Coyote Song
Andie watched the baby, head lolled to the side, chubby fingers curled around a rubber giraffe, face shaded by the stroller’s hood; the skin seemed bluish, fingers still; the baby looked dead. The mother, young and trim, waved a box of crackers beseechingly at an older child. Andie crept to the stroller and stole the giraffe from those chubby fingers. The baby released a reedy wail; Andie sighed with relief as she loped across the parkway.
She tucked the giraffe, head still wet from the baby’s last gnaw, into the waistband of her jeans, hiding the bulge with her shirt as though the giraffe were a gun. Eyes smarting, she leaned against the metal support of one of the audience tents. People clapped, stomping the grass beneath their folding chairs. Andie’s sniffling drowned by the honky-tonk tunes booming out from the band shell. She wiped her eyes on her shirtsleeve when she spotted Ash. He strolled across the green, giving each stall a thorough contemplation, speaking to each vendor; his hands animated, sweeping in appreciation of their garlic. The leading force behind their fitness centre, Ash had always loved the entrepreneurial spirit. Two yellow balloons, bobbed in the breeze, anchored to his wrist.
Andie rubbed her face, trying to even-out her colouring, pinched her cheeks to offset her red-rimmed eyes. It was important to keep the mood light; at least, that’s the advice she’d gotten before they’d left on the trip. Keep it light, don’t dwell, no matter what don’t dwell. She walked out to intercept him.
“Something wrong?” he said.
“Just the smell of the stinking rose.”
“For you,” he tied one of the balloons to her wrist, “better than flowers, never wilts.”
“But it wizens,” she said.
“Only if it’s seen. We could let it go, then who knows.” He stared at the darkening sky, as if expecting to see someone else’s balloon streak across the clouds. When it became clear Andie wasn’t releasing hers, he said, “We should hit the road.”
Darkness stretched upward from the horizon, dying the trees a sinister blue-gray. Andie had forgotten how the night fell in isolated places, heavy and impregnable, enclosing the road. She flicked on the car’s cabin light, pressing her finger to the map, over the circled Silver Hill Campground, willing their journey to shorten.
A light wind rustled Ash’s hair, elbow resting on the window edge; he seemed at ease. He whistled along to some old love song. But the ragged fingernails of his right hand beat the crest of the steering wheel. When Andie could no longer take his tightly chained anxiety, she glanced out the window, hoping a house would loom out of the dark. For a while, she counted the croaks of frogs. Eventually, the frog song became so intense, so overwhelming that she could no longer pick out individual cries. Tree boughs overhung the road and the wild grasses grew snug to the sharp turns.
A coyote paused in mid-lope in the centre of the road, seemingly dazzled by the headlights. Ash slammed on the brake, swearing. Dust from the road swirled. A second coyote appeared, tongue lolling out as if tasting the lights. Unease raced through Andie’s limbs. “Their eyes?”
The road beneath the car buckled, groaning.
