Gerard Mouras very deliberately did not finger the zigzag scar on his left cheek.  He had started out in Oklahoma, but the Land-Sea War had been fought on the coasts.  So he had come to decadent California and now resided, in the peacetime that must follow all wars no matter how outré, in debauched San Francisco.  After all:  how ya gonna keep ‘em down on the farm…

The heat absorbed by the tarmac of the DMV parking lot was being scoured away by an early afternoon wind moist with gathering fog.  You smelled the sea in this city; or Gerard did, anyway. It was a common enough post-traumatic symptom for wet-warfare soldiers who’d returned to Colorado, to Tennessee, to the most landlocked places they could find.

Gerard Mouras, however, didn’t mind the briny scent, or at least didn’t object to it, in much the same way he didn’t now touch his cheek’s scar.  San Francisco was a lively city, and he had even sampled a little of its debauchery.  Maybe more than a little.

Still, one had to make a living.  He had only been a soldier for the duration.  This was the work he’d done in Oklahoma, so now he did it here, sensibly.

His next appointed applicant showed up on time.  Skwids weren’t usually good with clocks, with sun-measured hours.  Gerard, determinedly fair and even generous, made a note of the punctuality on his clipboard.  He was holding his pen very tightly. Continue Reading