A short writing exercise - a sequel of sorts for John Grady (All The Pretty Horses), imitating the style of Cormac McCarthy:
He could see the man approaching from under the lowered brim of his hat. The air was hot and drifting southward. The dusty rust of the old chair lifted into a swirling breeze and dissolved into a thousand invisible particles. John Grady sat still and watched as the man grew bigger.
He exhaled gently and the warm air from his nostrils streamed into his dark rough moustache.
I’m here to deliver to a Mr. John Cole.
John Grady nodded and extended his hand. The man narrowed his eyes. Then he pulled a damp letter out of his back pocket and thrust it towards John Grady.
What's this about?
I'd say you better read the letter.
John Grady leaned back in approval. The chair creaked on its spindly limbs.
I'll be going now.
All right.
So long.
His heels scratched the gravel of the ground as he turned around and began to slink off into the grove of mesquite trees.
John Grady stared at the letter in his hand. He carefully unfolded it and smoothed the stiff creases with two pinched fingers. His eyes darted across the page at the small dark handwriting and callused whorls of his fingertips grazed the long lines of letters on the page and barely felt anything. The letters blurred together at first and then phrases began to form out of the inky chaos.
In the morning he was riding his horse in a beaten sliver of a rutted path along the highway with a clean loose shirt and two pairs of socks and a leather bag with his razor and toothbrush. A glossy car slowed down as it passed John Grady. The two children in the back pressed their noses on the window as they stared at him. He stared back at the car, so lustrous and out of place in this dusty stretch of Texas roads. The car stopped alongside him and the driver cranked down the window.
You need anything?
No sir.
Where you headed?
I'm goin to see my kid.
The man looked surprised and nodded at John Grady.
You a father?
Soon to be sir.
Sure you don't need anything?
John Grady shook his head and waved the car away. The window rose and the car sped off. He rode out along the highway that day and then across the unpaved pastures. He pushed the horse faster as the light grew blue. He rode out to the middle of an overgrown field lit dimly by the stars and stood with his head leaned back against the sinewy neck of the horse while the sky lit up electric and rumbling past the low mountains. He dug his hands deep in his pockets and braced against the cold of the night as he stole warmth from the horse.
Days to come he rode the mountains and looked out over the world from the highest rock shelves and thought of everyone. Their faces filled the empty sky and spoke to him in the whispers of the wind through the evergreen ash. He took off his hat and let their voices blow through his damp hair and cool his head.
He lay down his blankets and stared at the sky as the moon twisted up into its crescent and the sun-stroked blue turned into a bloody red and then faded into a dull stony blue which quickly disappeared and left only a canvas of black. Behind him he could hear the steady murmur of a creek as it carved itself deep into the rock of the mountain.
He was passed by a group of Mexicans riding dirt-crusted dark mules. Their clothes were rough and faded, and their weathered faces were whittled gaunt. One of them carried a dusty gun in his hand and pressed the cold metal against his face to cool his skin.
Es de Tejas? one of them asked.
Si, he answered. He finished his cigarette and watched them as they stopped to drink from the gritty river.
Donde estoy ahora? Cerca de Coahila?
They turned to look at him. They had forgotten he was there.
Claro. Ya esta en Coahuila.
Bueno.
He nodded and saddled his horse.
Que tengan buen viaje.
They smiled stiffly and turned back to the river with a tip of their hats.
He reached La Purisma in the midmorning. He walked beside the horse and tied him to a tree near the front of the bunkhouse. The air carried a familiar scent of leather and the sweat of horses and men. He could see the house and the shadows crossing the windows of rooms, but he didn’t walk over. He pressed his face into the neck of the horse and let the raw power fill his chest and lungs. In the late afternoon, when the sun began to paint the landscape in gold plating, he walked to the house.
He rapped four times on the door and rubbed his unshaven face as he waited. The door opened, and he saw her standing there. The sun poured over her and lit up her dark eyes from within. Her black hair was pulled up with a white ribbon and left her neck pale and exposed.
He nodded and looked down at her stomach, where the faintest outlines of a growing swell began to push at her blue dress. In a rush of emotion, he pulled her close to him and pressed his face into her glossy hair. He breathed in through his nose and smelled her perfume and softness and ran his fingers down her neck and she let herself be drawn in by him. Never had he been so glad to touch, to feel. She breathed warm into his the triangle framed by his neck and collarbone.
Todavia me quieres?
Yes, he breathed. God, yes.
Vamos.
They rode together down the ciénaga road with the sun dropping in the west like a golden ball falling quickly behind the trees. The silence between them was strange but light and more like a gossamer veil than a barrier. The horses pounded their castanet rhythms into the rocky ground and he never took his eyes off of her, but she kept looking straight ahead and squinting into the sun.
Do you want to marry me?
She pulled her horse to a stop and turned to look at him.
I think that would not work.
It would. I'll do anything for you.
She said nothing.
I love you, he said to her. But he was talking to someone who was not what she once was, someone weathered and twisted by something that he was not there for, something he did not understand. He understood that he could not understand, but it tore his chest in half as he realized it.
She turned away and drove her horse on. They got to very edge of the western mesa and turned around as the red sun was just melting into the streaked horizon. Going back they reached the lake where they had stopped so many times. The water looked the same dark warm black as always. In its fluid wrinkles he could see their paled and twisting reflections and the burning, dancing cold stars so far above them.
I don't know, she said.
Me neither.
We must go back.
What did your father say?
She said nothing and he looked at her and saw a dewdrop growing in her dark lashes. He reached his hand out to her face and pressed his thumb gently against her tear and pulled it away from her eyes. He pulled her close to him and looked up toward the piercing moon and heard the halting cries of the slender cranes that circled overhead and breathed in time with her and in time with the horses and in time with the night air. The cold of night had brought a deathlike chill to her pale skin and he rubbed his hands up and down her arms and tried to warm her.
You must go back to your home.
Why did you want me to come here? he whispered into the infinite darkness.
I made a mistake.
I can't.
She pushed him back and he fell on a rock and hit the hard ground. She turned away and mounted her horse.
Promise me you will be gone by morning, she said.
I won't leave.
She turned away and galloped down the ciénaga path.
I love you, she said, but it was lost to the merciless howl of the wind.
He awoke the next morning in the tall green brush to the sound of quiet footsteps. The sun was bright in the sky and burned his eyes. He stood up and stared at the face of Duena Alfonsa. Her gray hair was gathered up in the back and she was dressed in a dark, heavy skirt and white blouse. He took off his hat and let it fall off his fingers onto the ground.
Morning, mam, John Grady said.
You came back to her.
He nodded. She stepped forwards and pulled her leathery hands out from behind her back. In her left hand she held a small metal gun.
In the faded palm of an ancient woman, John Grady could see how everything in his life had connected and led up to this. The weight of his life came crashing down onto him and he let it sink him into the ground. The dirt pressed up into his bent knees and he willed himself to relax.
Here a woman's reputation is all she has.
Yes mam.
There is no forgiveness, you see.
The words rang bitterly familiar in his head. His mind reeled with a thousand thoughts but he spoke calmly and with distance and composure.
Call him Jimmy if he’s a boy, he said.
She nodded. She wove her fingers into the gun and pulled the trigger.
He felt the bullet rip through him and sank backwards onto the ground. There was warmth spreading like a glowing poinsettia over his white shirt. The sun burned a hole in the blue sky and grew over him. He listened to the soft voices that were whispering and snaking between the dry blades of grass. He could hear his grandfather, his father, Jimmy. They were pulling him closer, farther from the heavy ground.
You had honor, his grandfather said.
His father nodded. Jimmy smiled faintly.
It don't hurt so bad, see?
John Grady nodded.
And with one final thought of her riding the beaten path on that powerful Arabian, he let himself be burned into the whiteness of the sun.