“What happened?”
Lucian leaned back in his chair with his palms on his thighs. “Mike Thomas . . .” He paused for a moment. “He still got that spread out near the Stewarts?”
“Yep.”
“Well, the snow got so deep that it filled up the cattle guards, so Mike’s father had him string a strand of barbed wire across the ranch road to keep the stock in.”
“Oh, no.”
“Geo hit it at about forty miles an hour.” He chuckled.
“Mike and another artist fella, Joel Ostlind, found him that afternoon, and they had to use a digging spade to get him loose from the road where his blood had froze. Doctors said that the cold was probably what saved him.” I opened the door for Henry and Dog but, just before closing it behind us, he added, “Another good reason for you to not move to New Mexico—it’s warm down there, and you can bleed to death.”
On the way back from the old folks’ home, as Lucian referred to it, I conferred with the Cheyenne Nation, and we decided to partake of the best of both worlds and pick up a burrito at the Kum & Go and take it home to the jail to warm it up.
We were both surprised to find the much-used Olds Toronado parked out front and discovered Gina Stewart parked behind the counter. The same dirty parka was draped over her shoulders, and she was munching on some peanut butter crackers while watching a thirteen-inch black-and-white television, which was up on the cigarette shelves. She didn’t even glance at us as we walked past the height indicators that were taped to the doorjamb to help identify burglars. I had spent a lot of time in the gourmet portion of the store and knew that the frozen burritos were stacked like tiny bundles of firewood in the fast-food section at the back.
Henry studied me as I peered through the glass. “You are actually going to eat this stuff?”
There was the shredded beef and cheese, the bean and cheese, and my old standby, the chicken and cheese. There was always the cheese with cheese, but I never felt full without the little bit of protein from the supposed-to-be-meat filling. In all honesty, I tried not to read too closely when I partook of this type of fine dining. Armadillo and cheese would be more than I could stomach. “You don’t know what you’re missing.”
“Yes, I do.” He wandered down the aisle to look for something more suited to his epicurian tastes.
I pulled a chicken and cheese out for me and an extra shredded beef and cheese for Dog and called after him. “Snob.”
I put the veritable cornucopia of freeze du jour on the counter along with a tall-boy can of Rainier, pulled out my wallet, and waited for the young woman to see me. After a moment, she looked up, annoyed that someone was interrupting her evening, but when she saw me she brightened a little. “Oh, hi, Sheriff.”
I laid a twenty on the Plexiglas that protected the plastic counter and read the poster that informed me about the available career opportunities in the country’s third-largest convenience store chain with, easily, the most sexually suggestive name. “Hi, Gina, what are you watching?” I thought I could make out Cary Grant’s voice and possibly Deborah Kerr’s.
She chewed on a strand of her blondish hair. “It’s that movie where the man and the woman are supposed to meet at the Empire State Building, but she gets hit by a car.”
Must be the season for it, I thought.
She rubbed some crumbs off her jeans and dropped the empty cracker wrapper in a trash can behind the counter. “I think it’s supposed to be romantic—you know, for Valentine’s Day. I’m not supposed to be watching the TV during business hours, but the manager put it up there, and we don’t have television at the house.”
She paused as she looked past me to where Henry was opening another of the coolers along the back wall. “I get bored, and it makes me feel better when I watch a movie, but not because of the movie, though.” She thought about it, and I watched her profile as she looked past my shoulder and continued to study the Bear. “I think about all the other people around the state that are watching the same movie, and it’s like we’re watching it together. I mean they’re lonely, they’re bored, and we’re all watching the same thing.” Her eyes came back to mine, and her voice dropped. “You have to keep your eye on those Indians; they steal.”
I raised an eyebrow but ignored the remark. “It’s more than just the state.”
“Huh?”
I leaned back and traced the cable coming out of the display stand above me that then disappeared into the broken corner of one of the acoustic ceiling tiles. “It’s cable, Gina, which means you’re watching the movie with the whole country.”
She smiled. “That makes me feel even better.”
I smiled back. “How’s Geo?”
She thought for a moment. “I think Grampus’ fine, but I don’t know. Since I missed my shift on Monday they made me come in and cover tonight.” She leaned a little forward and confided. “I don’t like working nights; a lot of creepos come in here.”
Henry joined us with a bag of mixed salad and an unsweetened iced tea. “Present company excluded?”
She stared at him blankly. “Huh?”
I looked at him. “Gina here says she has to keep an eye on you Indians because you steal.”
He nodded. “We do, but only small stuff, unlike you whites.”
I pointed to the items I’d hunted and gathered. “I’ll treat to save you from petty theft.” I turned to Gina. “How much?”
Her fingers tripped across the keyboard of the cash register—she seemed relieved to have escaped the conversation. “Nineteen dollars and thirty-seven cents.”
I slid the twenty a little closer so that Gina would notice. I couldn’t think of anybody in our little community that I’d identify specifically as a creepo. “Creepos like who?”
She took the money and handed me my change. “Ozzie Dobbs for one. He’s always coming in here, standing around and looking at my butt, and hitting on me. It’s totally gross.”
That was surprising. “Really.” I took the change and stuffed it in my pocket.
A Volkswagen Jetta rounded the corner at Main, and the driver took advantage of the ice to hit the gas and drift the vehicle outrageously sideways. I raised my arm and hit the remote on my truck to blip the lights and draw attention to my unit, whereupon the driver slowed and drove on with a little more circumspection.
Henry’s voice rumbled. “Rachael Terry—she is a wild one.”
“Yep.” I nodded, making a mental note to call Mike and Susie. I looked back at Gina. “Ozzie Dobbs, really?”
“Yeah, he comes in here once a week at least. That’s the only reason I don’t mind covering other shifts—at least then he doesn’t know when I’m working.” She picked up the beer and the tea and stood them in a plastic sack. Her eyes strayed back to the television. “He always wants to buy me things, which is nice ’cause Duane is tight as the bark on a tree.” She dumped the frozen burritos and the salad on top. “You know, most people warm these up in the microwave before they eat them.”
I picked up the package. “Buy you things?”
She shrugged her narrow shoulders, and the parka fell off. She was wearing an oversized, gray sweatshirt that had UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS in orange stenciled across her chest. “Yeah, one time he offered to buy me anything in the store if I’d give him a kiss.” She glanced around. “Like I’d fuckin’ do that for anything in here.”
The lights on Main Street were swinging in the wind and blinking yellow, the way they always did after midnight, and it was as if the whole town, like a pinball game, had gone tilt. It was odd and depressing, thinking of somebody like Ozzie Dobbs targeting Gina; sometimes it meant something, but most of the time it was just the flotsam and jetsam of the human tide. “I’m concerned about the younger generation.”