by Jenna Blum
“I’m ambidextrous in that category, Laredo,” Kevin says against her neck. “I am a man of many skills.” They kiss and grapple with each other until their mouths are swollen and their skin flushed and the windows are completely steamed, and Karena is sliding her hand up the nearest leg of Kevin’s shorts and he is looking a question at her—shall we move to the backseat?—when suddenly Kevin pulls away. He holds up a finger.
“Excuse me a moment,” he says.
Then he opens his door and steps out of the Jeep.
“AUGH!” he yells at the sky. “AUUUUGGGHHHHHHH!”
Karena laughs, though she is bewildered. She pats her hair and combs her fingers through it—it’s in what her mom would have called a rat’s nest. The air from Kevin’s open door is pine-scented, damp and chilly, raising goose bumps on Karena’s bare skin and painting her flushed cheeks. She refastens her bra and pulls her shirt back down.
Kevin has been stomping around the parking lot, circling his arms and talking to himself. Now he returns and opens Karena’s door. “Ma’am,” he says, ushering her out. “Welcome to the Coitus Interruptus Tour, 2008.”
“Thank you,” says Karena. “What’s going on?”
Kevin pulls her in tight and they stand stomach to stomach, swaying a little. Karena can feel the evidence that Kevin’s circuit around the lot hasn’t done him much good. She sympathizes. She feels somewhat deranged.
“Laredo,” Kevin says, his breath stirring her hair, “I’d rather poke myself in the eye than say what I’m about to say, and I’m sure every red-blooded male in America is screaming in protest—but frankly, this kind of . . . activity . . . makes me a little nervous. For one thing, I’m on the clock here. I have this awful work ethic that makes me respect professional boundaries, and you’re a guest on my tour.”
“Actually, I’m media,” Karena reminds him.
Kevin draws back to give her a look. “All the more reason,” he says. “I don’t want you to give me bad press.” He pushes her hair aside. “Besides,” he says in her ear, “I’ve had it with this gearshift in the gut thing, haven’t you? I’d rather do this right, Laredo. I’d like to be horizontal with you.”
Karena’s stomach jumps in happy agreement, and her thinking self is relieved. She is on assignment too, and she needs to keep her head clear for Charles. “I concur on all points,” she says.
“You do?” Kevin says, and sighs. “I was afraid you’d say that. I was kinda hoping you’d talk me out of it. Oh well. We’ll figure something out.”
He takes her face in his hands and they kiss awhile longer until Kevin steps back with a grimace, adjusting his shorts.
“Okay, now I’m really done,” he says, “unless you want me to do something illegal. Say good night, Laredo.”
“Good night, Laredo,” Karena says.
“Smartass,” says Kevin, giving her a whack on the corresponding body part. Karena lets out a startled squeak. “See,” Kevin says, turning and walking away backward, “that’s what I’m talking about, that little noise right there. I want some more of that.” He tips a finger at her. “Good night, Laredo,” he says, “sweet dreams.”
Then he drags himself across the parking lot in an exaggerated Quasimodo lurch. Karena laughs. She knows how he feels, though she hasn’t felt it since—high school? College? Sometime back in the beginning, when everything was brand-new. She watches Kevin until he’s gone into the room he’s sharing with Dennis, then turns away, shaking her head and smiling. “Whoo,” she says, and locks the Jeep for the night.
18
The next morning Karena wakes up grinning. She lies gazing at the ceiling, listening to the air conditioner and Fern’s snoring, replaying the events of the previous day. Then she rolls her head to the side and looks at the clock. Eight fifteen. They are right on the cusp of Central and Mountain Time, so Karena’s not sure whether they’re supposed to be at briefing in forty-five minutes or if they have an extra hour. But she decides not to take any chances. She gets out of bed and cracks the curtains, peering out. The light from the lot dazzles her.
“Good morning,” Alicia says, pushing herself up on one elbow, her hair a dark skein across her face.
“Good morning,” Karena says. She loves how everyone on tour starts the day with this simple civility. It should be commonplace back in the Cities too, but with traffic and weather and the rush through daily obstacles, it’s often not.
“Bloody hell,” says Fern from beneath her pillows. “What bloody time is it?”
“After eight,” says Karena. “Rise and shine.”
She twitches the curtains back farther to see the J&J El Rancho Fergusson Inn & Suites billboard. Such a long name for such a modest motel. Karena loves it. She loves that there’s a café attached to it. She loves the fact that heat is already simmering off the vehicles in the lot, meaning there’s plenty of energy for storms later and she might find her brother. She loves everything about this morning.
Alicia pads over in her Cowboys T-shirt and boxers, her pretty face screwed up against the glare. “What’s it like out?” she asks.
“Sunny,” says Karena. “Steamy. Perfect.”
Alicia smiles and bumps her hip against Karena’s.
“Somebody sure is in a good mood this morning,” she says. “Could it be because of a sunset walk she took with somebody else?”
“Sunset walk, my arse,” says the lump that is Fern. “She got a jolly good rogering is more like it.”
“Fern!” says Karena. “Good Lord.”
“Oh my,” says Alicia, then, “What’s a rogering? Do I want to know?”
“No,” says Karena, “you don’t,” and she throws a pillow at Fern.
Fern rises majestically up out of her nest of blankets, her eyes slitted and her purple hair every which way.
“ ’Course you do,” she says grumpily. “Everyone should have a good rogering once in her life, even you. It’s the kind of quick and dirty shag that bangs your head against the wall and blows your bloody socks off,” and she tosses the pillows aside and stomps toward the bathroom. Halfway there she pauses and looks back at Karena, putting up a hand to shield her eyes.
“Just as I thought,” she says. “Afterglow. Bloody blinding.”
“It is not,” says Karena. “Because nothing like that happened, Fern!”
The bathroom door slams.
Alicia peers at Karena with interest. “You do seem to have a glow about you.”
“I do not,” says Karena. “If anything, it’s sunburn.”
She goes into the alcove to wash her face. She is sunburned, Karena sees, as she applies makeup in the cramped space crowded with bulging toiletry bags and hair dryers and cell and camera chargers. She should look like hell. She hasn’t exercised in days, she’s running on sleep fumes, she’s been subsisting on a convenience store diet of pretzels and V8. Her brows are like something from a nature special and her fingers bristle with hangnails from washings with gas station soap. But the red cheeks and feverish eyes and even the few extra pounds suit Karena, making her look less like an anemic, exhausted thirtysomething reporter and more like the girls in her grandmother Hallingdahl’s samplers. Actually, she has never looked better.
Fern comes out of the bathroom in a turban and towel.
“Glowing,” she says as she passes.
“Zip it,” says Karena.
She packs up, deciding to forgo a shower in exchange for a decent breakfast, and carries her bags out to the Jeep. It is already hot and humid. The sun glitters off mica in the lot. Karena pauses to snap photos of the J&J El Rancho Fergusson Inn & Suites billboard.
“Good morning,” she says to Dan Mitchell, who is wresting his breakfast, a Mountain Dew, from the vending machine near the motel office.
“Good morning,” says Dan, unsmiling as a pirate.
Dennis is smoking outside the café, and when he sees Karena he hastens to open the door for her. “Hilloo!” he says, in an Inspector Clouseau accent that reminds Karena of Cha
rles. “Good morning! Fancy meeting you here!”
“Good morning,” Karena says, grinning.
Inside, the café has an attached gift shop, gray-and-red linoleum, red vinyl booths, and Formica tables. Locals in plaid and overalls turn to eye Karena with faded interest as she enters the dining room. The wall chalkboard offers bottomless coffee for ninety-nine cents, daily specials for under five dollars. Karena decides Kadoka is one of her favorite places. She spots Kevin in a corner booth with Pete and Marla, his hair seal slick from his shower, and her stomach leaps. She nods professionally. Kevin nods professionally back. Karena takes a seat at a center table with Dennis, Melody, Scout, and Alistair.
“Good morning,” she says.
“Morning,” says Scout, smiling at Karena. “Did you have a good night?”
“I did,” says Karena, and Scout quickly touches her hand, then gives Karena a menu.
Karena orders the coffee and the Eighteen-Wheeler Omelet, which contains bacon, ham, sausage, tomatoes, peppers, onions, mushrooms, and hash browns and comes drenched in cheese sauce. She eats the whole thing and two slices of rye toast besides, for a while happily conscious only of filling her empty stomach, the sun slanting through the blinds, and Kevin’s presence warm at her back. When she is done she gets out her recorder as Dennis explains the day’s setup. He draws diagrams on a place mat with such enthusiasm that his pen rips the thin paper.
“So this,” he says, circling a dot several times, “this is the target. If it were me, I might go a little more north, toward the Cheyenne Grasslands Area. But Dan’s set on playing this region right here, between Pierre and Oweeo. And Dan’s the man.”
“Dan’s the man,” repeats Alistair. He is focused on a handheld video game, rocking slightly, thumbs working.
“You’re the man,” says Dennis to Alistair, who smiles but keeps playing. “How’d you like to see a tornado today?”
“Brilliant,” says Alistair. “Eight thousand four hundred fifty-five.”
“That’s the number of tornadoes he’s seen,” explains Melody. “From Twister.”
“Seen the film one thousand four hundred nine times,” says Alistair to his game, “six tornadoes in the film, eight thousand four hundred fifty-four.”
“Right!” says Dennis. “Gotcha.”
“That’s amazing,” says Scout, smiling. A stripe of sun tangles in her blond hair for a second, turning it into a nimbus. “You’re an amazing guy, Alistair, you know that?”
“Brilliant,” says Alistair.
“Today could very well be eight thousand four hundred fifty-five, my friend,” says Dennis. “Yup. Mother Nature could very well let her dragons out to play today.”
“Dragons,” says Alistair and hoots softly.
Kevin’s party heads through the restaurant, and Karena’s table too gets up to leave. Karena lingers to eat the remaining toast crusts, then uses the ladies’ room—always a priority before hitting the road. By the time she gets back out to the gift shop to pay, she is last in a line of locals, so while she waits she browses the books on South Dakota history, the polished rocks and pine soaps and sketches of Mount Rushmore. Trinkets, Karena thinks. Beneath the counter is a display of silver-and-turquoise rings.
“Are those Sioux?” Karena asks the woman at the register.
“You bet,” the woman says, “Lakota. Fella brings ’em in from Pine Ridge Reservation, guy by the name of Black Cloud.”
“They’re beautiful,” Karena says. She wishes she could buy one, but she doesn’t have time to try them on.
“Are you all tornada chasers?” the woman asks. She has a severe overbite and cropped brown hair like Carol Burnett, a similar toothy warm smile.
“Some of these guys are,” says Karena. “The rest of us are just along for the ride.”
“Well, I hope you brought a basement with you,” says the woman. “Remember the ’97 tornada, Bob?” she says to an old rancher standing behind Karena with his check in hand.
“Sure do,” he says. “Spencer. Destroyed the town. Peeled the paving right off the road.”
The woman hands Karena her change, and Karena sets the mullet photo on the counter.
“You haven’t seen this guy, have you?” she asks.
The lady slides on glasses hanging on a string of flowered beadwork from her neck.
“You know,” she says, “I believe I have. Only without the fancy hairdo. Is this the fella who had the ring that looked like Howie?”
She passes the photo to the rancher, who holds it at arms’ length.
“Who’s Howie?” Karena asks.
“Howie’s this guy right here,” the woman says and taps her finger on the display case, indicating a ring with a stern sterling-and-turquoise face, along with a headdress and feather earrings of inlaid onyx. “Never thought we’d see anyone else with a ring like Howie, did we, Bob?”
“Nope,” says the old rancher. “But this fella had one, all right.”
He flaps the photo, pinching it in an old man’s long yellowing nails.
“He still got this poofy hair?” he asks, squinting one eye at Karena.
“I hope not,” says Karena.
“ ’Cause if you’re talkin’ a guy with much shorter hair than this, and a little darker and about twenty years older, I think you got your man.”
“Excellent,” says Karena, beaming, “thank you so much! When was he here?”
The woman turns to Bob for confirmation. “I’m going to say . . . yesterday? For dinner?”
“Yep,” says Bob. “Alls he had was the soup. He coulda used more, I remember thinking. High wind’d blow him away.” He hands the photo back to Karena. “He got some Lakota in him?”
“Not that I know of,” says Karena. “Why?”
“Just had that look,” says the rancher. “And we figured why else would he have that big ring? Welp, don’t let the tornada boogeyman getcha.”
“I’ll try not to,” Karena says as she leaves.
The Whale is already idling at the entrance to the lot, the Jeep behind it with Kevin in the driver’s seat. Karena has missed briefing.
“Sorry,” she says breathlessly as she swings in. “But we had a Charles sighting.”
“Hold on,” says Kevin, and into the handset he says, “We got her. Proceed.”
“Copy that, SLM,” says Dennis. “KE5 UIY, mobile,” and the Whale turns left out of the lot.
“So guess what,” Karena says as Kevin follows suit. “Charles was here yesterday.”
Kevin nods. “Good,” he says. “Not surprised. He’s probably chasing the same setup we are—along with everyone else. It’s going to be a zoo out there.”
His tone is matter-of-fact, his face impassive as a cop’s behind his aviators. Clouds play across the lenses as they drive across the overpass. Karena looks at him, startled and a little hurt. Why is he still being all business when they’re alone? Did she do something wrong? Is Kevin going to pretend last night, yesterday, didn’t happen? But then he reaches over and curls his hand around the nape of her neck.
“How did you sleep?” he asks.
“Like a baby,” says Karena, and is amazed to realize this is true. For the first time in ages, she didn’t wake at four thirty A.M. “You?” she asks.
“Terrible,” says Kevin. “I was up all night in agony, thanks to you, Laredo.”
Karena laughs.
“Now you mock my pain,” says Kevin. “Nice. Very nice.”
They merge onto I-90 East behind the Whale. Karena toes off her sneakers and props her feet on the dashboard, watching the land fly past. Silver roll clouds float across the highway like submarines, the sun shining through them. Standing sentinel atop a ridge is a lonely water tower, blue and lollipop-shaped in the dissolving mist.
“This could be a very big day,” Kevin says. “I think today’s the day, Laredo.”
“I know,” Karena says. The water tower is just like the one in New Heidelburg, the one Charles loved to climb. She turns to watch unt
il it is out of sight.
Kevin laughs. “Somehow I suspect we’re talking about different things.”
“I know,” Karena says again. She pats his knee and looks out the window, smiling.
19
All morning they travel east on I-90, the mist burning off as they go but a thick cloud blanket developing. “Stratus deck,” says Kevin, squinting up through the windshield. “That’s not good.” He and Dan and Dennis discuss strategy on the ham while Karena listens and watches the land blur past outside the window. She has never seen anything like it, territory so untouched it looks prehistoric. Just grasslands rolling to the end of the world. Karena knows there are people here, that although the towns grow sparser and the distances between them greater, there are rich and complex and damaging lives being played out just beyond her vision. Still, she is entranced. She half expects to come upon a brontosaurus lifting its head from one of the small ponds that nestle among the swells, vegetation dripping in its jaws as it watches the Whirlwind convoy pass.
“I love it here,” Karena says suddenly. “I’d love to live here someday.”
“You would?” says Kevin, hooking the handset back in its cradle. “Now that surprises me, Laredo. Here I’d pegged you for an urban girl, never without her latte. You are a woman of great complexity.”
“Well, of course I’d have an espresso machine,” Karena says. “Still.”
She resumes her contemplation of the land flowing by, the horizontal layers of blue sky, green grass, clouds. How to explain why it makes her heart leap, her throat hurt with wistfulness and longing, just looking at it?
“I guess it’s hereditary,” she says. “Our great-greats had a homestead out here, we don’t know where exactly. Somewhere near Martin, we think. They had a soddie at first, then an actual house. But they must have suffered some kind of loss, locusts or blizzard or something, because they had to retreat to Minnesota where there was already family set up. My great-great grandmother, Libby—Lisbet—she never got over it. She pined for the empty space.”
“Wow,” says Kevin. “That’s fascinating, Laredo. You know this how?”