The Desert Sky Before Us

by Anne Valente

  I’ll be quick. And I’ll grab food. What do you want?

  Maybe something with caffeine. I don’t want to sleep the whole way.

  Rhiannon lets the pump run while she steals into the food mart. She pulls two Cokes from the wall of refrigerators and two Airhead sticks from the candy bins, Billie’s childhood favorite. She sets her items on the checkout counter, the only person in line, the station deserted.

  Are you Rhiannon Hurst?

  Rhiannon looks up at the boy behind the counter. He’s young, maybe early twenties, round plugs stretched into his ears. For a moment she wonders if she’s given him her driver’s license before realizing her wallet is still tucked in her back pocket.

  What?

  Rhiannon Hurst. The driver.

  Rhiannon stares at him, the surprise of standing here in rural Colorado, this boy knowing her name.

  I watched you race on ESPN when I was a kid, he says. Words that shock her, the first man she can recall ever mentioning her career. Her fans so often only girls at raceways, and so few of them, the small daughters of NASCAR diehards. Words that sober her for how young the boy must have been then, how long ago it was.

  Thanks, she whispers.

  I can’t believe it’s you.

  Rhiannon pushes the Cokes and candy across the counter. Just these, please.

  Are you heading north?

  On our way to Moab.

  You might want to rethink that. Highway’s closed ahead.

  Rhiannon glances out the mart’s windows. Where?

  Just past Cortez. About five miles down. Wildfire in the San Juan Forest just to the east. The smoke is so bad that visibility isn’t much through the mountains. They’re closing the road for the night until the winds die down.

  The brief vanity of being recognized vanishes. The haze. The clouded sky. Not drought alone but wildfire, what Rhiannon feels stupid to not have considered. The news filled with monsoons, tornadoes.

  Is there another route? she asks.

  You probably won’t get much farther west than here tonight, not anywhere in Colorado. The wind’s blown the smoke west and south, even all the way to New Mexico. Should diminish by tomorrow. You been listening to the news?

  Just earlier in the afternoon. There wasn’t any mention of a forest fire.

  Probably because the news is mostly covering those planes. The fire’s picked up these last few hours. You’d have seen the roadblock ahead anyway, a few miles down.

  Rhiannon looks out the window at the Mustang where Billie sits inside the car, the fuel gauge stopped. Are there any places to camp around here?

  Air quality’s not great tonight for that. Plenty of motels in Cortez up ahead.

  The boy hands her the receipt and slides her sodas and candy across the counter. Any chance I could get your autograph?

  Rhiannon hasn’t been asked in over six years. When she finally nods, the boy pulls a pad and pen from behind the counter and Rhiannon quickly scrawls her name.

  He glances out the window. You stay safe.

  Rhiannon nods and leaves the store, the door’s bell echoing behind her.

  In the car, Billie is reclined in the passenger seat biting her nails. Rhiannon throws her an Airhead. Keeps the boy’s recognition to herself.

  Road’s closed ahead, she says. We’ll need to stop in the next town for the night.

  Billie sits up. Why?

  Wildfire nearby. The guy inside said it would be clear tomorrow.

  Billie turns on the radio and scans the dial until she finds the local news broadcast and Rhiannon hears a staid male voice reporting from a Durango public radio affiliate. The sweep of the fire, the entirety of the San Juan National Forest and parts of the Rockies. A fire that must have picked up once she finally turned off the radio past New Mexico’s border. A fire she’d have heard about if she kept the radio on, a new route she might have been able to find two hours ago. The voice on the radio keeps reporting. Droves of firefighters and helicopters. The result of statewide drought and high winds, a summer without water finally erupting across Colorado. Wildfires common every summer. This one beyond control, enough to shut down an entire highway. The reporter stops short of climate speculation, the news immediate and breaking, the broadcast delivering only mandates for motorists to pull off the road.

  So that’s the reason for this haze, Billie says.

  The good news is that we’re not camping. The air’s too thick. At least you’ll get your hotel for the night.

  Billie picks up Rhiannon’s phone and scans the digital map. This pushes us back a day, she says. If we still stop in Moab.

  How far is Moab from the quarry? That has to be our next stop beyond southern Utah. Surely Mom wouldn’t send us outside the state again.

  Three hours, Billie says. Stopping tonight will put us in Moab by tomorrow afternoon. Then the quarry on Friday, assuming we also spend the night in Moab.

  That’s fine. We’re still on schedule. A week out, a week back.

  Rhiannon drives until they pass a green highway sign for Cortez. Then a flashing-orange road block, the two-lane highway bereft of vehicles traveling from the opposite direction. A cluster of cars backs up once they reach Cortez, the first line of traffic Rhiannon has seen since they left the outskirts of Albuquerque. She pulls off and follows the trail of brake lights, leaving behind the barricade of the closed highway.

  Keep your eyes peeled for a vacancy, she says.

  Billie nods and watches out the passenger-side window, her Airhead unwrapped in her hands. Rhiannon drives in the line of cars past several gas stations and a row of tourist trading posts. There, she hears Billie say. A red-blinking vacancy sign to the right of the windshield. The Mountain Ridge Inn. The Rockies rising beyond Cortez’s main thoroughfare, still visible through the growing haze.

  BEARD, JOHANNA. PHD. “WILDFIRE.” WEATHER AND CLIMATE. ED. DEAN TRUJILLO. CAMBRIDGE: HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS, 2010. 22–25. PRINT.

  CALL NUMBER: G552 .7 TRU

  WILDFIRE

  See Also: brush fire, desert fire, peat fire, vegetation fire

  Wildfires are classified as uncontrolled fires, often in dry areas with combustible vegetation. They are distinguished from other fires by their scope, their unpredictability, and their ability to quickly change direction and jump highways.

  Recent shifts in climate suggest the potential for wildfire growth. In order for a wildfire to occur, what is known as the fire triangle must be present: an ignition source, combustible vegetation, and oxygen. Typically, high moisture and humidity prevent combustion. But prolonged drought can cause more highly combustible environments, leaving habitats vulnerable to fire’s quick spread.

  37.3498° N, 108.5767° W:

  Cortez, CO

  The scent of stale cigarettes. The thin polyester lining of the bedspread. The room’s dim lighting. Billie sits on the edge of the mattress and takes in every sensation of a roadside lodge, this one far more ramshackle than the Salina Inn in Kansas. Cortez off the beaten path, a smaller highway, fewer tourists and passing traffic. The Mountain Ridge Inn unaccustomed to the influx of people waiting at the reception desk, forced into a night’s stop. The wall unit kicking sour air across the room in refrigerated intervals. The water heater pulsing through the wall, Rhiannon showering in the rusted bathroom, the door closed and trapping steam. The analog television transmitting a fuzzed signal, the local news and nothing else. Road closures. The heaviest areas of smoke. Local reports giving way to news of airports opening back up. Tokyo’s Narita. San Francisco’s SFO. Marrakesh’s Menara. Billie sits on the scratched bedspread and takes in the news and everything about the motel room. Everything in it meaning movement. Its empty dresser and threadbare sheets intended for traveling, nothing else. Nothing like the cinder-block walls and flame-resistant bedding of a prison cell.

  The water shuts off and Rhiannon steps out of the bathroom, a towel wrapped around her hair. Well, we have a free night we didn’t bank on, she says. Anything you want to do
?

  What, here? In this grand metropolis?

  Rhiannon nods toward the television. Any news on the fire?

  Just the same as what the front desk said. That firefighters are on it. That it should die down by morning, at least enough to open the highways.

  Rhiannon sits on the bed’s edge. Jesus, this is fucked.

  This isn’t necessarily connected to the planes or all the rain, Billie says though she doesn’t know if she believes the words leaving her mouth. She glances at the television’s footage of helicopters circling a stretch of burning forest. Reminiscent of FAA investigators circling burning wreckage, what she saw on the prison’s single television.

  There’s a bar next door, Rhiannon says.

  Billie laughs. Right. The motel bar is always the hot spot in any town.

  Fine. What would you rather do?

  Billie leans against the room’s window, the air unit blowing cold against her arms. The sun drops across a row of chain restaurants and gas stations along Cortez’s main drag, the Rockies barely visible in the distance beyond a thick layer of smoke.

  We have a free night, Billie says. Just like you said. Let’s do something fun.

  Like what?

  Get dressed. We’ll drive that sad strip out there until we find something.

  Once Rhiannon pulls on jeans, Billie follows her out of the motel and into the car. Neither of them dressed for a night out, hiking gear and T-shirts the only clothing they’ve packed. But Rhiannon is finally game for something beyond sticking to a schedule and Billie finds herself grateful. Every night since she left Decatur filled with purpose, from packing to decoding the journal to figuring out each next step. Rhiannon drives the town’s small strip until Billie points to a bowling alley set back from the road. Lakeside Lanes. A windowless warehouse, the parking lot half empty.

  Inside the alley, Rhiannon pays for two games and bowling shoes while Billie heads to the bar in socks, a twenty-dollar bill in her hand. The building lit in neon beer signs, only two men sitting at the bar. A few lanes populated with families, what looks to Billie like summer vacations on hold for the night. Van Halen warbling from the overhead speakers above the hollow sound of bowling balls knocking pins. Billie sits at the bar beside the two men who watch their bottles and not her.

  What are you having? the bartender asks.

  A pitcher. PBR is fine.

  You sure you don’t want the Oskar Blues instead?

  Billie looks up. Short dark hair. Darker eyes. About her age. A towel slung over his shoulder, a caricature of what a bartender should be.

  I would if it were cheaper.

  The bartender leans against the counter. What if it were?

  The music blares. Billie eyes him. His face far warmer than Jesse’s face in Colorado Springs, her bruise fading but still there, a thin blue lake on her arm.

  I’m listening, she says carefully.

  One pitcher of Oskar Blues, he says. Eight ninety-nine.

  The two men don’t meet her eyes as the bartender fills a pitcher with thick-foamed beer and Billie wonders if they’re regulars who have seen this before, this bartender in the habit of cutting women deals for a price.

  Thanks, Billie says when he slides the pitcher and a pint glass across the bar.

  You drinking all that alone?

  Billie nods toward the bowling lanes, where she can see Rhiannon at a console setting up their game. My sister’s over there. We’re just passing through.

  He hands her a second glass. The wildfire, right?

  We’re on our way to Utah, Billie says, wishing as soon as she says it that she could take it back. The road ahead is closed. We’re hoping it opens back up tomorrow.

  Billie moves toward the lanes with the pitcher and two glasses. Colorado Springs. Six years gone and she’s learned nothing of men. The bartender far more mellow than the man in Colorado Springs but she should keep her mouth shut, even if his eyes and the chiseled line of his jaw make her want to let down her guard. Billie places the pitcher on the small table beside Rhiannon, their names already blinking in the console, two marbled balls waiting in the return.

  I got a ten and a twelve, Rhiannon says. You can take your pick or use both.

  Billie fills the pint glasses and hands one to Rhiannon. Slips into her alley-issued shoes, the same size as Rhiannon. Same shoe size, same shirt size, same jeans size though across so many years of prison-issued meals and push-ups on the concrete floor beside her bunk Billie wonders if she’s lost too much weight for their clothing to still match.

  Rhiannon takes a sip. This isn’t PBR. Drinks must be cheap in Cortez.

  The bartender gave us a deal, Billie says and Rhiannon looks up.

  What kind of deal?

  Give me a break, Rhee. He was just being nice.

  I’m sure he was. Rhiannon says nothing else and Billie knows she’s thinking of the thick bruise on Billie’s arm.

  We’re fine. You’re here with me. And he was only being friendly.

  Just be careful. Rhiannon glances at Billie. You’re up first.

  Billie slides her fingers into the grip of the twelve ball and walks to the edge of the lane, fluorescent light slicking off the surface all the way down. Mineral oil, she remembers from a donated book on bowling in the prison library, meant to catch the grooves of a urethane ball. Three pounds of feathered muscle leaving her arm: the same release of a bowling bowl poised on the edge of a lane. Judas Priest blares down from the speakers. The sound of knocked pins echoes across the alley. Billie swings back her arm and lets the ball go and it glides down the lane and rolls through the center, a perfect split. Billie waits for the tongue of the ball return to cough up the twelve. The weight of a bowling ball far heavier than Alabama’s feathers but her brain reeling, her hands releasing something after six years of holding nothing.

  If you rotate the ball toward one side, Rhiannon tells her, they’ll knock across the lane and hit the other pins.

  I know, Billie says. You’re not the only one who understands math.

  Billie grabs the twelve again and draws back her hand and lets the ball fly down the lane and hears the sound of pins cracking against one another. Opens her eyes. Pins rolling around on the slick surface. One still standing.

  Not bad, Rhiannon says behind her.

  Billie smiles. Let’s see what you can do.

  Rhiannon grabs the twelve from the return and poises herself at the lane’s edge. Sizes it up in seconds, lets the ball release. Billie watches as her ball clears every single pin.

  Nice strike, Billie shouts. Been bowling with Beth these last few years?

  I haven’t bowled since high school.

  Billie remembers Arrowhead Lanes, the Urbana alley she frequented in junior high where every kid went to smoke cigarettes and drink shared beers that college students bought for them, the staff watching only for teens bringing disposable flip-flops to steal pairs of bowling shoes. Rhiannon never there. Rhiannon already racing in high school. She grabs the pitcher and pours herself more beer and Billie sees the clench of her fingers around the handle. Muscle memory. What it took to maneuver machinery across a raceway instead of wasting away her teenage years sneaking Coors Lights and shitty cigarettes.

  Billie bowls three more frames until she has a score of 29, Rhiannon a turkey of three strikes. The pitcher drained. Billie’s stomach begins to growl. I’m going to grab another pitcher, she tells Rhiannon. Maybe some food. You want anything?

  Fries, Rhiannon says. And for you to keep a safe distance from that bartender.

  The bar is empty when Billie enters, the two men gone, the bartender leaning against the counter watching a small television in the corner. Rockies baseball, Billie can see. A game still scheduled in Denver despite a cloud of smoke sweeping the entire state.

  Baseball fan? Billie says.

  The bartender looks at her. Just need a break from the news.

  The wildfire or the planes?

  Both. They’ve been cutting between them
all night. More Oskar Blues?

  Only if I can pay full price.

  Crowds are light tonight. Not many people coming out with the air like this. My manager won’t care. It’s not a problem.

  It’s a problem for me.

  The bartender looks up and Billie stops herself from meeting his eyes.

  I didn’t mean to creep you out, he says. It’s just not often a girl like you comes in.

  A girl like me? Please. I saw those guys who were in here. They seemed pretty used to seeing deals offered to any woman who walks in.

  I’m not like that, the bartender says. His face so honest Billie believes him.

  Full price, she says. And an order of cheese fries too.

  She slides another twenty across the counter and the bartender takes it.

  My name’s Nick, he says. Yours?

  Billie, she says before she can take it back. The truth this time. He fills another pitcher with Oskar Blues and charges her full price, eleven ninety-nine.

  I’m off at ten, Billie. He places the change in her hand. If you’re free.

  She says nothing and walks back toward Rhiannon with the pitcher but leaves a five-dollar bill on the bar, a 40 percent tip.

  AFTER THEY FINISH two games and two plates of fries, the music dies down inside the alley along with the sound of bowling balls against pins, the other families gone. Rhiannon crushes both games. The two of them the last customers, Billie’s head swimming with four pints of beer but not enough to keep from stopping by the bar and whispering to Nick the name of their motel and that she’ll be at its bar.

  Inside the car, the air outside tasting faintly of ash in the dark, Rhiannon turns on the engine and pulls away from the parking lot.

  You told him where we’re staying, she says. You told him, didn’t you?

  Come on, Rhee. It’s been so long. Let me have some fun.

  Fun like Colorado Springs? Fun like finding you screaming on the street?

  He’s not like that.

  How do you know?

  I don’t know. He just seems different.

  From who?

  Billie watches the stoplights flash along the street as they make their way toward the motel. From Tim, she says. From that asshole in Colorado Springs. From Dad.