On any given morning Ida might slip apple juice into my Chase & Sandborn and I might feed half her danish to the company dog, big Hans.  That sort of Tom foolery didn't bust the bond we had nor even dent it.  The bond was as sturdy as Mac the Tower.

     But when Rock Matson joined Doc's Car & Truck Hospital, I sensed that nearly everything might change.

     I said nearly.  Now, in the first, second and third place I couldn't blame her.  Rock had the mug of a movie star, the muscles of two men and fists three times larger than that.  

     And when Rock started spending more and more time in the office where Ida typed the invoices and counted the coupons, it spelled Trouble with a capital T on the near horizon.  Sure enough, when I caught that beast of a cold and Doc made me stay away for a couple, I sensed they had already stepped out behind my back.  You know how you just know.  Somehow, though, I felt in my bones and my brain that Rock Matson was one of those cool drifters with jump in his jeans and wouldn't be here that much longer. 

     I was right as spring rain.  Rock ran off with Mamie from the diner across the street.  That left Ida, Doc and me minding the place by ourselves and I knew Doc had sworn off women, good or bad, when his sixth wife drove away in his Caddy come last September.  That left just Ida and me and Mac the Tower that brings the busted Fords and broken Dodges and Chevrolets.