ever.

We go out and Nick says, "Let's have a coke." He's walking along with the
blonde, and instead of walking beside me the redhead tries to catch hold
of his other arm. This sort of burns me up. I mean, I don't really _like_
her, but I paid for her and everything.

Nick shakes her off and calls over his shoulder to me, "Come on, chicken,
pull your own weight!"

The girls laugh, on cue as usual, and I begin getting really sore. Nick
got me into this. The least he can do is shut up.

We walk into a soda bar, and I slap down thirty cents and say, "Two cokes,
please."

"Hey, hey! The last of the big spenders!" says Nick. More laughter. I'd
just as soon sock him right now, but I pick up my money and say, "O.K.,
wise guy, treat's on you." Nick shrugs and tosses down a buck as if he had
hundreds of them.

The two girls drink their cokes and talk across Nick. I finish mine in two
or three gulps, and finally we can walk them to the subway. Nick is
gabbing away about how he'll come out to Coney one weekend, and I'm
standing there with my hands in my pockets.

"Goo'bye, Bashful!" coos the redhead to me, and the two of them disappear,
cackling, down the steps. I start across Fourteenth Street as soon as the
light changes, without bothering to look if Nick is coming. He can go rot.

Along Union Square he's beside me, acting as if everything is peachy fine
dandy. "That was a great show. Pretty good fun, huh?"

I just keep walking.

"You sore or something?" he asks, as if he didn't know.

I keep on walking.

"O.K., be sore!" he snaps. Then he breaks into a falsetto: "Goo'bye,
Bashful!"

I let him have it before he's hardly got his mouth closed. He hits me back
in the stomach and hooks one of his ankles around mine so we both fall
down. It goes from bad to worse. He gets me by the hair and bangs my head
on the sidewalk, so I twist and bite his hand. We're gouging and
scratching and biting and kicking, because we're both so mad we can hardly
see, and anyway no one ever taught us those Queensberry rules. There's no
point in going into all the gory details. Finally two guys haul us apart.
I have hold of Nick's shirt and it rips. Good. He's half crying, and he
twists away from the guy that grabbed him and screams some things at me
before darting across the avenue.

I'm standing panting and sobbing, and the guy holding me says, "You oughta
be ashamed. Now go on home."

"Aw, you and your big mouth," I say, still mad e