He used to sell. Was an appliance man. Counter-depth fridges. Top-load washers. Express-rinse this and square-footage-of-simultaneous-browning that. Lotta sheet metal. Lotta running his fingers across stainless steel. He was good. More than once brought his department within inches of yearly sales records. Good enough to raise a small family. “Look here!” he snapped when the man in the mirror caught him looking. “How’d you sell them? Like a neighbor or a con? With a handshake or The Five Principles of Persuasion,” whatever the name of that seminar was, back in ’62. He was 17. It was easy, he’d started to learn. Once a man had a need, another could convince him…with talk and glitter. Porcelain glaze atop the real. Shit on bull with a fact foundation. He turned from the mirror and spat in the sink.