he walked along the towns main thoroughfare  

had he walked it long enough it would take him across the railroad tracks the ironworked bridge over a subterranean river and beyond into hayfields livestock pastures stables barns and domiciles

                                                                                    Not something yasee every day 

he said it out loud to hear himself  

to verify he was conscious lucid awake

he read as he walked

ahead of him two women walked

he guessed Mexicans Latinas   jetblack hair their shortsleeved white tops contrasted with their coffeecoloured skin

the one nearest the street curbthe taller of the two also wore a deepblue vest at the distance between them he saw what must have been a floral pattern running down her spine collar to hem 

they walked faster than he were pulling away

he read more

glancing up to take in the lay of the land before him he saw the smaller woman the one to the right was shorter now

he mustnt had seen her right earlier

he went back to the book a fascination passage

                                                   One eye socket was slightly bigger with a spectacular-strange blue-white crystal-marble orb in its bony casing, quite a masterpiece of ocular artistry, a tiny supernova of light and line, woven in jagged color, radiating out from a pupil that was not round. This ragged pupil was a hole light used to enter the mule.

looking up again

                  the women were holding hands the smaller women was shorter yet  and younger  what had been long braids were pigtails now

were his eyes playing tricks on him theyd been known to fuck with himmess with his mind he reset  looked down then back up

      NO was seeing what he was seeing they were pulling away from him their steps cadence quicker than his  they walked with purpose he was strolling  reading 

he began reading again

they got into his headdistracted him he had to looked again 

                                                               the small one was now a child half the size of the woman in the vest walking nearest the curb

he heard the bray of a truck

                              it emerged from a blind alley quicker than it should have  he startled the driver maybe because he was standing still at a stop short glaring at him he returned a sheepish expression its all fun an games until someone gets run over the look wouldnt have been sheepish if he kept walking the driver would have been horrified he wouldnt have been able to brake in time

he stepped backwaved the truck by

                                     they obviously needed to be somewhere   he didnt

it rolled past its tall dull white box obscured his vision

he looked after the women again

                                   could have knocked him sideways with hummingbird shit

the woman in the vest carried a baby he could see the crown of its head in the crook the elbow of her left arm

he stopped and watched her walk until the road veered right disappeared behind a row of hundredyearold live oaks

   he cleared his throat

                         he said Thats not something yasee every day

heard himself again

approximately 1440,  Thursday,  14  4. 22

1550,  Thursday,  14  4. 22

pg339  Pity the Beast  Robin McLean