Hard City

by Clark Howard

  Richie stared at her. He wanted to say yes. More than anything in the world at that moment, he wanted to say yes. Yes, let’s try. But he could not.

  “It won’t work for us, Linda. I wish it would—but it won’t.”

  “I’ll change, Richie. I’ll try to understand you better—”

  “No,” he shook his head. “If either of us has to change for the other, then it’s no good—and it’ll never be any good.” Some strands of hair were stuck on her cheek by the tears; Richie brushed them back with his thumb. “I can’t let you do for me what I won’t do for you. Letting you change would be as wrong as making myself change. We’ve got to be true to ourselves, Linda—both of us.”

  “But if we lose each other, Richie,” she pleaded, “what will be left for us?”

  “We’ll have what we are,” he said. “What we are inside. If we compromise that, either of us, we’ll always regret it. We’ve got to stay who we are and what we are; we can’t lose ourselves.”

  Suddenly she knew he would not relent, not on this: it was too important to him. “Can we . . . be friends?” she asked, groping for something.

  “Sure we can.”

  Linda smiled a tentative smile. “Maybe if we stay friends, someday we might, well. . . .”

  “Someday we might,” Richie said, knowing exactly what she meant. But he knew they never would.

  “Sometimes people just need time,” she said solemnly.

  “Come on . . . ,” He led her across the sidewalk and held the car door for her.

  “Maybe we’ll run into each other,” she hoped.

  Richie smiled. “Sure. In some library.”

  That made her laugh. He laughed too. They kept their faces happy as she drove away.

  Presently Richie started down Madison Street toward the pool hall. He suddenly felt very good. He was still himself, the way he was meant to be.

  He hurried on his way, to keep his promise to the kid who taught him how to kill rats.

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  Hard City is based in large part on my life, but it is a work of fiction. Names and descriptions of most persons and places have been changed, and the characters are either fictional or composites of several people. My parents, James Richmond “Tennessee Slim” Howard and Chloe Clark Howard are real people, and the city of Chicago, at least as I knew it, is also obviously real. All the rest is not meant to be an historically accurate portrayal of any person or place and should be read as fiction.

  Hard City

  By Clark Howard

  Published by Delabarre Publishing

  Originally published by Dutton, 1990

  Copyright © Clark Howard, 1990

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.

  ISBN - 978-0-9829247-6-1

  ISBN of Dutton hardback – 0-525-24857-9

  Original cover of the Hard City hardback published by Dutton in 1990