The veins on his hand always bulge while he's driving. He'd taken his watch off, and now I could see the ludicrous contrast between his tan and pale skin. Playing softly in the background, music took the place of any regular conversation.
Without warning, the world on the other side of my window began to fade in and out of focus and complete obscurity. Yellow frocked every prairie, wood, and pasture from San Marcos to Dallas. Beneath the car, a quilt, assembled in lines of asphalt and pavement and assorted rock, rolled out for miles, in a line cutting smooth through the rolling green and tan of the countryside.
"Whatcha thinking about?", asked Raul. He shifted in the chair slightly. While the AC had been running the whole time, nothing could block the sun's oppressive heat that was coming through the window. Sweat ringed the bottom of both our shirts.
"I'm thinking about what happened."
"I'll leave you to it then."
That car was then like a beetle, sculptural and precariously airbourne, flying flying flying, slowly, the yellow and reds and pale green that swarmed all around it like midday midtown motor traffic, never televised, soaking sleeping sliding under sol and stress and slop from the formless sky and the trees waved goodbye, their husbands troubadours, the wind there last wishes, the fell Bombay, and the clouds, turning twisting twitching troubling no one and casting creating canon in shadows, succulent in their variety and reprieve. It's always a long time coming when driving in Texas.
