Someplace to Be Flying Read Online Free PDF Page A

own coffee-and-cream complexion. His cowboy boots were black. His jeans were an old and faded gray, shirt black, as were the flat-brimmed hat and duster he invariably wore. He had his hat on this morning-like Dwight Yoakam, she doubted he ever took it off in public-but he’d left his coat inside for now.
    As soon as they saw him, the crows on the roof began to squabble, filling the air with their racket.
    “Hush, you,” Jack called over his shoulder. “Go make yourselves useful somewhere.”
    Still squabbling, the small flock erupted from their roost and flew out across the empty lots that lay between the bus and Moth’s junkyard on the edge of the Tombs. Jack shook his head as they watched them go.
    “Going to tease the dogs,” he said. “Silly buggers.”
    Katy smiled. “Someone’s got to do it. Moth lets those dogs get too lazy. Do you want some coffee? I think it’s just about ready.”
    “You’re spoiling me.”
    “I guess someone’s got to do that, too.” “I won’t say no.”
    She got up from her seat to get mugs from inside the bus, filling them on her way back to the sofa. They both drank it black. Squatting was easy to accomplish in the Tombs-regular citizens didn’t venture into its sprawl of abandoned factories and tenements and all you had to do was roll out your bedding to stake a claim-but amenities, even such simple ones such as sugar and cream, simply didn’t exist unless you brought them in yourself.
    Jack took a few sips of coffee and smacked his lips in appreciation. Taking out a pipe, he went through the ritual of filling it, tamping the tobacco down just right, getting it lit. He drank some more coffee. Katy watched the air show the crows were putting on above Moth’s place, dive-bombing the junkyard dogs, swooping and darting in among the wrecked vehicles. The dogs howled their frustration.
    “You’re feeling sorry for them,” Jack said.
    “Them and me. But at least those dogs of Moth’s have a place to be- somewhere they fit in.”
    “Anytime you need a place to stay …”
    Katy sighed. “It’s not that. It’s just … she’s coming. I don’t know how I know, but I do.”
    Jack nodded to show he was listening, but let her talk. “I won’t be able to stay away from her. I know I promised her before, and it was hard, but I could manage it because we had a few thousand miles between us. But now she’s coming here.” She looked at Jack. “So it’s like the promise is broken, isn’t it? She broke it.”
    “You’re going to have to work that one out for yourself,” Jack told her. “Maybe her coming means she’s changed her mind.” “Could be. You could ask her.” Katy shook her head. “Anybody else, but not her.” “You’ve got nothing to be afraid of,” Jack said. “She can kill me.”
    Jack wouldn’t let her run with that. “You can’t die.”
    Because she’d never been born. But Jack was wrong. She wasn’t like some of the animal people in his stories who kept coming back and back, their lives a wheel where most people’s were a simple line from point A to B. She could die. She knew that, no matter what Jack said.
    “Maybe the crow girls could help me,” she said. “You could introduce me and I could ask them.”
    Jack laughed. “You know how it goes. They do any damn thing they please. But ask them right and maybe they’ll help you. Point you down a road, anyway. Could be where you want to go. Could be where you need to go. That’s not always the same place, you know.”
    Katy sighed again. “Tell me a story,” she said. “What kind of story?”
    “Something about the crow girls.” “The crow girls,” Jack repeated.
    He leaned his head back against the sofa, which made his hat push up and fall down over his eyes. “I can do that,” he said.

4.
    This is how it was in the long ago: Everyone respected the crow girls. Didn’t matter where you were, walking the medicine lands or right here in this world with the roots and dirt