A Thousand Falling Crows (16 page)

The bird drew Tió's attention away from Carmen for a brief second. If she had planned on stabbing him and running out, this was her chance. But it passed as quickly as it came. He looked back at her with his black swollen eye.

“Did Eddie hurt you?” Carmen asked, summoning what bravery she had left by stepping forward.

Tió responded by stepping backward. He had never shown any interest in her touch; he just watched her every move from a distance. Carmen assumed that he was like all the other boys, but now she was not so sure.

“Don't matter. Eddie's lookin' for you, too.”

Carmen walked slowly toward Tió. She could see all of him, even in the dull, flickering light. It was his eyes and his fingers, specifically his fingers on the gun, that interested her. “I won't hurt you, Tió. I promise.”

He backed up against the wall. It was sweating as much as he was. “You have to go,” Tió said.

His male smell rushed up inside Carmen's nose. Tió smelled sweeter. Even though he was a threat, up close his features were softer than Eddie's. His nose was gentler, not so much a conquistador's but a servant boy's from some fable; lost in the woods outrunning an army of trolls. His eyes, too, now that she could see them clearly, were not so vacant. Tió was afraid.

“I won't hurt you,” she said softly, without any intention of arousing him. He looked like an injured bird in need of tending to. It was questionable whether he would fly again, or . . . if he had ever known the pleasure of it in the first place.

Tió turned his head away. “I don't like you.”

“I know,” Carmen said. It was a hush, a whisper. She raised her hand to the side of his face, reached toward his bruise with her index finger.

Tió drew back slowly as his eyes grew wide. If his head could have melted into the hard adobe wall, it would have.

His skin was warm and without thinking about anything any further, Carmen allowed her instincts to take over. She angled her face upward and brushed her lips across Tió's cheek. He swallowed hard.

“That's enough.”

The voice came from behind them, and it startled Carmen. She stepped back and turned around quickly. She knew the voice. It was Eddie.

Like normal, Tió sat in the backseat and Carmen sat in the passenger seat, pushed up against the door. The Ford had a bench seat in the front and there was plenty of room for Eddie and Carmen to be comfortable. It was a different car, a newer one, but she didn't ask any questions. If it was stolen, she didn't want to know.

Eddie usually liked for her to sit as close to him as she could, his hand on her leg. Sometimes, he would slide his hand under her dress and rub her in her private place, causing her to breathe hard, get wet, and be embarrassed because of Tió sitting in the backseat, usually looking out the window—or acting like he was. Eddie always flashed a grin to his brother in the rearview mirror. But not today. Eddie and Carmen sat as far from each other as they could.

“We have to get out of here,” Eddie said.

Carmen stared out the passenger window, into the darkness. Night had fallen, and there were very few houses that sat on the road they traveled. Distant lights flickered like lightning bugs. She could never catch them when she was a girl and had chased after them. “I want to go home,” she said.

Eddie shook his head. His face was illuminated by the soft glow of the dashboard lights. “You can't. If anybody knows you were with us, they'll come looking for you there.”

“How would they know?” Carmen asked.

Tió rustled in the seat behind her.

“He used my name,” Eddie said. “It won't take them long to figure out it was us.”

Carmen flinched but continued to stare out the window. She had always thought she could go home if she really wanted to. “Where are you going?”

“Oklahoma. At least to the other side of the state line. We'll have to lay low for a little while. But we have to make a stop first.”

They were way past Wellington and Memphis. Carmen knew they were heading north, but she had no clue where they were. “I don't want to go.”

Eddie turned to her. “We're not going back. I can't risk it. Not for a minute. You're with us, Carmen; that's just the way it is. I‘m not letting you out of my sight. Not ever again. Do you understand?”

Tears started to well up in her eyes, but she fought them back. They would just make Eddie madder than he already was. She tried to swallow the fear and the sadness, make it go away anyway she could. She started counting the stars in the sky.

Eddie pressed on the accelerator and the engine roared, almost like it had been sleeping the whole time and had just come to life. They sped down the vacant road, and Carmen restrained herself from looking over at the speedometer. If they crashed, she hoped she would die fast. Get it over with.
Por favor, Dios, que sera rapidó
. Please, God, make it fast.

Up ahead, there were lights on the horizon, and, in a few blinks of the eye, they were upon a row of buildings. Another county line that offered roadhouses and a place for gas. Eddie slowed the car and turned into the first parking lot he came to.

He stopped the car in the shadow of the building, dug into his back pocket, and tossed a handkerchief at Carmen. “Put it on.”

Carmen let the piece of red cloth fall into her lap. “Why?”

Eddie ignored the question and looked over the seat at Tió. “You stay here,” he ordered, then turned back to Carmen. “We're gonna need some money, Carmen. I had to leave all that gin behind because of you. Now, you're gonna be my Bonnie Parker.”

Carmen felt like she was trapped in a deep well. Her fingers were gripped tight on the door handle, but she knew she wouldn't get far if she made a run for it. It was hard telling what Eddie would do to her if he caught her.

“Give her your gun, Tió,” Eddie said, tying the bandana across his face. “And honk the horn if you see somebody coming.”

JUNE 28, 1934

The crows were accustomed to road traffic, were glad of it actually. They could perch on a telephone line for hours staring down at it, waiting for a mouse, raccoon, possum, or any other slow-footed animal to meet its fate darting from one side of the hard surface to the other. The crows would caw and flutter about, celebrating the ease of the hunt. It took no energy, just a leisurely amount of patience. Skill was needed in timing after the kill had been made—a crow would have to fly away from its feast frequently, depending on the traffic, or risk meeting the same fate as its meal had.

The larger the kill, the more of them joined in on the feast, brought in by an unmistakable, echoing announcement that could be heard for miles around. Flocks were usually greeted with explosions from humans, who would appear out of nowhere, pointing long guns at them, with flashes of fire and death erupting from the ends of them.

Guns made no sense to crows, but they understood the concept of tools. In difficult times, they would drop a nut or a turtle in the right place on the road and wait until one of the machines crunched it open. Then rush in to feed. The humans didn't know they were being used by crows, and that suited the birds just fine.

On this day, a lone crow sat at the top of a gangly and spiraling live oak, keeping watch over the road. The recent storm had slowed his feeding. He was in the middle of the town, among the buildings, but the perch was perfect to see everything that was going on below and to call from, when there was reason.

One building took up the whole block, sat right in the center of it, like it was an important nest. Other smaller buildings sat around it, with people coming and going throughout the day. At night, it was quiet, and starlings huddled in the few trees surrounding the big building, playing their safety in a numbers game. Coyotes and foxes trailed through the streets after the moon vanished, and raccoons raided trash cans, dining on the food left out for them by the humans, or so thought the coons.

This crow was accustomed to the ways and sounds of the town during the day. But it was surprised when a long bus lurched around the corner. Usually the machine appeared at the same time that it had the day before, and the day before that, just when the sun started to drop shadows on the red brick street from left to right. But it was early. The sun hung high in the sky, lighting the world, warding off any more rain or storms for the foreseeable future.

The crow liked the bus. People would straggle out of the big machine, never the same number, never a crowd either. Sometimes, they would drop shiny things, and the crow was just as interested in those as it was in food. Crows loved shiny things.

The machine stopped across the road, and a big puff of black smoke belched out the rear end of it. No one seemed to notice or care, but the crow jumped. It sounded like a big gun had gone off.

After it calmed down and reclaimed its spot, the crow waited and watched intently as people exited the machine. They reminded him of ants, only they were bigger, with fewer legs but far more dangerous. He was hoping one of the smaller of them would drop a cookie, a sweet. It liked sweets almost as much as it did shiny things.

One of the humans caught the crow's attention, drew it away from the possibility of food. It was a female, not that old, looking very unsure of herself, unsure of where she was. She looked lost, and she looked like she was carrying a child inside her; at the very start of showing a brood, yet to lay her eggs. Eggs for humans were different than they were for crows. The crow knew that much but cared very little beyond the thought.

The other people pushed past the girl as she stood and stared up and down the road. It concerned the crow that the girl was alone. If she were a crow, there would be wings everywhere, fussing over her and her coming brood. But humans were more solitary than the crows.

The machine pulled away, coughing out more black smoke, and all of the other humans had disappeared. All but the girl.

Finally, after pacing up and down in front of the spot where she had exited the bus, she sat down on a bench. Comfort did not ease her nervousness. The crow couldn't take his eyes off her, even though there was nothing shiny on her or about her.

It wasn't long until another machine, a smaller one, pulled up in front of the girl. The driver leaned over and rolled down the window. “You look lost,” he said.

The crow had seen him before, followed him. Saw what he did. People trusted him right away, even though they shouldn't have. It was the one thing that perplexed the crow. Hawks were hawks and sparrows were sparrows. There was no question about what they were and how they hunted. But humans could be anything they wanted. At least, that's how it seemed to the crow.

“I‘m waiting on someone,” the girl said. She had a box with her, like a lot of the other humans. Sometimes trinkets fell from them. But the box was locked tight, and the crow had very little interest in it.

“Pete Jorgenson, I suspect,” the male human said.

“Yes, how'd you know?” The girl relaxed, allowed a smile to flitter across her face. A bead of sweat ran down from her forehead to her chin. She wiped it unconsciously.

“I can take you out to his place.”

“Oh, I wouldn't want to be any trouble. He'll be along shortly, I‘m sure of it.”

“The bus was early, and Pete might have his hands full.”

“You know him?”

“Everybody in town knows Pete.” The man pushed the door open and motioned for her to get inside.

“I don't want to be any trouble,” the girl repeated.

“Oh, don't worry, you won't be any trouble at all. No trouble at all.” He patted the seat next to him.

The girl nodded, stood, and leaned down to pick up the box—but by that time the man had jumped from his machine and was at her side.

“I‘ll get that,” he said. “You go on, make yourself comfortable.”

The girl smiled. She seemed to like the man, just like the other girls had. “I‘ve always heard there wasn't anything like Texas hospitality, and I guess it's true.”