I didn't get the job after all.  The email bearing this news came minutes before Tony knocked on my door.
    "Just a sec," I called from the bathroom.
    "Are you okay?" he asked, when I let him in.
    I nodded and explained that I had been turned down for a job in the town next over. 
    "I can tell you've been crying."  He pantomimed following a tear down his cheek; he seemed proud of himself that he recognized the symptoms.
    "Nope."  I shook my head.  "Do you want something to drink?"
    Tony didn't drink beer, but he accepted some tonic water, a preference that I found interesting.  Admittedly, it was a little early for a drink.  Even though the dirty light that cues dusk was sneaking its way into the dining room, the clock insisted it wasn't even five o'clock.  Putting a muzzle on propriety, I used what was left of the tonic water to dilute some whiskey that I had uncoverd in the liquor cabinet.  I waited for Tony to make some remark about my proclivity for such strong liquor at such an early hour, but he glanced at my drink and said nothing. 
    Within a half hour, Tony was drinking whiskey too.  "The only thing I could see being appealing about bank telling--and not that I would have wished this upon you--is the possibility that I'd be a victim of a hold-up."  He was staring at ceiling of our kitchen, as if trying to envision it.  "You could be the hero who dials for the cops with his foot which he freed from his shoe when the bandit was preoccupied with blinding the cameras."
   "Yes, that would be very exciting," I said.
   "But the chances of that happening are pretty slim.  You know what I love about lifeguarding?"
   "Saving lives."
   "Telling the squirrely kids to slow the fuck down when they're going across the wet tile.  I get such a kick out of watching them slam on the brakes.  I can practically see the skid marks.  I love it."
   "You enjoy being in the power seat," I said, deductively.
   "Saving lives.  You had it right the first time.  I can see the future like a shaman, and if I weren't there telling them to keep their m.p.h. down, they would be minced meat.  They hate me, and for some reason it turns me on.  It's like, well, it's like some kind of game, like one of those relationships, where I'm the partner who gets all jazzed about being ignored and they're the partner who gets all stoked about being screeched at.  You know?"
   "No, I have no clue what you're talking about.  Can we just say that you like saving lives and leave it at that?"
    He rolled his eyes and flipped his hair back.  And in that moment, because it was one in which I had no feelings for him, I wanted to ask if he was gay.  He seemed too comfortable in my dining room, getting up and pouring himself more whiskey.  It occurred to me then that he had never been romantically interested in me, not even during our first interaction at the coffee shop.  He was just, like me, a lonely person, and his oddly-timed hair adjustments were not nervous ticks but, instead, just manifestations of an unconscious and perservering desire to look good.  As the evening waned, we chatted and the whiskey bottle emptied, until the fact that Tony could not drive home was acknowledged, at which point I made up a spot for him on our sofa.  He emitted a  satisfying snore as soon as his head hit the pillow.  Meanwhile, I pulled out my computer and started researching the Air Force.