Elisha's Bones - Don Hoesel [86]
The waiter has been by twice, yet it’s not until Esperanza slides the bill in front of me that I understand. I reach for my wallet and extract some of Angie’s cash.
After I hang up, I feel lighter. Walking through the whole thing with Duckey—forcing myself to lay it out in linear form—was cathartic. It’s helped me to get a handle on what we’ve done, and to begin to formulate what we need to accomplish still. As I try to answer that last question, I find that even if I don’t have a good long-term plan, I think I have a place to start.
CHAPTER 18
Two hours have passed since I’ve seen another car, and I’m beginning to believe I’m the last man on earth. Like most people my age, I liked the Mad Max movies from the eighties, and I can understand how this setting spawned the post-apocalyptic feel of the films. There’s a primordial rawness here—the sense that the place exists as some vast and important thing regardless of the dearth of humans crossing it. It is all desert and sky, mile after mile of two-lane road scorched by the sun and covered over by windblown sand, and nature battling nothing but itself. And it’s an experience and a vista rendered impotent as long as the Mustang’s radio can pick up even one signal.
In this case, it’s an FM jazz station, originating from Leonora. I have off-tempo bass guitars and horns acting as fellow journeyers, and I’m grateful for the connection to the outside world, especially because Esperanza checked out over an hour ago. The music is a link to something beyond these environs—a reassurance that even this manifestation of nature is comparatively small as long as I have something else with which to occupy myself.
As the darkness gradually recedes, a coat of red dirt is revealed on the once-shiny body of the Mustang. With Sydney far behind us now, the road in front of me ascends and the Mustang’s tires knuckle down on the dust-covered surface. A line of low hills—red dirt with sparse green cover—is the only thing to differentiate this land from the desert I see through the windshield.
Regardless of the circumstances, I’m looking forward to seeing Jim, even if I have to steel myself for the barbs he will surely throw at me about my becoming a professor. My hands tap a quiet rhythm on the steering wheel, an anticipation of sorts. The last time we spoke face-to-face was at Will’s funeral and, while he fared better than I, even working for a few years after the tragedy, I don’t think he completely lost the haunted feeling when in the field. I hope retirement has been better for him. When I called and told him I was in the country, his pleasure couldn’t have been more genuine. Espy and I could stay with him and the lovely Meredith for a month and not be made to feel as if we were intruding.
The Mustang crests the top of the hill, and Laverton opens up before us, the whole of the town bordered by gradual rises that highlight the vastness of the surrounding desert, as well as offer a buffer.
Espy stirs. She does a half stretch, which one must do in a cramped car, then opens her eyes. It takes her a little while to absorb the scene outside the car. I can tell the second she’s fully awake, because I see her grimace. Not that I blame her. A vista of sand, sky, barren hills, and a city so exposed to the elements must appear strange to someone used to jungle and urban areas, even if Espy is more traveled than most.
“Have we died and gone to hell?” she asks.
“Once you taste Meredith’s cooking, you’ll think we’re in heaven.”
It’s the wrong thing to say; my stomach has been growling for the last two hours. I press down on the gas pedal, moving the dirty red car onward and hoping that Meredith has made her coffee cake.
While the house is old, an original of its period, the large pond it overlooks is all Jim’s doing. My friend has always loved water, and although an affinity for the town and