She shifted a large bag of onions so some of the weight was on her hip. "So how's the music business?"

"Lento, as we say. Slow. You want to buy a song?" Actually, he realized, one was forming in his mind. The first few notes of a mock-bombastic overture. A greeting for the aliens.

"If I could afford a song from you, I wouldn't be tending bar."

"There you go." He sang to the tune of the last century's "The Teddy Bears' Picnic": "If I could afford a tune from you / I wouldn't be tending bar."

"Wow. You just make that up?"

He smiled. "Trade secret."

"You take care." She shifted the big bag of onions onto her shoulder and walked away. Completely different from Luanne, her walk was stiff and mannish. It was probably from the fire; months of immobility and then walking in braces. Brave girl, Norman thought.

Sara

She could feel his eyes on her butt, every man's eyes. One more operation. Cut through the scar tissue, give her two buttocks again. Then learn how to walk again like a woman.

Not covered by Medicare. Rebuilding a womanly butt was not covered; it was "cosmetic." If you wanted cosmetic surgery you had to save up for it. They had paid for this so-called face and the two hard sponges on her chest. They opened her labia up and gave her pubic hair again, which of course is not cosmetic because who sees it?

Nobody had, not socially. Not until she could afford the last operation. She kicked open the door to the bar with unnecessary force.

" Nuestra Senora de las Cebollas," said Jose, the morning man. Our Lady of the Onions.

"Hey, next time you carry 'em and I'll cut 'em."

"Sure you will." The bar's big specialty was the onion flower: a machine slices the onion carefully in a crossed dice, three quarters of the way through. Then when somebody orders one, you just dip it in light spicy batter and deep-fry it for a few minutes. It opens like a flower in the cooking and turns sweet.

All very delicious, but someone had to peel a few dozen onions before eleven, and it wouldn't be Sara. "I'll take over the coffee. You get on the onions."

"Let me take a leak first."

"Oh God, yes. Don't pee on the onions."

"Flavor of the week." No customers, which wasn't unusual at nine sharp. Jose had crowds on the half hour, five-thirty, six-thirty, seven-thirty, eight-thirty. Things were calm by the time Sara came in.

She put on an apron and took a cloth to the machines. They had a hundred-and-fifty-year-old cappuccino monster that still worked, and Jose liked to mess with it. Sara didn't. She made cappuccino with the milk jets on the espresso machine, and nobody complained. When everything was shiny, she made herself a cup and sat down.

"Chee-wawa," Jose said, coming out of the men's room. "I work like a dog since dawn and my boss comes in and drinks coffee."

"Some bosses drink blood, Jose. Be grateful."

He popped an orange drink and sat next to her at the small table. " Que dia."

"Already? What's happening?"

"Oh, the usual. Drunks, bums. Invaders from outer space."

"We get 'em all."

"No, I mean verdad. People from outer space."

"Really. What did they want? Beetle juice?"

"No, I mean verdad! You don't watch the news."

"How could I watch the news when I don't have a cube at home?"

"Okay. A good point."

"So what about these invaders?"

Jose poured the orange drink over ice and squeezed a half lime into it. "Government bullshit, you ask me."

"It was on television?"

"Yeah, some woman at the university. She got some message from outer space. We got aliens on the way."

"Hold it. This is really true?"

"Like I say, government bullshit. Next week they come up with some alien tax we got to pay."

"Did you record it?"

"What I record it with? You leave a crystal here?"

"It was on CNN?"

"I guess, I don't know. Whatever was on."

"You're a big help." Sara got up and started doing the tables. Wipe each one down with a cloth, reposition the silverware. "I mean really, it's real?"

"Your friend the musician's wife, the professor? She was on the cube."

"Oh, yeah. Dr. what's-her-name Bell. The astrologer." She sat back down. "So really. It's really real."

"Would I bullshit you?"

"All the time. But I mean, this is real."

" Verdad. Really real."

"Holy shit. Do you know how bigthis is?"

"Yeah, yeah. That's all they talk about, all morning."

She sipped her coffee. Then she drank half of it in two gulps. "Holy shit."

"I wouldn't get all worked up over it. It's just the government."

"Jose, look. The government doesn't always lie. What could they gain from this?"

"Alien tax."

"Oh yeah, sure. But I mean, don't you see? We're not alone! There are other people out there."

" 'Course there are. I knew that all the time."

"Oh God, of course. Your tabloids."

"So what's wrong with my newspapers? They're right? That's what's wrong with my newspapers?"

"Just ... just let's go back, about three squares. You saw this on the cube."

"Bigger than shit. Like you say, CNN."

"CNN. And it wasn't a joke."

"No way. Verdaderamente."

Sara was strongly tempted to go to the bar and pour herself something. Not so soon after dawn, though. She sat back in the chair and closed her eyes.

"You're thinking."

"Happens." After a moment: "So have they called out the army yet? NASA going to blow them back to where they came from?"

"Not yet. They're not due for another three months."

"Nice of them to tell us." The door banged open and Willy Joe flowed across the floor and onto a bar stool, the one nearest the men's room.

"Cup of espresso, Senor Smith?" Jose said. He nodded.

Sara checked her watch. "You're two minutes early."

"It's the goddamn aliens. Screwin' everything up." While the espresso machine was building up pressure, Jose punched "No Sale" on the antique register and took out a pink five-hundred-dollar bill.

"Hey. Be obvious," Willy Joe said.

"I'm an obvious kind of man." He put the bill under the saucer in front of Willy Joe.

"I could make you real obvious. You don't watch your fuckin' trap."

"Yeah, yeah." He poured the coffee, making a sound like a chicken, just audible over the machine hiss.

"Jose ... " Sara warned.

He served the coffee. "It's okay. Senor Smith knows I know his boss."

"You know too many people, genie. Get you some trouble someday."

"Enjoy your coffee, sir," he said with a broad smile. "I hope it is done to your liking."

"You boys want to put your dicks back in? Customers coming."

"You watch your mouth too, lady."

Sara turned and made a sign only Willy Joe could see: right thumb rammed up through left fist. " Y tu madre," she mouthed, her face turning red.

"Yeah, well, fuck you, too." He turned back to his coffee. Two women and two men came in, suits from the federal building. Sara took their orders and passed them on to Jose.