The Yellowstone Conundrum

by John Randall

  She looked at them again, strikingly beautiful with blond hair but Native American features, both children, one a little girl, the other a little boy. Beautiful children. Apparently they didn’t speak English.

  “Hello,” she said, simply. Two sets of wide eyes. “My name is Penny,” she patted her chest as she said the words. Wide eyes blinked but remained wide. She tried it again. “Penny”, then pointed to the little boy.

  “Jason,” he replied, shocking Penny.

  Well knock me up and call me Betty.

  “Jason?” she asked.

  His mouth contorted. “Yes.”

  Penny laughed. “Well, Jason, I’m Penny,” she reached out her right hand and touched his small hand. “Who’s this?” she nodded to the little girl, who turned to Jason, then back to Penny.

  “Amanda,” Jason replied simply.

  “Sure, Amanda. That would have been my second guess,” Penny smiled. Penny looked around to make sure she wasn’t in an alternate universe. She had two adorable three-year olds in her borrowed truck that she’d just saved from being wolf chow.

  Penny slowed to a stop. Southern Montana was rugged territory. She looked around at the mountains, the bare macadam highway she was on, the Death Cloud in the distance; took a deep breath and realized she wasn’t on a game show with cameras on her.

  OK. You have two kids. You’re not going to leave the kids like you’ve left everthing else. The Black Cloud to her right had crossed over the mountain range and hung there with no apparent momentum to go further north. Red Lodge probably was in trouble.

  Penny smoothly shifted into second, then third, as if she’d driven a stick shift all her life instead of three hours. There were only a handful of trailer homes, all of which were off their cinderblocks, mostly destroyed; that may or may not have people inside.

  Ahead, Edgar didn’t have much promise. Maybe in Pryor, which was inside the Crow Indian Reservation, she’d find the answer. The town was named for Nathaniel Hale Pryor, a sergant in the Lewis and Clark Expedition; but was more known as the burial site for Chief Plenty Coups, a Crow visionary who once said:

  “Education is your greatest weapon. With education you are the white man’s equal, without education you are his victim and so shall remain all of your lives. Study, learn, help one another always. Remember, there is only poverty and misery in idleness and dreams---but in work there is self-respect and independence.”

  Chief Plenty Coups, Chief of the Mountain Crows, or Apsaalooke, of the Crow Nation. Named chief at age 28, he was a fierce and respected warrior. Covering himself with a wolf hide, he would sneak into enemy camp and scout; touching his enemy with his coup stick, he would return to his home with a plan of attack. Plenty Coups became chief of the Crows in 1876, the same year as the Battle of Little Bighorn; his scouts worked for Custer at the time and were aligned with the white man against their natural enemies; the Lakota, Sioux and Cheyenne. His vision was cooperation with the white man.

  “Where’s your mother?” Penny asked little Jason.

  “Pam’s,” he replied.

  Bump-de-bump she went across the Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroad tracks, which if you were a steer meant that eventually your field trip from southern Montana would end up at the stockyards in Cheyenne and Laramie and you’d have your head cut off.

  “Where does Pam live?” she asked. Jason shrugged his little shoulders.

  Edgar was a pathetic, hard scrabble town with a world-class view.

  How the hell am I going to find Pam?

  The parts of Edgar that weren’t down and out were instead simply destroyed by the earthquakes.

  All except Pam’s Bar and Grille. The Pepsi sign—put there in 2002 when there had been hope for some tourism in the area, now hung wopperjaw as if saying all you drunks, come on in!

  “Is this where Pam lives?” Penny asked. Jason nodded yes, silently.

  The only building left standing in this shity little town was the bar. The brick façade above the building had collapsed onto the sidewalk, but the building itself was OK. Sure, that made sense. It was probably the only business that made any money; right next to the Indian Reservation where there would be no liquor for sale. People would drive for miles just for a cold Coors or a shot of Jack.

  “Don’t get out of this truck,” she ordered the children, parking the beat-up Toyota and getting out.

  It was one in the afternoon when pretty Penny walked into Pam’s Bar and Grille in Edgar, Montana.

  Her father had died accidentally wind surfing on a stormy night coming down Mt. Hood. If he had been alive and had followed his daughter’s career in skiing, he would have been proud. At some point in time he, not her mother, would have given her a pearl of advice, most likely after a few beers or a couple of cocktails.

  Never get in a bar fight with a drunk.

  Very simply, drunks don’t feel pain. You have to beat them into submission, which is difficult to do.

  Penny parked the Toyota in front of Pam’s Bar and Grille. There were no lights on in the town. Buildings had collapsed. The single-thick layer of brick façade in the building housing the bar and other “establishments” had been ripped by the earthquake; but, like drunks, the bar was virtually untouched. Except inside.

  It was obviously whoopie time at Pam’s.

  It was like walking into the back set of a 50’s western movie after the bar fight. The huge ten by six glass window behind the bar had been shattered; only a W-shaped wedge of very sharp glass remained. The rest had come down probably in a single fell swoop, taking the front line of bourbons and scotches with them. Entering the bar, one was immediately confronted with a u-shaped padded bar with dated high-style chairs. To the right were the quiet seats, to the left the small dance floor, dirty with eons of dust, peanut shells, spilled drinks and stuff you just don’t want to know about.

  Penny took two steps back and scanned the road back and forth.

  “Baby, come right over here and suck my dick!”

  This was followed by a smattering of woo-hoos and “Right down here, honeys,” followed by pants getting unzipped.

  Nobody stood up because they were all so loaded; been drinking since 7:25 this morning when the earthquake hit, the down destroyed all but their favorite watering hole, the pit that it was.

  Penny lasered a look to the cheering crowd that drew some oooohs. One geezer actually pulled out his limp dick and started rubbing it like Aladin’s lamp. Penny didn’t exactly look like Little Miss Buttercup. She was dirty, covered once by the Black Cloud, sweaty, not just damp but sweaty, and if the hornballs looked carefully, the ski pants she wore were taut with muscled legs. Naked, which they all wanted her to be, she’d be an awesome sight, firm shoulders and arms, tight chest muscles with small breasts and a 24-inch waist.

  Shaking off the leud comments, Penny approached what she assumed was the owner who slowly continued to clean up the mess the mirror had made when it snapped in two. The word “grizzled” normally was associated with a worn, scruffy man, 60ish, faded hairline, thin, perhaps a moustache, but certainly sprouting two weeks of unshaven whiskers, or more. But grizzled was the word that popped into Penny’s brain as she approched the bar.

  “You Pam?” she asked, which was followed by gafaws of laughter from the peanut gallery.

  “Get out of here,” Pam ordered, dismissing the much younger woman. Pam was indeed in her early 60s—63 to be exact, and worn at every edge of her body like she’d been carrying barbells. There wasn’t part of her body that seemed soft, difficult for a woman. Look up the word “hardscrabble” and the picture would be Pam Hastings looking back at you with dark eyes, wrinkles on her leather-tanned face, and a trace of lipstick on lips that just weren’t there any more.

  “No, fuck you,” Penny looked her dead in the eyes, then turned to the assholes in the lounge, “and fuck you.”

  Mouths dropped in surprise. Penny’s mouth would have dropped in surprise at what she’d said if she had been in the real univers
e instead of the alternate universe along with Captain Kirk.

  “I’m looking for the mother of these two children,” she turned to the open front door. Parked in front was the raggedy Toyota with cute-as-a-button Jason and Amanda in the front seat, both on top of each other looking out the passenger side window.

  Taken aback at the push-back from the young woman, who was obviously very agitated, Pam turned to her left.

  Seated at the far end of the bar, her reflection odd and jagged in the remaining glass, was a 30-something woman, blond-ish, 5-6, 160 with flabby features that could have been pretty. She wore a red man-sized shirt to cover up her tummy rolls so she could move and flirt and make herself more attractive. Everyone knew she’d fuck any man for anything he’d give her. The woman had tough-tittie written all over her. She had her head on the bar, her body slumped in a sitting-while-sleeping position.

  “Are you serious?” Penny asked. “This is the mother?” Penny shook her head at the pathetic sight. She turned to the hornballs in the lounge. “She left her babies in that shit house! It collapsed. Fucking wolves were ready to eat her children!” Penny shouted. The men stopped their banter. “Has she been here all night?” Penny’s voice started to rise along with bile in her system. She was getting really hot.

  Penny had never struck anyone in her life; so when her right hand jumped out, a balled fist at its end, and hit the woman smack on the left shoulder, hard enough to break a bone, it could only have come from an alien.

  Whoa. Didn’t see that one coming from the lounge rats.

  “You fucking slut! Leave your children to die so you can come here and get drunk. You God-damn pig slut!” Penny smacked her with a left hand, this time clipping the woman’s head and knocking her off the bar stool, falling hard to the grimy floor. Damn that hurts. The woman’s head was hard as a rock.

  Driven by a lifetime of running from commitment and self-preservation, Penny’s anger at the woman’s callous disregard for her children surprised even herself.

  Instantly alert, or at least as alert as a drunk can be, and instantly furious at being repeatedly whacked, the fight was on. The stocky woman dove at Penny’s solid legs, driving a fist into her midsection as she tackled the younger woman and knocked her off her feet, now down with the peanuts and grimy things on the dark floor.

  The dudes in the peanut gallery perked up. Watching two good-looking women in a cat fight was one of those erotic things rarely seen. Wagers were quickly made, odds given on both women; it was about even. The drunk had a weight advantage while Penny was younger, taller and appeared more athletic.

  Momma went straight for the crotch, driving her right fist between Penny’s legs hard while her left hand went for tit. Penny cried out in pain, lost momentum and top-side position, now both going for leg control. Penny’s heavy jacket was in the way, while the worthless shit momma was in shirtsleeves, even though the bar was cold, to her advantage. Grunting in anger, there were no rules in a catfight, any fight for that matter, if you weren’t prepared to knock your opponent out or kill her, for that matter, then you should have stayed home because you were going to be toast. Momma’s stinky breath came in gasps as the fight reached the two minute mark; four minutes was about the limit for either woman. Penny found hair and pulled back hard, a cry of pain and a slight relaxing of the older woman’s grip; she yanked her head to the right as hard as she could, causing Momma to pay attention to the scalp pain, enabling Penny to wrap one leg around her opponent’s thighs. Twisting, grabbing fleshy breast, scraping nails on young flesh; both women were in pain. Slowly, ever so slowly Penny was able to move her legs to a point where she had the woman in a sizzors lock and was able to free up her left hand for punishment.

  The pair rolled on the floor, Momma her bra up around her neck, fleshy tities open and flopping, skin angry red with nail scrapes. Almost out of steam, Penny started to rail on the woman with her left fist—one, two, three, four, five smacks hard as she could, each accompanied with grunts of anger. Still the woman wasn’t quite done in. Barely heard were the hoots and hollers from the bar crowd. With a handful of blond hair and lower body control, Penny smacked the woman’s head against the hardwood floor—one, two, three—come on bitch—four—five times until her body went limp.

  Penny rolled over onto her back, drenched, dirty, bleeding and out of breath; what was the world coming to? Pretty Penny Armstrong in a bar fight. Struggling to her knees, her jacket fell to the floor; shirt completely torn, sports bra shredded, her small, firm breasts on display for the hooters in the corner. Now to her knees, she struggled and managed to get to her feet, bleeding from her neck, face, scalp and back.

  “What’s this woman’s name?” Penny asked, looking around. Cat had everyone’s tongue.

  “Janice Barrow,” Pam replied.

  Penny kicked Janice Barrow hard in the crotch with her boot, enough that the knocked-out woman responded in pain.

  “Tell Janice Barrow that I’m taking her children to whatever agency in Montana handles this,” she paused. “Wolves were about to kill them,” she scanned the room. “Is there a husband?” she asked, knowing the answer.

  The men in the lounge exchanged not-me looks.

  “Yes, there was,” Pam finally answered.

  “Was?” Penny caught the past tense.

  “Yeah, was.”

  Janice Barrow, 120 pounds, five-foot six, long blond hair with a killer smile, let her firm naked breasts sway gently back and forth across the face of Jimmy Two Shoes, her nipples just a temptation for his tongue; occasionally just lapping the tip. She, of course, responded with a gentle moan. Dipping ever so closer, Jimmy was able to capture a breast with its rigid nipple in his mouth and feel her warm flesh, a tasty treat, indeed. Jimmy’s hands ran down her naked back and dove under the flimsy cotton material of her panties, his fingers seeking, and finding the warmth of her wet pussy; his thumbs peeled her underwear back until the soft cotton strained against her thighs.

  Jimmy was in full War Eagle formation, stiff attention to detail, and like the heat-seeking missle he had, found the target, diving deep. Janice responded accordingly with groans and the mysterious movement of her hips, one that wrapped his manhood with velvet gloves, driving him to pulse his movement more quickly. No not yet, she thought. Too early.

  Withdrawing, she shifted positions and before he could complain, had his flagship in full oral control. Guys really don’t care if they have vaginal sex, just as long as they have a home for The Beast when its time. Any port in a storm, as has been reported. This time it didn’t matter. No matter what she did to slow him down, Jimmy Two Shoes was ready, more than ready. He dumped a load in the back of her throat two seconds before she realized he was going to cum; straight down to FlavorTown. Yuck. No matter what they say, it doesn’t taste like chicken.

  Jimmy was eighteen and full of life. Being the town, hell, the county slut, for the last eight years, Janice had bounced from one bed to another, controlling every good-looking man she ever met by her incredible sexual energy and prowess. Oh baby it’s OK if you want to fuck my butt. It doesn’t hurt at all. Young Mr. Two Shoes was primed to be the future leader of the Crow Indian Tribe and had already earned a full scholarship to the University of Montana in Missoula, where school officials in private conversations with Crow leaders about Rhodes Scholarship nominations if Jimmy could continue being the scholar-athlete-leader he was at such a young age.

  The university was highly-ranked (17th) in all schools in the United States with Rhodes nominations; also highly-ranked Truman, Goldwater and Udall scholars.

  Oh Jimmy fuck me, fuck me hard. That’s it, harder. The boy’s dick was an eight-inch railroad spike. Of course, every small town has a local slut, a pretty girl who is just too lazy to do anything but fuck; incompetent at typing, filing, being on time, serving food. The one skill that Janice did have, one that amazed every man who had her in bed, was her ability to gobble dick without gagging. After a while she proudly wore a cut-off yellow t-shir
t with I SWALLOW and I SPIT with the I SPIT crossed out.

  She would lie on her back with her head over the edge of the bed and take in whatever a guy could give her without gagging; normally naked but for panties. Guys love panties. She did have to breathe, however, so her guys knew that at most they had a minute-fifteen of pump time before she had to breathe, plenty of time for most hornballs; especially with a beautiful sexy view. A handful of the men were flexible enough, including young Jimmy Two Shoes, that they could bury their face in her pubis, enabling both of them to get off at the same time. It was quite a skill.

  Jimmy had heard of Janice; who in Big Horn County hadn’t? Big Horn was a large county perched on the Wyoming-Montana border, just north of the mountain ranges that went eastward from Yellowstone; population with 94% Native Americans, the remaining whites lived in Pryor, the western “capital” of the county, 15 miles east of Edgar. Edgar was forbidden fruit, the land of liquor, of white pussy; nothing for a young stud. After High School graduation, a carfull of teenagers took off for Edgar for a night on the town. There Jimmy Two Shoes met the county slut Janice Barrow; while Jimmy made it back to Crow Reservation, 60 miles to the east where his family lived, it was all over but the shouting. Jimmy was yet another young boy sucked into the Velvet Pussy.

  There was a house in New Orleans

  They call the Rising Sun

  And it’s been the ruin of many a poor boy

  And God I know I’m one.

  My mother was a tailor

  She sewed my new blue jeans

  My father was a gamblin’ man

  Down in New Orleans

  Performed by The Animals; lyrics by Writer(s): PRICE, ALAN / SKORSKY, NICOLAS / DE SCARANO, JEAN / PETIT, JEAN-CLAUDE

  Every night, every day; young Jimmy Two Shoes and his eight-inch railroad spike returned to Edgar; until the night Janice’s husband Jake returned from his fourth duty in Afghanistan and found his wife in Full Gobble with an 18-year old boy. The hippy-hop rabbits in next door Carbon County could hear Janice’s cry of dismay, as could every last soul in Edgar, Montana.