The tears, the way his dumpling face is lost the chiseled shadows that used to pool under his brow and cheekbones, the way Seth's hand will sneak up and tweak his nipple through his shirt and his mouth will drop open and his eyes roll backward, it's the hormones. The conjugated estrogens, the Premarin, the estradiol, the ethinyl estradi-ol, they've all found their way into Seth's diet cola. Of course, there's the danger of liver damage at his current daily overdose levels. There could already be liver damage or cancer or blood clots, thrombosis if you're a doctor, but I'm willing to take that chance. Sure, it's all just for fun. Watching for his breasts to develop. Seeing his macho babe-magnet swagger go to fat and him taking naps in the afternoon. All that's great, but his being dead would let me move on to explore other interests.

Driving, driving, Seth says, "Don't you think that somehow television makes us God?"

This introspection is new. His beard growth is lightened up. It must be the antiandrogens choking back his testosterone. The water retention, he can ignore. The moodiness. A tear slips out of one eye in the rearview mirror and rolls down his face.

"Am I the only one who cares about these issues?" he says. "Am I the only one here in this car who feels anything real?"

Brandy's reading a paperback book. Most times, Brandy is reading some plastic surgeon's glossy hard-sell brochure about vaginas complete with color pictures showing the picture-perfect way a urethra should be aligned to ensure a downward stream of urine. Other pictures show how a top-quality clitoris should be hooded. These are five-figure, ten-and twenty-thousand-dollar vaginas, better than the real thing, and most days Brandy will pass the pictures around.

Jump to three weeks before, when we were in a big house in Spokane, Washington. We were in a South Hill granite chateau with Spokane spread out under the bathroom windows. I was shaking Percodans out of their brown bottle and into my purse pocket for Percodans. Brandy Alexander, she was digging around under the bathroom sink for a clean emery board when she found this paperback book.

Now all the other gods and she-gods have been eclipsed by some new deity.

Jump back to Seth looking at my breasts in the rearview mirror. "Television really does make us God," he says.

Give me tolerance.

Flash.

Give me understanding.

Flash.

Even after all these weeks on the road with me, Seth's glorious vulnerable blue eyes still won't meet my eyes. His new wistful introspection, he can ignore. The way the orals have already side- effected his eyes, steepened the corneal curve so he can't wear his contact lenses without them popping out. This has to be the conjugated estrogens in his orange juice every morning. He can ignore all that.

This has to be the Androcur in his iced tea at lunch, but he'll never figure it out. He'll never catch me.

Brandy Alexander, her nylon stocking feet up on the dashboard, the queen supreme's still reading her paperback.

"When you watch daytime dramas," Seth tells me, "you can look in on anybody. There's a different life on every channel, and almost every hour the lives change. It's the same as those live video Web sites. You can watch the whole world without it knowing."

For three weeks, Brandy's been reading that book.

"Television lets you spy on even the sexy parts of everybody's life," Seth says. "Doesn't it make sense?"

Maybe, but only if you're on 500 milligrams of micronized progesterone every day.

A few minutes of scenery go by behind glass. Just some towering mountains, old dead volcanoes, mostly the kind of stuff you find outside. Those timeless natural nature themes. Raw materials at their rawest. Unrefined. Unimproved rivers. Poorly maintained mountains. Filth. Plants growing in dirt. Weather.

"And if you believe that we really have free will, then you know that God can't really control us," Seth says. Seth's hands are off the steering wheel and flutter around to make his point. "And since God can't control us," he says, "all God does is watch and change channels when He gets bored."

Somewhere in heaven, you're live on a video Web site for God to surf.

Brandycam.

Brandy with her empty leg-hold trap shoes on the floor, Brandy licks an index finger and slow turns a page.

Ancient aboriginal petroglyphs and junk are just whizzing past.

"My point," Seths says, "is that maybe TV makes you God." Seth says, "And it could be that all we are is God's television."

Standing on the gravel shoulder are some moose or whatnot just trudging along on all four feet.

"Or Santa Glaus," says Brandy from behind her book. "Santa Glaus sees everything."

"Santa Glaus is just a story," says Seth. "He's just the opening band to God. There is no Santa Glaus."

Jump to drug hunting three weeks ago in Spokane, Washington, when Brandy Alexander flopped down in the master bedroom and started reading. I took thirty-two Nembutals. Thirty-two Nembutals went in my purse. I don't eat the merchandise. Brandy was still reading. I tried all the lipsticks on the back of my hand, and Brandy was still propped on a zillion eyelet lace pillows in the center of a king-sized waterbed. Still reading.

I put some expired estradiol and a half stick of Plumbago in my bag. The realtor called up the stairs, was everything all right?

Jump to us on Interstate 5 where a billboard goes by.

Clean Food and Family Prices Coming Up at the Karver Stage Stop Cafe

Jump to no Burning Blueberry, no Rusty Rose or Aubergine Dreams in Spokane.

He didn't want to rush us, the realtor called up the stairs, but was there anything we needed to know? Did we have any questions about anything?

I stuck my head in the master bedroom, and the water- bed's white duvet held a reading Brandy Alexander that was dead for as much as she was breathing.

Oh, clipped lilac satin of the beaded rice pearl hemline.

Oh, layered amber cashmere trimmed in faceted topaz marabou.

Oh, slithering underwired free-range mink bolero.

We had to go.

Brandy clutched her paperback open against her straight- up torpedo boob job. The Rusty Rose face pillowed in auburn hair and eyelet lace pillow shams, the aubergine eyes had the dilated look of a Thorazine overdose.

First thing I want to know is what drug she's taken.

The paperback cover showed a pretty blonde babe. Thin as a spaghetti strap. With a pretty, thin little smile. The babe's hair was a satellite photo of Hurricane Blonde just off the west coast of her face. The face was a Greek she-god with great lash, big eyeliner eyes the same as Betty and Veronica and all the other Archie gals had at Riverdale High. White pearls are wrapped up her arms and around her neck. What could be diamonds sparkle here and there.

The paperback cover said Miss Rona.

Brandy Alexander, her leg-hold trap shoes were getting dirt all over the waterbed's white duvet, and Brandy said, "I've found out who the real God is."

The realtor was ten seconds away.

Jump to all the wonders of nature blurring past us, rabbits, squirrels, plunging waterfalls. That's the worst of it. Gophers digging subterranean dens underground. Birds nesting in nests.

"The Princess B. A. is God," Seth tells me in the rearview mirror.

Jump to where the Spokane realtor yelled up the stairs. The people who owned the granite chateau were coming up the driveway.

Brandy Alexander, her eyes dilated, barely breathing in a Spokane waterbed, said "Rona Barrett. Rona Barrett is my new Supreme Being.”

Jump to Brandy in the Lincoln Town Car saying, "Rona Barrett is God."

All around us, erosion and insects are just chewing up the world, never mind people and pollution. Everything biodegrades with or without you pushing. I check my purse for enough spironolactone for Seth's afternoon snack. Another billboard goes by: