Chapter 1

I was walking around the little store stretching my legs when I saw her. She looked tired and dirty. She didn't really belong in this dirty, desert store. I'm not good at guessing ages but she was somewhere between fourteen and twenty-two. She had a cute face, brunette hair, nice legs displayed by her shorts, very thin hips, almost no waist and small breasts pushing out her tight yellow shirt. She was listlessly walking around the store looking at the food. There was something about her that peaked my curiosity. What is she doing here?

I had stopped at this combination gas station, store and lunch counter just across the Arizona border east of Blythe. It was lunchtime and I knew there wasn't much along these roads so I had stopped at his not very promising lunch stand. I was driving a van I had converted for this trip. The back had been modified into a simple, with emphasis on little, apartment on wheels. Storage areas for clothes, CD racks for my music, a little cabinet for emergency provisions like wine and snacks and a pull down mattress that was actually pretty comfortable. I wasn't planning to sleep in the van all that often but I could do it if I was away from towns and needed too. Towns are sometimes few and far between in the Southwest.

I had planned this trip to see the Southwest. Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Utah and Nevada were all on the itinerary. Setting out from California in the spring to avoid the heat of summer I was making my first stop. What was the girl doing here? I looked around the store. No one else was in the store. She wasn't here with family. I looked outside. My car was the only one here. She obviously didn't live around here. The only thing within miles was cactus and sand. Our meandering paths crossed at the candy. She looked up at me with that same listless look but it turned to a little smile.

I took a chance. "You want to have some lunch?"

She stopped. I could see a lot of thoughts going across her face.

"On me," I continued.

She looked over at the restaurant. It was open and public and safe so hunger overcame apprehension. "Kay."

I led the way over to the cafe. We sat in a little booth and the waitress brought menus. The waitress gave me one of those stares. She probably had noticed that we hadn't come in together. Fine, I thought. She sure hadn't offered the girl lunch. Screw her. We ordered a couple of burgers with fries and cokes.

"I'm Mike."

"Tammy." I held out my hand and we shook. For some reason she thought this was funny and started giggling. The weariness left her face. That quick shake broke the ice. I don't know why but the dam had been breached. She started talking. She had hitched from somewhere in LA. This is as far as she got. She was riding with a trucker who picked her up in Riverside. A few hours out of LA he had let her know there was a price attached to the free ride. He had pointed to the bed in the back of his cabin. So at the first stop when the trucker had needed to take a pee, she had run into the ladies room and hidden until he left. An hour later she was still wandering around the store when I said Hi. I had a million questions but some things are not a stranger's business.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"Going east."

"Me too," she said. "How far?"

I smiled. "Until I get far enough."

"Far enough?"

"Yeah," I said. "Far enough."

"Are you going somewhere or going away from somewhere?"

I was startled. That was a perceptive question. I looked into her eyes. There was genuine concern and intelligence in those eyes. I started to give a flip answer but stopped myself. "A little of both. But mostly going away I guess. Why did you ask that?"

"I'm doing the same I guess. I thought maybe you were like me." She rested her head on her upraised hand. Some of the tiredness was back.

"You want to ride with me?" She looked apprehensive. "Or you can wait for another truck driver."

She got my point. I could see she was thinking that she didn't have a lot of good choices. I guess she didn't think I was a great choice either. "You're not a truck driver?"

I smiled. "Nope. I'm not a truck driver. But the accommodations are cozy. I don't want to lie about that. You'll know whether I snore."

She hesitated and then said, "Well, I guess that's better than staying here. I'll ride along. What are you going to do?"

"My plan was to see the sights in the Southwest. I want to see some of the cliff dwellings. Some of the national parks. Maybe see the caverns in New Mexico. I want to see Monument Valley."

"What's that?" she asked looking puzzled.

"That's where they filmed the westerns. John Ford started filming there in the thirties. You know the shots in westerns where you see these giant columns in the background coming straight out of the desert?"

"Yeah."

"That's Monument Valley. I've wanted to see it since I was a kid watching John Wayne. It's America."

Tammy smiled again. "So you and me are going to be like in the movies huh?"

"I guess so," I answered. "By the way. How old are you." Her face clouded up a little. I was prying and she didn't like it. I couldn't blame her. I didn't want her prying into my life either. When it hurts to look back the last thing you want is someone forcing you to look. "I'm not prying. I don't really care. But you have to be eighteen or I can't take you along."

She looked at me and said a little defensively, "Sorry. I don't trust a lot right now. I'm eighteen. You won't get in trouble."

"That's good enough for me."

We finished lunch right after and headed out to the van. I took off down highway 95 south toward Yuma. The country rolled by. It was bleak. The same monotonous colors. Everything was gray and brown. Even the cactus, although nominally green, look gray and sandy colored in that forlorn country. The only real splotches of color are man-made, the occasional billboard or road sign. Sand, rocks and scrub. That's it.

Chapter 2 »