Ledman Pickup

Seventeen

Leonora Wells was not in a hurry. She knew where she wanted to go, even if she didn't yet know exactly what she wanted to do. She sat at the picnic table at the rest area and watched the cars pull in, their drivers and passengers spill out and take their breaks, return and drive off again. She was waiting for one vehicle in particular, one she would know when she saw it. In the meantime, she felt a growing sense of something new, a feeling of potential power like she had never known before. She imagined that this must be how it felt to be a lioness about to spring on its oblivious prey. The sensation was growing stronger by the moment. Ideas were coming into her mind, thoughts of a variety previously inconceivable to her, as if she could know, at the snap of her fingers, everything there was to know about anybody she might pick at random.

Anything about them would suffice to bring results instantaneously to her mind - a license plate number, a name, a receipt that might fall from their jackets - any scrap of data would be enough to form a complete and perfect picture. She would know not only the person's name, address, telephone numbers and email addresses, but exactly how much cash they had in their wallet, where they were going and why, what she could say to evoke whatever response she desired. How to be omniscient. It seemed insane and partly she did not believe it, and yet she knew it was true, as if that little voice in the back of her mind was a mythical genii suddenly at her command. She had always followed her own little voice and it had never let her down before. She was tempted to try, and yet a little afraid that it might be true. She held her breath and then said, aloud,

"That old blue pickup, Colorado 464-CCM" and already she knew. The old man emerging from the driver's side was Patrick Veers, age 74, from Tinsley. He'd stopped at a gas station seventy miles back and used an ATM to withdraw one hundred and twenty dollars, paying a two dollar seventy five cent service fee for the privilege. He was two hundred and fifteen miles from home, returning from a visit to his daughter's house in Santa Fe. He had recently purchased a toy gun, probably intended for his six year old grandson, Stephen. The woman remaining in the passenger seat was his wife of forty-six years, Lily. Lily did not know that Patrick had been married once before, in secret, or so he believed, and had another daughter from that marriage who was living only a few miles from here. Patrick would be surprised to hear of this. He had forgotten about the girl, now woman, long ago. Leonora could easily intervene, and even provide detailed directions to the long-lost daughter's house. Maybe she should tell Lily? It was tempting.

"The green jeep. Tennessee plates 339-AJX." The man was Harbin Ellston, 29. The boy was Jasper, 7. The dog was Willie. They'd come a long way. Last scanned in Oklahoma. Arkansas before that. Been on the road for a while. Willie was a shaggy mutt of the large and friendly variety. He trotted past Leonora and gave her a glance before disappearing behind some trees to quietly do his business. On returning he stopped to nuzzle her palm. Instantly she liked him and his big brown eyes. He was wearing a collar from which a sort of pouch was hanging. She wanted to know what was in it, but the boy was already approaching so she didn't have the chance.

"His name's Willie," the boy said. "I'm Jasper."

"My name's Leonora," she smiled at him. "I like Willie very much. He seems like a very special dog."

"He's been with me all my life," Jasper said, now standing beside the dog. She noted the father checking on his location before going into the cement block structure that housed the vending machines. 'If I was a man', Leonora thought, 'he wouldn't leave his child alone with me', and then she knew that the man was feeling guilty. The boy didn't have a mother. They were always on the lookout for one. The mom might be alive, although she must have changed her name. Records about her had discontinued a few years earlier, when she'd moved to Houston. Vanished after that. Nothing scanned. Leonora couldn't pick up a trace. 'Even if I could', she realized, 'it wouldn't do any good. That woman's gone for a reason. She doesn't want to get found. She'd know where they are, for sure. Boy and the father hadn't moved, been in the same house all along back home in Maryville. Father worked at the local high school. Teacher. Must be on leave or something. Maybe had a clue about the mom. Leonora wanted to know and almost started to ask, but the father came back to the car with a couple of cans of soda, gave a whistle, and the boy and the dog ran off to join him. Just as they got settled and he pulled out, the old man and his wife left also.

'Guess it'll be somebody else', she thought with a shrug. 'No worries', and got up to stretch her legs.