Rocket City. Cathryn Alpert

okra turn out?"

      "Not too well," he responded.

      "Did you fix it up with lots of butter and salt, like I told you?"

      "Damn," he said. Once again, he'd forgotten to buy butter.

      "You gotta listen to me. I've been fixing the stuff for over forty years."

      "I guess I'm not the okra type," said Figman.

      Verdie looked him over. "No, I reckon you ain't," she said.

      Figman wondered what she meant by that. He excused himself and drove home quickly, anxious to begin his afternoon of sketching.

      Figman thought about what he should draw. He looked around his house, but few of his possessions called out to him. At a loss, he dug through a box in his spare bedroom's closet. Halfway down, he came upon an album of photographs. Surely it contained a wealth of subject matter, snapshots from which Figman could sketch portraits of the people he had known. But when he lifted the album, he discovered his six bottles of Essence of Chicken. He remembered having packed them despite his promise to scale down his possessions. Essence of Chicken was too weird to throw out; too wonderfully surreal to keep packed away. Perhaps their rediscovery was yet a third omen.

      He carried all six bottles to the counter in his kitchen. Essence of Chicken had not aged well. Thick and red, it looked like the blood that Drs. Feldstein and Mercer had extracted from his body. When he shook one bottle, he saw particles. Beaks maybe, or chicken toes. It was foul, this rediscovery, but not insignificant, for Figman knew that in life there were no accidents. He stored five of the bottles on a shelf in his pantry. The sixth, he decided to keep in plain sight as a curiosity. And as a reminder. He wiped the bottle clean, tightened its cap, and centered it on his windowsill.