She felt her road sight falter, her mind sight calling up Bonnie behind the wheel of a truck, driving herself and a gaggle of Bone Pile women into town. Swarming that bank with their dusty bare feet and treacherous voices, gathering the envelope. Driving away with the monetary means of escape in their skinny white hands. Taking down their town, attaching it all to their dilapidated vehicles. Their unknowing men bearing it all away.
Melveena had always had the sight. She had always known what was to come. But she hadn’t needed the sight this week. She had known all week, watching the lovely defiled girls of Bone Pile, looking at the reddened, stuporous face of the man she couldn’t even remember loving. She had known while sitting at her table with Raven and holding her hand in a good-bye that neither of them could bear to speak out loud. She had known her time at Ochre Water was over. Whatever held her in the Francie June Memorial Trailer Park, just outside Ochre Water, California, it was gone.
And now, she was free. Free to find the ocean, free to find a man, free to fill up a cookie jar. Free to do whatever she wanted. She had finally found her way to the highway in Granny’s Caddy, the wind tossing her hair, Rhondalee’s stash of skimmed cash in her pocketbook, Francie June singing on the radio.
The desert surrounded her in all its parched glory. Now and then she drew back her arm and pitched a remote onto the highway. She’d pilfered quite a few over the years, and she watched them smash and splinter on the blacktop. Yes, that was another mystery solved: what had happened to Clyde’s remotes. She grabbed another. Holding that remote told her the story of Clyde’s life. Changing brake pads and changing the channel.
She let it fly.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Karen Berry lives and works in Portland, Oregon. Her daily life is arranged around numerous daughters, small dogs, and friends. She would like to thank all those friends by name, but that would take up too many pages, so she has to call out just a few for their particular help as readers: Mimi Newhouse, James MacDougall, Sue Sabol and Sarah Bryant.
Karen G. Berry - Mayhem 01 - Love and Mayhem Page 32
