away from me."

"Baby…"

She pushed away from me and pointed at the bike. "That’s not your bike. It’s mine."

"Baby…"

"Don’t `baby’ me."

"But baby…"

She climbed onto the bike and turned to me. "Maybe that’s your bike, there." She pointed to another bike that was leaning against a nearby telephone pole. It was my shiny Kidprince 10-speed.

"Oh," I said. "You might be right about that."

She turned and pedaled away.

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