The Steeps

Chapter 2 - Old Dog, New Tricks

The Greyhound bus left a wake of roadside dust-swirls as it sped across the plains, the only vehicle on this desolate stretch of long flat highway. 

Inside the coach, in a window seat, Casey Janz was distractedly twisting one of his dreadlocks as he paged through Skateboarder Magazine, ignoring the featureless landscape rolling by outside. 

“Can you watch him for me?” a woman’s voice said. 

Casey looked up. A sixtyish woman in a blue work shirt and worn jeans had just gotten up from the adjoining seat and was standing in the aisle. 

“He seems to like you,” she said. “I need to get him some water.” 

In the vacated seat, a tiny Chihuahua was sitting there with its big eyes staring at Casey. 

“Sure, no problem.” 

Casey patted his stomach and the little dog climbed over the arm rest and plopped onto Casey’s lap. He stroked the creature’s tiny head and gazed indifferently out the window, seeing nothing but horizon out there. After a few moments the woman was back. 

“Here we go.” 

Casey reached for the paper cup the woman held out. He tipped it so the Chihuahua could drink and the woman settled back into her seat. 

“So,” she said, “where you headed?” 

“Place called Copper Crest.” 

The woman nodded. “High country.” 

“I guess.” 

The woman studied him, watched her dog drink. 

“You don’t sound happy about it.” 

“What’s to be happy?” Casey said. 

“So you’re going under duress.” 

“What’s that mean?” 

“Just like it sounds.” 

He took an unsure look at her – the weathered features, the pulled-back gray hair, the tan line from wearing the cowboy hat he saw her get on the bus with. He started to ask more about duress, changed his mind and looked back out the window. 

The woman said, “I wasn’t sure myself I wanted to come out here. Had to kind of force it.” 

“Why’d you do it?” 

“To get away from what wasn’t working.” 

The Chihuahua wanted to change seats again – the woman helped it climb back into her lap. 

“The best way to do that,” she said, “was to reinvent myself.” 

“As what?” 

“Didn’t really matter. I just took some moves I already knew and gave them a different spin.” 

Casey gave her another unsure look, got a crinkly smile back. 

“Old dog, new tricks,” she said, scratching the Chihuahua. “Right babe? 

She patted the little dog, rested her head back and closed her eyes. 

Casey watched the two of them, this tough leathery woman, the pipsqueak dog – and then put his own head back. 

An hour later, he blinked awake when the bus pulled off the highway and bumped to a stop. He turned and looked at the seat beside him – and sat up straight. The old woman and her Chihuahua were gone. 

He looked up front, saw the woman with her cowboy hat back on saying goodbye to the driver. She went down the steps, Chihuahua in one arm, a backpack slung over her other shoulder. She stepped off and put the little dog down, the two of them walking around the front of the bus, the only ones getting off. 

This was in the middle of nowhere, just miles of flatland covered with sagebrush stretched out under a relentless blue sky. The only sign of civilization was a vague dirt road that the woman and dog crossed over to. 

The driver pulled the door shut, goosed the engine and pulled the Greyhound back onto the highway. 

Casey back there in the seat by himself leaned in close to the window, looked behind him toward the dirt road. He could see the old woman walking down it, the little dog trotting to keep up, the two heading off toward – what? 

When he couldn’t see them anymore, he turned and looked forward, thinking there was something about the woman he’d gotten strange vibes about. He thought about it as he kept looking toward where this bus was taking him, toward whatever it was he was getting into.        

And now he could see that up there through the front window was part of what it was going to be. He didn’t need the driver’s announcement to tell him that under that relentless blue sky, with snow on the distant peaks, he was getting his first look at the foothills of the Rockies.