that sold me the car gave me some. I haven’t smoked any in years.”
Janie started cracking up, holding her stomach as she laughed. “Justin is such a stoner,” she finally said. “He’s one of those guys who’s convinced that everyone he sees is high.”
“Maybe they are.” Hank smiled and reached into his pocket, pulling out the rolled up Ziplock. “Check it out.” He opened the baggie and smelled the pungent green nuggets. “Smells pretty good.”
“How are we gonna smoke it? You got a pipe or something?”
Hank tipped up his can of beer and drained it in three big swallows. He shook the empty can and stifled a belch. “Nah, but we can make do.”
He took out the small pocketknife he’d bought in Vegas—the last bit of equipment he’d acquired that wasn’t broken—and went to work on the can. Janie watched him bend a small depression in one side, near the bottom of the can, and poke a series of small holes in it. She smiled.
“I must have watched my little brother make a thousand of those.”
Hank grinned. “You’d think a guy who was making that many would buy a pipe.”
“I used to kid him about that, but he’d always say that even if he had a pipe, he’d still use a can because he always ended up places where he wouldn’t have the pipe anyway.”
Hank poked a hole in the side of the can and put his thumb over it. He held the can to his lips and inhaled through the hole in the top, testing the air flow through the tiny holes in the bowl-shaped depression by covering and uncovering the thumbhole. He turned to her and smiled. “Well, it’s good to have survival skills, I guess.”
Janie shook her head. “I don’t think it’s survival skills with Eddie. I think it’s a case of always being unprepared.”
Hank pinched a small clump of the pot from the baggie and packed it, as best he could, over the small holes in the makeshift bowl. He fished a lighter out of his pocket and handed it and the can to Janie. “Hit it.”
She giggled. “You’re a gentleman.”
Hank raised his eyebrows and smiled. “Chivalry lives.”
“That’s good to know,” she said, as she placed her lips to the can and sparked it. She inhaled and immediately coughed with such force that the glowing ball of weed leapt off the can and rolled away from them, toward the edge of the rock. Janie slapped her palm on her chest and bent over, turning away from Hank as she choked. “Jesus … fucking … Christ,” she uttered, between gasps.
Hank tried to stifle his laughter. She turned back to him and handed the can back, trying to clear her throat. Hank pointed to the cherry red coal, glowing at the edge of the precipice. “I’m glad we have more,” he snickered. “Because I’m not crawling over there to get that.”
“Funny,” she said. “Let’s see you do it any better.”
“I guess that’s one advantage of smoking,” Hank said, as he repacked the bowl. “You can really inhale the good stuff when you need to.”
He held the can to his lips and composed himself. “Okay, watch this, slow and steady.” Hank lit it and took a small amount of smoke into his mouth. He tried to breathe in a little at a time, but his lungs rejected it. He started coughing immediately and handed the can to Janie.
“Oh I see,” she smirked, as he tried his best to hold it in. “Is that how it’s done?”
He managed to get out a “Yeah,” before he started coughing and hacking. Janie hit the pipe again. It was easier the second time. They passed it back and forth until it was cached. A tingling numbness floated over them and they sat quietly for a few minutes, staring out into the shimmering clarity of the night.
After a few minutes, Janie picked up the previous conversation, which, to Hank, seemed almost totally random now. “But I love my brother,” she said, then paused, and added, “Maybe that’s why I still stay here. So I can look out for him.”
Hank grunted a response and continued staring up at the sky. It was absolutely clear. The universe revealed itself as a million points of light poking through the blackness of space. There was never a view like that in New York City. Janie’s talk about her own brother reminded him of his, and the stars were a good distraction. Finally, Hank asked, “Why don’t both of