The Butterfly Lanai 3

After he'd got Mr. K out of the way, Mr. J took a hanglider to Hoboken. Believing he was in Baltimore, he spent some long walks by the water looking for Revolution Hill. That was where he was to meet the man who'd fix his telly. But as the nature of wandering along a waterfront gets one approached, as the shushing ocean bids one to reach out, Mr. J found a different man to fulfill his needs. He said his name was Hollybrick Vine. He was 42 and ambled along as though he were about to fall backwards. His jeans were beat up and his shirt hung on his shoulders like the lumpenproletariat on Vichy. There was nothing in his pockets, and his only possession was a tribal tattoo on his left shoulder blade. Hollybrick Vine also went to elementary school with Mr. J in Jersey but neither recognized the other.

Hollybrick Vine saw patterns everywhere, on solid print wallpaper, in suburban long grass curling over in the breeze, in disparate pop music, on buildings and underground trains, at bottoms of cups of coffe and tea, and more. He made an excellent handyman. Even so he was a notorious hermit, and only the inconvenience of hunger brought him out of the house. His life was noteworthy for its abstractions of everyday matters into the song lyrics he already knew by heart. It was brilliant from a single point of view.

They retired to Mr. J's flat. Hollybrick entered with purpose but while there was a telly that looked broken sitting on a TV tray by the radiator, his attention was drawn to the sliding door displaying a white bengal tiger lying coiled on the blue tile of the lanai.