Things would be different.

"Things could have been different."  She said.

"Yep." I answered back.

"Things would have been different."  I said.  I was leaning back against the concrete wall.

"You need a woman to make you do things."  She looked at me and took a drink from the long neck beer she had resting against her waist.

"I do." I admitted.

I looked down at my feet.

"But you would have treated me right."  She said in between drinks of her Bud Light.

"I would have."  I agreed.

"You need a good looking woman to keep you interested."  She accused me, rightly.

"I do."  I told her.

"But you're a different kind of man."  She said.  She took one of her legs and crossed the other leg with it at the knee.

She was still a good looking woman even though she was pushing 38.  She had thin legs.  She had on those snow boots that had become fashionable with all the teenage girls.  Her Levi's were skin tight and tucked into her boots.

"But,"  she continued "You aren't the kinda man that gets distracted by beauty.  You only need one good looking woman to keep you happy."

I don't know about being that good of a person.  But I think I knew what she meant.

"I would-uh treated you well."  I told her.

"I know you would-uh."  She smiled back at me.  Her long dark hair was moving in the breeze like a sail on the most magnificent sail boat you had ever seen.

She dug out a cigarette from her purse and put the cigarette between her chalky white fingers.  Her pink nail polish gleamed in the moonlight.  She lit the cigarette and took a long, deep inhale.  She blew the smoke out of the mouth.  A little of the smoke escaped from her nose.

She shook her head like she was disagreeing with herself a little.  Then she smiled to herself and looked up at me.

Chemistry.  We had it.  I never even had to try with her.  Words came out when they needed.  Actions around her seemed fluid.  Natural.  Everything slowed down to super slow motion.  I just sat there and counted her breaths.

We looked at the pavement a lot when we talked.

"It's funny."  I said.  And we both laughed at the inside joke.

"It is funny."  She said back to me. 

My mouth was dry so I got myself another beer from the six pack we were drinking from.  The six pack was sitting on the asphalt.

After a long while I decided to break the silence.  "I wonder how things would have been with us."

"I do too."  She said softly.

She uncrossed her leg.  She put her hand behind her head and stretched her back out a bit.  She smiled shyly over at me.  Self-conscious.

"You ever kill anybody?"  She asked me.

"Sure."  I told her.  "Why do you ask?"  I wondered.

She did not answer my question. She just asked me another one.

"How did you dispose of the body?"

"Medical waste."  I answered.

"So who do you wanna kill?"

"Marty."  She said.  "I am sick of his shit."

I swallowed a big gulp of beer.  My heart was beating pretty fast.

"You still got that GAT in your glove department?"  She looked over at my truck.

"Yep."  I said as smoothly as possible.  "I still got it."

The gun was not hidden very well.  Everyone knew about my gun.  They knew how I kept it stashed in my glove department and how I never needed to bring it out. 

"I'm serious!"  Her pretty little head was full of pout.

"I'm gonna have to borrow it."

She quit looking over at the gun and the Ram 1500 and looked back over at me.

"A body can be pretty heavy to move."  I said matter-of-factly.   "And it can be pretty difficult to bury by yourself."

She took one final puff off her cigarette and tossed the bud towards the gutter.  It landed a few yards away from the water and burned into the grass, innocently enough.

"You're gonna start a fire."  I told her and laughed.

"I don't give a shit."  She said with an edge to her voice I had never heard before.

"You shore sound pissed."  I told her.

She shrugged her shoulders at me.  Then she headed over to the red colored cardboard carrier and took out another beer.  She bent down to pick up another beer and her sweater opened up at the neckline.  I made no real effort to divert my eyes and I got a look at her bra.  It was black and real lacy.

She looked up and saw me staring at her.  She rolled her eyes a bit at me.

"I forgot what a boob man you are."  She smiled up at me.

Then she brought herself to her full height in her boots.  She stood real close to me.  She was almost as tall me as me in those boots.  I could smell menthol  and lipstick on her breath. 

"You should help me, you know."  She said it to me like she was asking me to help her with the dishes.

Doing the dished is the kind of chore a woman always wants you to help her with.  But as soon as you do she starts fucking the next door neighbor, or your brother.  The she tells you how it's all your fault and how you were never really man enough for her.  She tells you how she hates the way you smell of axle grease and dirt when you get home.  And how you don't ever wash your penis enough and how she always hated the taste of your foreskin.

"That's some bullshit."  I said a little harshly thinking about my ex.

Her eyes looked surprised and she took  stepped backwards from me.

"I didn't really mean it."  She said.

Only I knew better.

"I think you did."  I took another drink from my beer.

We both stood there staring at each other for a second.

Then she smiled at me the way she smiled at me the first time I saw her walking towards me.  Back then she was the accounts payable girl at the mini lube where I worked.

She was walking towards the copier machine.  She had on a short skirt with flat shoes and when I saw her I would swear to you that her hair was blowing just like in one of those shampoo commercials.

I'd never seen a girl as pretty as her in real life.  She had pale skin and dark eyes.  She was dressed so professional.  It was cute because there was no reason to dress so nicely at this job.   The last girl who had her position always wore jeans to work.   On Saturdays the other girl would wear sweats and she would always keep her hair in a ponytail.

"Maria."  I said.  But all I could get out was her name.

She ran her fingers through her hair.  She looked so angry.  Her eyes were steel.  Her jaw was clenched.  She fingered the bottle of beer.  I could tell she was just counting the seconds to make a get a way from me.

"Marty's gonna be expecting me soon."  She said through clenched teeth.  Her eyes drifted out to space.

"I bet he is."  I said evenly.  I did not want to give away my disappointment with how things were going.

A shiver went through her and she tugged at her jacket.  She zipped her jacket up and drank the last half of her beer down.  She looked around to find a place to get rid of the empty bottle and settled on putting it back in the six pack.  That meant she had to walk over to me again.

I backed up so as to let her put the bottle away and as to not let her get any funny business going on.  I had a feeling I could not let her get too close to me. I figured for just another whiff of her perfume I might go in to the cab and grab my pistol.

Before she left me she gave me a last look over her shoulder.  Her long dark hair blowing in the wind again just like the first time I met her.  But this time her pink cheeks were rosy for all the wrong reasons.