We are driving in separate vehicles out of Houston. Very soon I am in terrain I do not recognize. I pass through a tunnel which was never there before. All these roads, they're strange to me.

A guy is close by the driver's side of my auto, so I roll down the window and ask him how I go back where I started from. He thinks this is a trick question, and ponders it. He is smiling, but he doesn't wanta be made a fool of.

I move on. Here is a stopping place. I don't understand why I pick this place. It is nondescript outside, one of those tin industrial parkways, almost abandoned. I enter a restaurant. Sit. Smile. Everybody like me now.

I ask a lady at a nearby table. How do I go to - and I forget the city I started from this morning. I grin and think. Houston, oh, yeah, Houston. How do I go back to Houston. Nobody thinks of just wondering why I don't go back the way I came.

This one says, "You go down this highway you were on." She means I should continue on the road I have been traveling, which is away from Houston. But, I nod. "You will see four D's."

She doesn't explain, so I don't ask. I'm supposed to know what D's are, I assume. I nod more. She says nothing. "So, after the fourth D, I turn..."

"No, no," she scoffs. Such a ridiculous idea. Turning. I nod. I am afraid to ask anything more.

So far I have: I continue on the road I have been using to drive away from Houston in the same direction I have been going. I will pass four D's. I am to, at that point, do something which isn't turning. Okay.

So now I am leaving. I stand up and go out. Now we are on the second floor, like an interior office of a warehouse. I must slip down someway. Then, when I'm on the concrete floor, I remember I've left something up there in the restaurant. I have to go back. A sweater, I think. Something.

To go back, I try and find access. Stairs are of course out of the question. I don't even know how it was I went there before. The owner of the restaurant comes by. He sees my problem. Shows me a rope, says, there you go. I grasp it and try to climb up. It's incredibly difficult.

But here I am inside the restaurant, and here is the owner. How did he arrive ahead of me? He says, you aren't gonna wanta miss this. He tells me his wife is coming, with someone famous.

A couple creates minor bedlam, laughing. They tumble over a table in hysterics.
"Just look at that honeymuck on her face!" derides the owner. I look for a hickey, but cannot see.

Then the wife comes right in. I am alone now, and she says, Henri is coming. There is something on her cheek. Maybe a honeymuck? Her hair is short and she is stylish and somehow she wants me to know Henri, the famous San Francisco stylist, is with her.

Okay, I say. I try and radiate enthusiasm out of all my confusion.