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
