She checked her image in the full-length mirror. Not bad for an old broad. Still looked pretty good in her jeans. She turned sideways and looked again. Yep, not bad. And her jacket hung nice and straight in the back.

Moving closer to the glass, she peered intently at the face reflected within. A few lines here and there. A scar or two. But miraculous, considering. From a distance, the casual onlooker couldn't tell a thing.

Well, time to get back. He'd be wondering what was taking her so long. There was one last thing to check, though. She pulled up the left leg of her jeans and slipped a hand into the top of her riding boot. Her fingers connected with the familiar coolness of the switchblade handle, tucked securely in place. Satisfied, she pulled the pant leg back down over the boot. Turning to the side once more, she again considered the lay of her jacket. Her six-shooter was stashed in the small of her back, jammed down in her jeans fully loaded, safety on. Didn't want any telltale bulges from the backup piece.

She was as ready as she'd ever be.

She pushed the door open and left the sanctuary of the bathroom for the bustle of the beer joint. Her quarry was right where she had left him, nursing his vodka tonic with a twist, awaiting her return. She slipped into the chair beside him and smiled.

"Hey, mama," he said.

"Hey."

"Say, did I tell you about filling in over at the airport store last month? Some boys got in a big mess over there so Carter sent me to straighten it out. Troubleshooter, you know. I'm like the Big Gun Troubleshooter for this region."

"Yeah?"

"Oh, yeah. Any time there's trouble somewhere, they send me."

"That must be exciting. Challenging work, I would think."

Yes, it was terribly challenging. He launched into a full blown explanation of exactly how challenging. She looked him in the eye as he talked, watching his facial expressions and body language, absorbing the whole of him. The black eyes, the olive skin; that scar on his right cheek the size of a silver dollar, a despised reminder of the time he fell face down in a bucket of coals when he was a kid. His features were all so familiar to her.

Meantime, he talked. He talked and talked and talked. Of missions accomplished and accolades won. He loved pontificating about himself. Unfortunately, she already knew more about him than she had ever wanted to know. More than she should ever have had to know. She had learned it first hand, as a matter of fact, one freezing night in February eighteen years ago.

She was twenty-something when they met. He was two years older. They had fallen passionately in love. He had seen her walk by the service station where he was working one hot summer's afternoon and decided right then and there that she was the woman he loved. He pursued her intensely. They married. They partied, they loved, they fought. And then one night he slashed her face into mincemeat and left her beside the road to die. Thirty-six hours later she regained consciousness in a strange hospital in a strange town. The nurses wouldn't let her have a mirror. They told her she didn't really want to look.

The pain had been almost unbearable. Her doctors shot her full of every drug available but nothing came close to truly easing it. Pain throbbed continually, moment by moment, heartbeat by heartbeat, the intensity and the depth of it measured not in rhyme or meter but in buckets and lakes and rivers of agonizing tears.

"They're doing wonderful things with plastic surgery these days," the doctors said.

When she was strong enough, reconstruction began. One operation. Two. Then three and four. Still she could not walk down the street without people staring openly and unabashedly at the mess that once had been her face. They tried not to react; well, at least some of them tried. But the revulsion she saw in their eyes was irrefutable.

He had totally destroyed her. Destroyed not only her looks, but her ego, her self-confidence, her pride and self-esteem. Must she face the horrified reactions of others for the rest of her life? How could she endure them even one more day? She hurried about her errands, doing only as much as she absolutely had to do in order to survive. Mostly she holed up, isolating herself, staying out of public view. Eventually she went underground.

Following surgical operations ten and eleven, some semblance of normalcy crept back into her life. The stares diminished. After fourteen and fifteen she was almost as good as new. As good as she was going to get, anyway. It was then that she had happened upon a magazine article explaining something called "the paper trail". The paper trail was sort of the black market road to acquiring a new identity. According to the article, it seemed that all one had to do was accumulate the proper documentation, and voila! Brand new name, brand new life.

Pick a name, any name. Begin by going to the courthouse to search the death records. Find the name of a child the same sex as you who died before they reached their majority. Try to pick someone fairly young so they wouldn't have had a social security card. From the death certificate, copy all vital information: name, birth date, parents' names, etc. Then contact the State Registrar for a copy of the birth certificate. That's the beginning. With the birth certificate you can get everything else you need. Social security number, driver license, bank accounts, credit cards.

"Want another beer?", he asked, interrupting her thoughts.

"What? Oh, no ... no, I don't need one yet, thanks."

He signaled the waitress and ordered another vodka tonic, throwing a twenty down on her tray to cover the tab. His drink arrived a few minutes later.

"Where were we? Oh, yes, I was telling you about that roust in Houston, the one where Bentley got thrown in jail and ... "

On he droned. The story was singularly uninteresting. One of those monologues where she only had to nod, smile, and grunt occasionally to keep up her end.

She let her eyes stray over his shoulder to a pool game in progress at the far side of the room. The boys were there, right where they were supposed to be. Dollar Bill and Lucky. Two of the biggest, baddest, meanest Bandidos in all the south coast of Texas. You wouldn't know it to look at 'em tonight, though. The boys cleaned up right nice when there was a good reason.

The tension was building inside her. She was all nerves, like a mountain cat poised for the strike but patiently awaiting that one perfect, flawless moment of attack. The zen of it excited her. His black eyes flashed across the table. Black to match the color of his heart, she mused. Well, it wouldn't be long now. Everyone was in position. All she had to do was let that moment arrive.

There had been five years of reconstructive surgery. Years of physical and emotional therapy after that. And thousands of days and thousands of nights of horror. She had lived with the horror every moment. It had become her abiding and constant companion. She clasped the horror to her as if a babe, nurturing it, feeding it, watching it grow. Finally one day she let it go, kicked it out of the nest, and emerged with a new face and a new name. Then she started tracking the son of a bitch down.

She had followed him to Amsterdam on a wild goose chase in '89. Almost caught up with him in Atlanta a year later, but her car broke down on the way and she missed him by hours. There had been so many roads, so many dead ends and false trails, so many sleepless nights poring over city directories and telephone books in unfamiliar libraries in unfamiliar towns. Months and months of endless waiting was sometimes all that connected the different towns and the near-misses. She learned patience. Patience and persistence.

Then came her big break. She had to wait eighteen years for it, but it came. Lucky and the boys managed to track him to Corpus where he was working as a night manager at McDonald's. She had smiled at the thought of it. Wouldn't she love to see him in one of those little hats? Yeah. She'd like to see that. Right before she slit his fucking throat. She departed for Corpus Christi as soon as she got the call. Packed a few things and hit the road. Got an apartment, found a job, and started eating at McDonald's.

The first time she walked into the place she was so nervous she thought she'd heave. Her heart threatened to leap from her chest. She even checked to see if her blouse was pulsing outward with each pound, pound, pound of the excited, anticipatory beast.

She was mere seconds from seeing him again after all those years. After all that pain and misery. She knew she would gaze at his familiar face, into his familiar eyes, and it would be as if eighteen years had not elapsed at all. Today would suddenly become yesterday once more. She had to be in control when that happened. She couldn't flinch, couldn't hesitate. She had to be completely normal, just a friendly chick in search of a burger.

Would he recognize her? She had looked in the mirror so many times asking herself that question. Examining the new face from every angle. Would he know? Would he see past the facade and discern her beneath? Would she startle him when he looked into her eyes? Her heart pounded even harder. The moment of truth was at hand.

She had walked to the counter in her most provocative manner, slow and easy like a cat. Smiled a big smile, using all her new teeth. Her voice came strong and true, in spite of her lungs' inability to function, and in the time it took for her to be able to breathe again, her spell had been woven. He had become enchanted. He was stunned by her presence and beauty. Hers not the usual kind of beauty, but rather a whisper of something remembered, of a promise implied. There was a faded glory about her, and a luster. He had vowed right then that she would be his. But he had NOT recognized her, and for that she thanked all her personal gods.

Now, months later, they sat in a beer joint talking. Awaiting the perfect moment. A movement near the pool table caught her eye. She focused on it. Lucky and Dollar Bill were motioning toward the door. It was time.

"I think I'd like to stretch my legs for a minute," she said. "Want to go smoke a joint before the music starts?"

"Sure!"

"Okay, let's boogie."

She got to her feet, pushing the chair out of the way with her boot. The boot containing the switchblade. She stashed her cigarettes in her jacket and headed for the door. He fell in behind to follow her. Lucky and Dollar Bill would wait a few moments and then follow him. Oh, they didn't intend to kill him. That was too easy.

But out back by the dumpster, on a brisk February evening, one rotten son of a bitch would see how it felt to get a new face.