Be calm. Keep reading.

I could hear an old man in the stall next to ours sucking a hustler’s cock; I thought of animals gathering at a salt lick during the night near a cave: carnivore rubbing shoulders with deer.

Next door I could hear the old man’s soul flap its heavy vermillion butterfly wings as the hustler shot a load down his throat.

He has a real knack for coming up with balls. He's picked off some passes and he's excellent at reading quarterbacks. A lot of that is instinctive, but he's gotten better over time. He's a kid back there that surprises you with some of the breaks he gets on the ball.

Reading gives one something to think about other than one's self.

Indeed, there is something about reading in a restaurant that is borderline romantic. Leaning back in that corner booth, an evocative title in our hands, a stale cup of java in front of us, every so often bolting forward to jot a phrase onto the napkin, we look like, well, poets-unknown belletrists scraping through the hardscrabble years and awaiting the distinction that is imminent. the waiter of waitress refills our cup, we drop a memorable apothegm or two, share a laugh fraught with meaning, scope out the joint, and return to our tome. Nonbiblioholics strain to espy our title; conversation is struck up on things Kafkaesque and Kierkegaardian; and we forge a genuine biblioholic simpatico with all around.