Coyote Blue Chapter 28~29

CHAPTER 28Hope Is Bul allowproof, Truth Just Hard to HitAs Minty strong drove back to Las Vegas he thought virtually what surface-to-air missile had said You consecrate a mother, dont you? And the question set Minty Fresh to thinking ab reveal a ph matchless and only(a) call from his mother that had changed his life.Youre the only bingle left can do something, baby. The others argon too far or too far done for(p). Please come fireside, baby, I need you. (Even when he had to manipulate to pass through her front door she still called him baby.) That tone hed heard it in her voice before, when she was tugging at her husband to labor him to stop strapping her youngest. nevertheless he hadnt gone back for her, had he? It was a call deep with duty and silent pride that brought him home. He went back for Nathan.Nathan Fresh had never been home when any of his nine children were born. He was a sailor, and as far as he knew, when you came home from sea a new child would be postpon ement for you. The others grew an inch or two at a time, and the shoes that one was wearing when you left would be on the next one down when you got home. He loved his children, foreign creatures that they were, and trusted his wife to raise them as long as they could line up, snap to, and pass inspection when he came home. And although he was gone most of the time, making the high seas safe for democracy, he was a presence in the house photographs in crisp get along whites and blues stared down from the walls commendations and medals a letter once a week, read let on loud at the supper table and a thousand warnings of what Papa would do to a doomed misbe crapr when he got home. To the Fresh children, Papa was only a little bit more real than Santa Claus, and only a bit more conspicuous.On the ship, Chief lilliputian Officer Nathan Fresh was go throughn only as the Chief feared and respected, tough and fair, starched, razor creased, and polished, al modalitys in trim and into lerant of anyone who wasnt. The Chief did you nonice that he was black? only five foot five? barely 130 pounds? No, besides did you see his eyes, bid smiles, when he was showing the pictures of his kids when he was telling tales of lobbing shells the surface of refrigerators into the hills of Korea? Did you ever mention retirement to him? Thats a frost, thats a chill.Minty Fresh, the youngest of nine, the one born with golden eyes, knew the chill. Hes not mine, Papa said said it only once. Minty stayed forbidden of Papas way when he could, wore dark glasses when he couldnt. At age ten he stood six feet tall and no amount of slouching would roll Papas resentment glum his back. His place in the family was a single line at the bottom of a letter Babys fine too far enough from Love, Momma to turn away the association. At dark, by flash wispy, he wrote his own letters My team is going to the state championships. I was voted all-conference. The press calls me M. F. Coo l, because I wear tinted goggles when I play, and sunglasses during interviews. The colleges are calling already and sending recruiters to the games. Youd be proud. Momma swears youre wrong. In the bathroom he watched the letters go, in tiny pieces, virtually the bowl, down, and out to sea.Minty Fresh left for the University of Nevada at Las Vegas the week after high school graduation, the same week that Nathan Fresh took his mandatory retirement from the navy and came home, to San Diego, for good. The coach at UNLV treasured Minty to lift weights all summer, beef up for the big boys. The coach gave Momma Fresh a new washer and dryer. Nathan Fresh put them out on the porch.The day before the first game, when UNLV was going to unleash its secret weapon on the unsuspecting NCAA a seven-foot center with a tether-foot vertical leap who could bench-press quartette hundred pounds and shoot ninety percent from the free-throw line M. F. Cool got the call. Im on my way, Momma, he s aid.My father needs me, he said to the coach.When we brought you up from nothing, gave you a good scholarship, put up with the goggles and the shades and the silly call down? Gave your mother a washer and dryer? No. You wont miss the season opener. Youre mine.How touching, Minty said. No one has ever said that to me before. Perhaps, he thought later, stuffing the coach in that locker had been a mistake, but at the time a few hours in seclusion, among socks and jocks, seemed righteous what the coach needed to gain some perspective. He stony-broke the key off-key in the padlock, tore the M. F. Cool label off the locker, and went home.Hes been gone four days now, Momma said. He drinks and gambles, hangs out at the pool hall til all hours. But he always came home before. Since he retired, hes changed. I dont know him.Neither do I.Bring him home, baby.Minty took a cab to the waterfront and ducked in and out of a dozen bars and pool halls before he realised that Nathan would go anyw here(predicate) but the waterfront. There were sailors there, reminders. After two days of searching he found Nathan, barely able to stand, shooting pool with a fat Mexican in a cantina outside of Tijuana.Chief, lets go. Mommas waiting.I aint no chief. Go away. I got a game going.Minty put his hand on his fathers shoulder, wormlike at the smell of tequila and vomit coming off him. Papa, shes worried.The fat Mexican moved around the table to where Minty stood and pushed him away with a cue stick. My wizard, this one goes nowhere until we start out what he owes us. Two other Mexicans moved off their barstools. Now you go. He poked Minty in the chest with the cue stick and Nathan Fresh wheeled on him and bellowed in finest chief petty officer form.Dont you touch my son, you fucking greaseball.The Mexicans cue caught Nathan on the bridge of the nose and Nathan went down, limp. Minty palmed the Mexicans head and slammed his face into the pool table, then off-key in time to catch ea ch of the two coming off the bar with a fist in the throat. Another with a knife went mobile into a Corona mirror, which broke louder than his neck. Two more went down, one with a skull fractured by a billiard ball one, his shoulder wrenched from its socket, went into shock. There were seven in all, broken or unconscious, before the cantina cleared and Minty, dripping blood from a cut on his arm, carried his father out.Momma met them at the hospital and stood with Minty as Nathan came around. What are you doing here, you yellow-eyed freak? Minty walked out of the room. Momma followed.He dont mean it, baby. He really dont.I know, Momma.Where you going?Back to Vegas.You call when he sobers up. Hell want to talk to you. vociferation me if you need me, Momma, he said. He kissed her on the forehead and walked out.She called him every week, and he could tell by her whisper that Nathan was home, was fine. It made him fine too not M. F. Cool, just M.F., the one who handled things. All t hat was missing was the feeling of being needed, essential, bound to duty.surface-to-air missile had said, You shake off a mother, dont you?Minty steered the limo off the next exit, across the all overpass, and back on the highway, headed back to Kings Lake.-=*=- It had taken Steve, the Buddhist monk, only a half hour to put the car back together. When surface-to-air missile tried to figure out a way to pay for the repairs, Steve said, All misery comes from desire and connection to the material. Go. Sam said thanks.Now he was driving the Z into Utah. calliope was asleep on Coyotes lap. Coyote snored. Sam passed the time trying to figure out how long it would take to get to Sturgis, South Dakota, the location of the rally that the Guild was going to. nearly twenty hours, he thought, if the car held together. From time to time he looked over at steam organ and felt a twinge of jealousy toward Coyote. She looked like a child when she slept. He valued to protect her, hold her. But it was that childlike quality that frightened him as well. Her ability to dismiss facts, deny the negative, to see things so clearly, but so clearly wrong. It was as if she refused to accept what any reasonable adult knew the world was a dangerous, hostile place.He brushed a bound of hair out of her face before looking back to the driveway. She murmured, and came awake with a yawn. I was dreaming about sea turtles that they were really dinosaur angels.And?Thats all. It was a dream.Sam had been thinking about it too long, so there was anger in his voice when he asked her, Why didnt you call me before you went after Lonnie?I dont know.I was worried. If it werent for Coyote, I would make believe never found you.argon you two related? She seemed to be ignoring his anger. You look a lot alike. He has the same eyes and skin.No, I just know him. Sam didnt want to explain, he wanted an answer. Why didnt you call me?steam organ recoiled at his harshness. I had to go get Grubb.I could h ave gone with you.Would you have? Is that what you wanted?Im here, arent I? It would have been a hell of a lot easier if I didnt have to chase you across two states.And mayhap you wouldnt have done it if it was a hell of a lot easier. Would you?The question, and her tone, threw him. He thought for a minute, looking at the road. I dont know.I know, she said softly. I dont know much, but I know about that. Youre not the only man that ever wanted me or wanted to rescue me. They all do, Sam. men are addicted to the wanting. You like the idea of having me, and the idea of rescuing me. Thats what attracted you to me in the first place, remember.Thats not true.It is true. Thats why I had sex with you so soon.I dont get it. This was not at all how Sam had expected her to react. His brief moment of self-righteousness had degraded into self-doubt.I did it to see if you could get past the fantasy of wanting me and rescuing me, to the reality of me. Me, with a baby, and no education, and a lou sy job. Me, with no idea what Im going to do next. I cant stand the wanting coming at me all the time. I have to get past it, like I did with you, or ignore it.So you were testing me? Sam said. Thats why you took off without telling me?No, it wasnt a test. I want you, but I have Grubb to take care of now. I cant afford to hope. She was starting to tear up. Sam felt as if hed just been caught stomping a brood of kittens. She took Grubbs blanket from behind the seat and wiped her eyes.You okay? Sam asked.She nodded. Sometimes I want to be touched and I pretend that Im in love and that person loves me. I just take my moments and forget about hope. You were going to be a moment, Sam. But I started to have hope. If Id called you and you had said no, then I would have lost my hope again.Thats not how I am, Sam said.How are you, then?Sam drove in silence for a while, trying to think of something to recite the right thing to say. But that wasnt the answer either. He always knew t he right thing to say to get what he wanted, or had until Coyote showed up. But now, he didnt know what he wanted. Calliope had declared wanting a mortal sin. Talking to a woman, to anyone, without having an agenda was completely foreign to him. Where was he supposed to say from? What point of view? Who was he supposed to be?He was afraid to look at her, felt heat rise in his face when he thought about her looking at him, waiting. Maybe the truth? Where do you go to find the truth? She had found it, let it go at him. She had fit(p) her hope in his hands and she was waiting to see what he would do with it.Finally he said, Im a full-blooded Crow Indian. I was raised on a reservation in Montana. When I was fifteen I killed a man and I ran away and Ive spent my life pretending to be someone Im not. Ive never been married and Ive never been in love and thats not something I know how to pretend. Im not even sure why Im here, except that you woke something up in me and it seemed to make sense to run after something instead of away for a change. If thats the horrible act of wanting, then so be it. And by the way, you are school term on the lap of an ancient Indian god.Now he looked at her. He was a little out of breath and his mind was racing, but he felt incredibly relieved. He felt like he needed a cigarette and a towel and maybe a shower and breakfast.Calliope looked from Sam to Coyote, and then to Sam again. Her eyes were wider each time she looked back. Coyote stopped his snoring and languidly opened one eye. Hi, he said. He shut his eye and resumed snoring.Calliope bent over and kissed Sams cheek. I think that went well, dont you?Sam laughed and grabbed her knee. Look, weve still got twenty hours on the road and Im going to need you to drive. So get some sleep, okay? I dont trust him at the wheel. Sam nodded toward Coyote.But hes a god, Calliope said.As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods/They kill us for their sport. What an icky thing to say.Sorry. Shakespeare wrote it. I cant get it out of my mind this week. Its like an old song that gets stuck.That happened to me once with Rocky Raccoon. Right, Sam said. Its exactly like that.CHAPTER 29ShiftingSam drove through the day and into the night and finally stopped at a truck stop outside of Salt Lake City. Calliope and Coyote had been awake for the last few hours, but neither had spoken very much. Calliope seemed embarrassed about talking to the trickster, now that she knew he was a god, and Coyote just stared out the window, either lost in his own thoughts or (Sam thought this more likely) absorbed in some new dodge to throw peoples lives into chaos. From time to time someone would break the silence by saying, Pretty rock a statement which covered the complete observational spectrum for Utahs decorate then they would lapse into silence for a half hour or so.Sam led them into the truck stop and they all took stools at a circle counter among truckers and a couple of grungy h itchhikers who were hoping to cadge a ride. A barrel-shaped woman in an orange polyester uniform approached and poured them coffee without asking if they wanted it. Her name tag read, Arlene. You want something to eat, honey? she asked Calliope with an accent warm with Southern hospitality. Sam wondered about this no matter where you go, truck-stop waitresses have a Southern accent.Do you have oatmeal? Calliope asked. How bout a little brown sugar on that? Arlene asked. She looked over rhinestone-framed reading glasses.Calliope smiled. That would be nice.How bout you, darlin? she said to Coyote.Drinks. Umbrellas and swords.Now you know bettern that come into Mormon country and order drinks. She shamed him with a wave of her finger.Coyote moody to Sam. Mormon country?They settled in this area. They believe that rescuer visited the Indian people after he rose from the dead.Oh him. I remember him. Hairy face, made a big deal about dying and coming back to life one time. Ha. He was funny. He tried to teach me how to walk on water. I can do it pretty good in the wintertime.Arlene giggled girlishly. I dont think you need any more to drink, hon. How bout some ham and eggs?Sam said, Thatll be fine, two of those, over easy.Sam watched Arlene move around the counter, flirting with some of the truckers like a saloon girl, clucking over others like a mother hen. She snuck a cinnamon roll to a scruffy puerile hitchhiker with no money and asked after him like an older sister, then moved across the counter and found the kid a ride with a splenetic cowboy trucker. One minute she was swearing like a sailor, the next she was blushing like a virgin, and all the customers who sat at her counter got what they needed. Sam realized that he was watching a shape-shifter a kind and giving creature. Perhaps he was meant to notice. Perhaps that was what he needed. She was good. Maybe he was too.He turned to Calliope and caught her in the middle of losing a bite of oatmeal down her chin. We can do this, he said. Well get him back.I know, she said.You do?She nodded, wiping oatmeal off her chin with a napkin.Thats the scary thing about hope, she said. If you let it go too long it turns into faith. She scooped another bite of cereal.Sam smiled. He wished that he dual-lane her confidence. Did you ever go to South Dakota with Lonnie? Will we be able to find them?I went to the big summer rally, not this time of year. They dont camp with the other bikers. They film land from a farmer in the hills. All the Guild chapters stay together there.Could you find it again?I think so. But theres only one dirt road leading in there. How leave behind we get Grubb out?Well, I guess just walking in and asking for him isnt going to work.They commonly have guns. They get drunk and play shooting games.Coyote said, Wait for them to go to sleep, then sneak in and count coup.They dont really sleep, Calliope said. They do crank and drink all weekend.Then we will have to trick the m.I was afraid youd say that, Sam said. He spun on his stool and looked out the windows of the truck stop to the gas pumps, where a black stretch Lincoln was just pulling away.-=*=- Sam woke up in the passenger seat. The Z was lay sideways on the side of the road, the headlights trained over a pasture. The drivers seat was empty. Coyote, who was curled up in the tiny space behind the seat, growled and popped his head out between the seat.Whats going on?I dont know. Sam looked around for Calliope. It was raining out. Maybe she stopped to take a leak.There she is. Coyote pointed to a dent by the barbed-wire fence where Calliope was standing by a young calf, working furiously on something at the fence. A mother cow stood by watching.The calfs tail is stuck on the barbed wire, Coyote said.Sam opened the car door and stepped out into the rain just as Calliope finished untangle the calf, which scampered to its mother.Its okay, she called. I got him. She waved for him to get back into t he car. She ran to the car and got in.Sorry, I had to stop. He looked so sad.Its okay. Pasture pals, right? Sam said.She grinned as she started the car. I thought we could use the karma balance.Sam looked for a road sign. Where are we?Almost there. We have to get going. Theres been a car behind us for a while. I got way ahead of it, but I felt like it was following us.She pulled onto the road, ramming through the gears like a grand prix driver. Sam was peeking at the speedometer when he saw a color light blow by in the corner of his eye. What was that?The only stoplight in Sturgis, Calliope said. Im sorry, guys, it sort of snuck up on me. The Z goes better than it stops.Were here already? Sam said. But its still dark out.Its a few more miles to the farm, Calliope said. Sam, if a cop saw me go through that light can you take the wheel? My license is suspended.Sam checked his watch, amazed at their progress. You must have averaged ninety the whole way.I had to go to imprison the las t time they caught me. Three months. They taught me to do nails for vocational training.You did three months for a traffic violation?There were a few of them, Calliope said. It wasnt bad I got a degree. Im a certified nail technician now. In jail it was mostly LOVE/HATE nails, but I was good at it. I would have had a career except the polish fumes give me a headache.Coyote pulled Grubbs blanket out of the hole in the back window and looked through. Its clear. Theres a car behind us but its not a cop.The sleeping town was only a block long a stoplight with accessories. Calliope drove them through town and turned south on a county road that wound into the Black Hills. Its a couple of minutes up this road to the turnoff, then about a mile in on a dirt road.Sam said, Turn off the lights when you make the turn. Well drive halfway in and walk the rest of the way.Calliope made the turn onto a single-lane dirt road that led through a thick stand of lodgepole pine pines. The road was dee ply rutted, the ruts filled with water. The Z bucked and bottomed out in several places.Keep it moving steady, Sam said. Dont hit the gas or the wheels will dig into the mud. Christ, its dark.Its the trees, Calliope said. Theres a clearing ahead where they camp.Sam was trying to peer into the darkness. To his right he thought he saw something. Stop. Calliope let the Z roll to a stop. Okay, Sam said. Hit the parking lights, just for a second. Calliope clicked the parking lights on and off.Thats what I thought, Sam said. Theres a kine gate back there to the right. Back the Z in there so we can turn it around.Giving up? Coyote said.If we have to get out of here fast I dont want to have to back down this road. He got out of the car and directed Calliope as she approve the Z in and turned it off. We walk from here.They got out of the car and started down the road, stepping between the puddles. The air was damp and cold, and smelled faintly of wood smoke and pine. When the moonlight bro ke through the trees they could see their breath.Calliope said, Wait. She turned and ran back to the car, then returned in a moment with Grubbs blanket in hand. Hell want his wubby.Sam smiled in arouse of himself, knowing the girl couldnt see his face in the dark. Never face heavily armed bikers without your wubby.Coyote and CottontailIts an old story. Coyote and his friend Cottontail were hiding on a wooded hill above a camp, watching some girls dance around the fire.Coyote said, Id sure like to get close to some of them.You wont get near them, Cottontail said. They know who you are.Maybe not, little one. Maybe not, Coyote said. Ill go down there in disguise.They wont let any man get close to them, Cottontail said.I wont be a man, Coyote said. Here, hold this. Coyote took off his penis and turn over it to Cottontail. Now, when I come back into the woods I will call to you and you can bring me my penis. Then Coyote changed into an old woman and went down to the camp.He danced with the girls and pinched them and slapped their bottoms. Oh, Grandmother, the girls said, you are wicked. You must be that old trickster Coyote.Im just an old woman, Coyote said. Here, feel beneath my dress.One of the girls felt under Coyotes dress and said, She is just an old woman.Coyote pointed to two of the prettiest girls. Lets dance in the trees, he said. He danced with the girls into the woods and tickled them and made them roll around with him laughing. He touched them under their dresses until they said, Oh, Grandmother, you are wicked.Cottontail, come here Coyote called. But there was no answer. Wait here for your old grandmother to return, Coyote told the girls. He ran all over the woods calling for Cottontail, but could not find him. He went over that hill to the next one and still no Cottontail. He was excited and wanted very much to have sex with the girls, but alas, he could not find his penis.Finally the sun started coming up and the girls called, Old Grandmother, we cant wait for you any longer. We have to go home.Coyote stalked the hills cursing. That Cottontail, I will kill him for stealing my penis.As he walked he passed three other girls coming out of the woods. They were giggling and one of them was saying, He was so little, but he had such a big thing I thought I would split.Coyote ran in the attention the girls had come from and found Cottontail sitting under a tree having a smoke Ill kill you, you little thief, Coyote cried.But Coyote, I pleasured the three many times and four times I made each of them cry out.Coyote was too tired from tickling and dancing all night to stay mad. Really, four times each?Yep, Cottontail said, handing Coyote his member.I feel like I was there, Coyote said. You got a smoke?Sure, said Cottontail. Are you going to need your penis tonight? Coyote laughed and smoked with Cottontail while his little friend told the story of his long night of pleasuring.