by Laura Drake
Eye roll, then Nevada points at the sign for the next exit, one mile up. I raise my thumb in agreement, and fall behind again.
We pull off the highway and into the first gas station we find.
After a snide comment about pregnant women’s bladders, Nevada heads for the Stop-n-Go mart.
I pull my phone and hit speed dial.
“Hello?”
Cora’s voice brings a flood of moisture to my eyes. It seems so long since I heard a friendly voice. “Hi, Cora.”
“Oh Carly, it’s so good of you to call—Brittany, do not eat the cookie dough. Don’t you know it’ll give you worms?”
I hear a chorus of pre-teen gross-out in the background.
“Sorry, Carly. We have a kitchen full of Brittany’s friends, and my daughter went to the store to get more butterscotch chips.”
“How’s the baby?”
“Down for a nap, but I doubt that’s going to last long with this bunch…Annalise, not in her hair!”
“Sounds like bedlam.”
“Are you kidding?” I hear her smile. “This is heaven.”
So much for being saved by the cavalry. I knew it was a long shot. “I’m happy for you.” And I am. But…I shoot a glance at the store. “Look, Cora, Nevada is worse than difficult. She’s rude, obnoxious, and insubordinate. We almost got in a knock-down in Costco. I don’t know if I can—”
“Megan, mind the stove, hon, it’s hot. Sorry. Have you tried sitting down and talking to her?”
“I threatened to sit on her to get her to talk to me, but she’s a hard case. Won’t you fill me in on what happened to land her in jail? It might help.”
“I’m sorry, Carly, I promised her I wouldn’t. I’ll lose her respect if I go against her wishes.”
“I get that. I just don’t know if I can work this out.”
“Come, Brittany love. Take the spoon and keep mixing this, will you?” I hear steps, and the noise recedes. “I know this is hard for you, Carly, but there’s not much I can do from here. I did warn you, remember, but you—”
“I know, I know. I’ll find a way to work it out, Cora, don’t worry.”
“Now, tell me how you’re feeling. Morning sickness? Have you run into Austin yet?”
“Yes, and yes.” The store door opens and Nevada walks out. “But it’s a long story, and I’ve gotta run. You enjoy the family and I’ll fill you in when I see you in Alamogordo, next Sunday.”
“Okay, but Carly? Please be patient. She’s hurting, too.”
“I’ll try. Thanks, Cora. Kiss the baby for me.” I drop the phone into my jacket pocket by the time Nevada walks up. My stomach growls. Loud.
The corner of her mouth lifts. “You want me to fix you a hamburger?”
Wow. If that’s her idea of an olive branch, I’m grabbing it. “I’ll tell you what. We’re close to stopping for the night anyway. I’ll buy you dinner.”
She looks at me like I’m a vacuum salesman standing on her doorstep. “Why?”
“I’d offer to smoke a peace pipe, but we’d probably be arrested for contraband, right here in the parking lot. It’s a free meal that you don’t have to cook. Are you going to turn it down?”
“Hell no. Lead on, moneybags.”
We head to the pizza place that shares a space with the station’s convenience store. I’m starving, but seeing the pooled grease on the slices under the heat lamp makes my stomach start an agitation cycle. I order a salad and garlic bread, instead.
Nevada orders two pieces with pepperoni and a soda from the pimply kid in a paper hat.
I pay, and we take one of the two plastic tables. The locals must feel the same way I do about the pizza; the place is deserted.
Nevada takes a big bite and grease runs down her chin.
I must have winced, because her face tightens and her chin lifts. “What, my manners not good enough for a Rodeo Queen?” She swipes her chin with a thin paper napkin.
“No. It’s just the grease doesn’t agree with the baby.”
“Oh.” It comes out small.
“Not everyone is judging you every second, you know.”
“Yeah. Probably. In your world.” She takes another bite.
I pick at my salad, picking my words as carefully. “We live in the same world. It’s all in how you look at things.”
“Look. I can tell you’re trying to be all sincere. But I doubt your world growing up had rats and junkies and Johns, okay? You grow up that way, then tell me how I should see things.”
She takes another bite, like she just told me we were low on coffee. I check the muscles of my face, to be sure my shock won’t show. “Where did you grow up?”
“Houston. Third Ward. And I don’t want to talk about it. I’ve had social workers in my life. I don’t need another.”
“Okay, fair enough. What do we talk about?”
“Dunno.” She says around a mouthful of pizza.
Talking to Nevada is like juggling porcupines bare-handed. “What do you think of the rodeo? Have you watched it yet?”
She nods and swallows. “Cora made me, when she first hired me. I think it’s stupid.”
She’s a city girl. I smooth my hackles. “Why do you say that?”
“A bunch of kids who don’t know they can die, doing dangerous things with huge animals, for tacky jewelry and not much money.” She shrugs. “What’s the smart part about that?”
“I’d like to argue, but put that way, I’m not sure I can.”
“Holy shit.” She slaps her forehead. “Is this it? The end of the world? Did we actually find something we can agree on?”
“Nah, I love the rodeo.”
When I smile, she smiles back.
Chapter 11
Carly
We’ve made our meandering way to Ruidoso the past week, picking up extra cash by feeding people at industrial complexes, offices, and the random parking lot. Nevada was her normal attitudinal self, but we’ve worked together a bit better; which is to say she managed about ten minutes of conversation per day. But we haven’t gone all roller derby, so that’s progress, right there.
Friday morning in the lead on the bike, I take the road out of Ruidoso into the mountains, a section of Highway 48 known as the Billy the Kid Trail. The air is fresh and pine-infused, the scenery beautiful. My spirits lift.
Unforgiven tugs like a tether on my heart. One more rodeo. By Sunday, I’ll be on my way home.
I’ve changed from the girl who scooted out of town like a scared bunny. I’ve felt the shift inside that the baby is only partly responsible for. I may not have it all figured out yet, but I feel forged; as though the fire has made me stronger, tougher. I don’t need to be half of a couple franchise.
Next time, I’m going to choose a man who wants to be a partner.
In the tiny town of Capitan, Nevada passes me and pulls in at the Horse Head Motor Inn, a single-story cinder block from the ’60s, painted baby-barf gold. The sign out front is missing most of its old-fashioned lightbulbs.
We park, and Nevada steps out of the truck.
I shut down the bike and pull my helmet off. “This place is sketchier than usual. You sure you don’t want to drive up the road and see what else there is?”
She squints at the worn façade. “It does look more like a horse’s ass than its head, but it’ll mean less expense for Cora.” She looks down her nose at me. “Not up to your queenly standards?”
There’s that sweet temperament. “By all means, lead on.” I throw my leg over, stand, and pull the key. I guess I should be happy that she wants to do right by Cora, but my back hurts just imagining the mattress in a place like this. I check us in, and the measly nightly rate about guarantees the bed is going to be bad.
The huge fluffy thunderheads that gathered as we ascended have morphed to flat-bottomed steel wool, parked on our heads. “We’d better get everything in before those things let loose,” I yell over the wind to Nevada on the way back to the truck. “It’s gonna come a gully-w
asher.”
“Golly, Elly May, wonder if’n they got a ceeement pond in this here place?”
“Oh, hush up, city girl.” I roll my bike under the overhang in front of our window. It’ll save me a wet butt later. I unstrap my duffel from the sissy-bar, and open the door with the key on an old plastic fob.
The smell of stale Lysol smacks me in the face. The room is small and boxy, and a bare lightbulb with a long pull chain hangs in the middle of the ceiling. Linoleum, cinderblock walls, vinyl curtains, and paint-by-number artwork over the beds. The bathroom fixtures are chipped and rust stained, and I refuse to look too closely at the shower grout.
My cozy bedroom back home calls to me, with the bed under the window covered in the quilt Nana made by hand. I sigh and toss my duffel on the saggy bed. It squeals. Great.
Nevada slams through the door. “The gully-washer’s here.” Beyond her, rain drums the broken asphalt parking lot.
“That should make for a mud-fest rodeo.” I untie the top of my duffel.
“Nah, they’ll cancel.” She sits on the bed and bounces. It squeaks like a stepped-on rat.
“You’re kidding, right? In rodeo, anything less than a full-on lightning storm is considered entertainment. For the audience, it is, anyway.” I pull out a change of clothes. Not my good ones.
“Seriously?”
“Hey, the projects aren’t the only dangerous places, you know.” I’m learning that if I’m to survive her razor-sharp snark, I’ve got to give as good as I get. “I’m going to grab a shower. We’ll head to the rodeo grounds in an hour. It’s about two miles out of town, and I want to snag a spot on some grass, so we don’t get bogged down.”
“Can hardly wait.”
I wear flip-flops in the shower, in case of athlete’s foot, or worse. At least there’s hot water. When I step out, I rub the mirror twice, but it keeps fogging and the fan just makes noise. I pull on my clothes, open the door, and walk into the room. “I’m going to have to wait to do my hair. It’s a sauna—What are you doing?” But I can see plainly what. She’s leaning over my bed, pawing through my duffel.
Her face goes red and her eyes widen—the picture of “busted.”
The raw emotions of the past days gather, swirling into a black whirlpool of anger in my chest. “Oh, I get it. You pick crap hotels to save Cora money, but you feel free to steal from me.” I take the three steps to the bed to snatch my duffel from her, ripping the cord through her fingers. “I should have known. Once a thief, always a—”
“Don’t you say that!” She bounces off the bed, right into my face. “I am not a thief!”
“Says the felon. Then why were you pawing through my things?”
“Because I…I just wanted to…Oh, fuck it. You believe what you want. I don’t give two shits and a gully-washer what you think of me. You hear me?”
“They can hear you at the rodeo grounds!”
“Don’t you dare yell at me.”
“What are you going to do, beat me up, city girl?”
“Don’t tempt me.”
“No, you know what? How about I just call the cops?”
She flinches.
“Yeah. Then I’ll call Cora, and let her know she’s been wrong about you.”
As if her tension was held by her stare, her shoulders slump and her chin drops to point at the floor. “I wasn’t stealing. I did that one time, but I had a good reason. And I paid for it.”
I cross my arms. “Tell me about what happened, back then. Depending on your answer, maybe I won’t call the cops.” She doesn’t need to know I wouldn’t.
Her bed rat-squeaks when she drops onto it. “I’d just started working as a maid in one of the nice hotels on the north side of Houston. A cherry job.” She shoots a look around the room. “I lived in a rented room, worse than this. I was eating dinner at a cheap diner when I saw her. A teenager; not much more than a kid, really, hanging out in front, trying not to stare at the people eating inside. She was dirty, had a ripped-up backpack and a windbreaker that wasn’t made for Texas in December.”
My bed squeals when my butt hits it.
“She looked sad, pissed, and scared. I know what that’s like. I went out, brought her inside, and bought her a meal. While she wolfed it down, she told me she was from Dallas. Her mother had a new boyfriend that was bad news, so she took off. She didn’t have to tell me what ‘bad news’ meant. Her darting eyes and shaky hands did that.” Nevada tucks escapees from her ponytail behind her ear. “She was trying to get to Lafayette, where her grandma lived, but she ran out of money. I took her to my room, let her take a shower and sleep on my floor. I wanted to give her the money she needed, but I’d just started working, and every penny I had went to rent the room and buy me one meal a day.
“I’m an honest person. I am.” She glares at me. “But the guests at that hotel, they were rich. I was cleaning this guy’s room and found his wallet in the bathroom. It was stuffed with cash. He wouldn’t notice if I just took enough to buy a bus ticket to Louisiana and maybe a couple of candy bars to tide her over. It was a worthy cause, after all. I stuffed a fifty and a twenty in my pocket, and was putting the wallet back when the guy walked in. He pressed charges, and they charged me with stealing the whole fifteen hundred dollars in his wallet. I did twelve months.”
“What happened to the girl?”
She shrugs.
From the little I know of Nevada’s childhood from her “rats and junkies and Johns” comment, she saw herself in that girl. Her tough-chick façade is to cover a scared kid who had to grow up way too fast.
We sit in silence for a time, until I remember. “So why were you going through my things?”
“Makeup.” It comes out like she’s a little girl, caught in the act.
From her squirm, this is harder to admit than grand larceny. “What?”
“Look, it’s not a big deal, okay? I just wanted to see what brands you use, so I could, you know…” The rest is unintelligible.
“So you could what?”
When she looks up, her face is pink, heading for scarlet. “Buy some.”
“Well, heck, why didn’t you just ask?”
She shrugs. “Because you’d laugh at me, and make a big deal about it.”
“Do I look like I’m laughing?”
She studies my face. Closely. “No.”
“You might find that not everyone is out to put you down, or make you feel bad, if you’d stop snapping at them long enough to listen.”
“Where I came from, they did.”
“Well, good on you, for being smart enough to get away from that place. You want to give the rest of the world a chance?”
Her jaw takes that familiar hard line, and I realize I’ve pushed too far. I pull out my two makeup bags, unzip them, and dump the contents on the bed. “What do you want to know?”
She looks at the pile like it could be harboring a rattler. “Everything?”
“Nevada Sweet. Do you mean to tell me that you’ve never worn makeup?”
“When there’s not enough money for food and the rent”—she waves her hand at the pile—“all this is unimportant.”
Sweet Jesus. “Okay, let’s see. You and I have different coloring, so not everything I have will work, but…” I dig through the pile for pastel eyeshadow samples I got at a makeup party once.
“You’re not putting all that glop on me, are you? I don’t want to look like I’m turning tricks behind the food truck.”
I put a fist on my hip. “Does my makeup look the least bit whorish?”
“N-n-no.”
“Then shut up. And follow me. There’s not enough light in here to see a shadow from a spook. The bathroom light is garish, but we’ll make do.”
A half hour later, I’m looking in the mirror at a fresh-faced, All-American girl. “Are you sure you won’t let me show you how to do the false eyelashes?”
“Oh hell, no. I’m good.”
“You’re better than good. The cowboys are going
to be drooling on the counter of the lunch truck.” I pat her curly high ponytail. “When we go to buy you makeup, we’re getting you some Shimmer highlights.”
“I don’t know…”
“And I do. That’s why you asked me for help.”
She sticks her tongue out at me in the mirror.
“We could stop by a mall when we get to Alamogordo. You know, to update your wardrobe.”
“Stop right there. I like my clothes. If you don’t, you can bite me.”
“It was worth a shot.” I check my phone. “We’d better get a move on if we’re going to catch the lunch crowd.”
When we step out in the parking lot, the showers have ended. The air is washed clean and smells good enough to bite down on. But there are pools of water everywhere. “It’s going to be a goat rodeo.”
“What? Those guys are way too big—”
“No, city girl.” I can’t help my chuckle. “A goat rodeo is a screwup. A fubar. A—”
“A cluster-fuck.”
I know now. She uses tough as a primer, to cover the gaps in her education, manners, and her soft spots. “You’ve got to work on your vocabulary.”
She smiles. “You want to ride in the truck? We’re coming back here tonight, and that way, you won’t trash out the bike.”
“Brilliant idea, Sweet.”
We park, and Nevada heads to the back, for the grill. I stop her with a hand on her arm. “You go open the window. I’m cooking today.”
“No, you’re not.”
“Yes. I am.” I plant a fist on my hip. “You think I can’t do it? I cut my teeth as a short-order cook at the diner.”
“It’s my job.” She manages it with her teeth clenched. She’d make a pretty good ventriloquist.
“Not today, it’s not. I’m the boss, remember?”
Grumbling, she takes the steps out the back door.
An hour later, I flip a burger and mentally pat myself on the back. I’ve seen the cowboys eyeing her backside at the grill. Now that they’ve gotten to see her face, they’re swarming.
“Hey, Nevada, come go out with me tonight.”
“Screw off, dude. I don’t date cowboys.”
“How come?”