Horns

“Why’d he do it?” Terry asked.

“Mr. Williams said he’s moving down to Sarasota, and when he gets there, he wants to feel the sun on his bare head. Also, because his wife hates men with shaved heads. Or maybe she’s his ex-wife now. I think he’s going to Sarasota without her.” She smoothed a leaf out on her knee, then picked it up by the stem, lifted it into the breeze, and let go, watched it sail away. “I’m moving, too. ’S why I quit.”

“Where to?”

“New York,” she said.

“City?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Hell. Look me up when you get there, why don’t you? I’ll show you some good clubs,” Terry said. He was already writing the number to his cell on an old receipt in his pocket.

“What do you mean? Aren’t you in L.A.?”

“Naw. No reason to hang around without Hothouse, and I’d take New York over L.A. anytime. You know? It’s just a lot more…real.” He handed her his number.

She sat on the ground, holding the scrap of paper and smiling up at him, her elbows back on the log and the light dappling her face. She looked good.

“Well,” she said, “I think we’ll be living in different neighborhoods.”

“That’s why God invented cabs,” he said.

“He invented them?”

“No. Men invented them so they could get home safely after a night of drunken carousing.”

“When you think about it,” she said, “most of the good ideas came along to make sin a whole lot easier.”

“True that,” he said.

They got up to walk off their sandwiches, went for a meandering stroll around the foundry. As they came to the front, Terry paused again, looking at that wide swath of burned earth. It was fu

“Lookat,” Gle

It was a gold cross, threaded on a delicate chain. She held it up, and it swung back and forth, flashing a golden light into her smooth, pretty face.

“Nice,” she said.

“You want it?”

“I’d probably catch fire if I put this thing on,” she said. “Go for it.”

“Nah,” Terry said. “This is for a girl.” He carried it over to a sapling growing up against the foundry, hung it on one of the branches. “Maybe whoever left it will come back for it.”

They went on their way, not talking much, just enjoying the light and the day, around the foundry and back to her car. He wasn’t sure when they took each other’s hands, but by the time they reached the Saturn, they had. Her fingers slid from his with unmistakable reluctance.

A breeze lifted, raced across the yard, carrying that smell of ash and the fall chill. She hugged herself, trembled pleasurably. Distantly there came the sound of a horn, a saucy, jaunty thing, and Terry cocked his head, listening, but it must’ve been music from a car passing on the highway, because in a moment it was gone.

“I miss him, you know,” Gle

“Me, too,” he said. “It’s fu

“Yeah. I feel that, too,” she said, and smiled: a tough, generous, real smile. “Hey. I should go. See you in New York, maybe.”

“Not maybe. Definitely.”

“Okay. Definitely.” She got into her car and shut the door and waved to him before she began to back away.

Terry stood there after she was gone, the breeze tugging at his overcoat, and looked again at the empty foundry, the blasted field. He knew he should’ve been feeling something for Ig, should’ve been racked with grief…but instead he was wondering how long after he got to New York it would be before Gle

The wind gusted again, not just chilly but genuinely cold, and Terry cocked his head once more, thought for a moment he heard another distant snatch of trumpet, a dirty salute. It was a beautifully wrought little riff, and in the moment of hearing it he felt, for the first time in weeks, the impulse to play again. Then the sound of the horn was gone, carried away on the breeze. It was time for him to go, too.

“Poor devil,” Terry said before he got into his rent-a-car and drove away.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS, NOTES, CONFESSIONS

EXPERTS DISAGREE ABOUT THE LYRICS of the Romantics’ seminal 1980s hit, “What I Like About You.” Ig sings it “you’re whispering in my ear,” but many other listeners claim that Jim Marinos is hollering “warm whispering in my ear,” or even, “phone whispering in my ear.” Given the widespread popular confusion, I felt I could allow Iggy to have it his way, but I apologize to rock purists who feel I got it wrong.

The copy editor on this book noted, correctly, that locusts die off in July, but the author chose to pretend otherwise, for those famous artistic reasons we’re always hearing so much about.

My thanks to Dr. Andy Singh, for providing me with a rough sketch of BRCA1, the form of cancer that claimed Merrin’s sister, and might’ve claimed her, if my plot didn’t demand otherwise. Any errors regarding medical fact are, however, the author’s own. Thanks as well to Kerri Singh, and the rest of the Singh clan, for indulging my hand-wringing over this particular novel, during the course of a variety of evenings.

Much gratitude as well to Danielle and Dr. Alan Ades. When I needed a place to work where no one would bother me, they found me one. Thanks as well to the folks at Lee Mac’s for feeding me for four months. I’m grateful to my friends Jason Ciaramella and Shane Leonard, who both read this book in manuscript form and provided me with a good deal of helpful feedback.

Thanks to Ray Slyman, who filled me in on the Don Orione cross; to my sister, the minister Naomi King, who pointed me to several useful passages in the Bible. A book, God’s Problem: How the Bible Fails to Answer Our Most Important Question-Why We Suffer by Bart Ehrman (HarperOne), also proved a helpful resource. I read God’s Problem while I was neck-deep in the fifth draft. I suspect that if I had read it earlier on, this would’ve been a very different novel. Not better or worse, just different.

A dedicated team of passionate book people worked on Horns behind the scenes at William Morrow/HarperCollins: Mary Schuck, Ben Bruton, Tavia Kowalchuk, Ly

Appreciation is due as well to Jody Hotchkiss and Sean Daily, who are passionate book people themselves (as well as passionate movie people), and who were fierce, happy advocates for this story.

There was a point at which I came to feel that this book itself was the devil; I’m grateful to my editors, Jen Brehl, Jo Fletcher, and Pete Crowther, and to my agent, Mickey Choate, both for their patience while I struggled with the thing and for all the help they offered to guide me through the nettles of my own story. Finally, love to my folks, Leanora, and my boys; without them, I wouldn’t have had a hope in hell of finishing Horns.

– J.H., August 2009