Estrangement, by Eric Smith

20/7/2014

They crossed into Goshen County along the Nebraska border in southeast Wyoming. Sagebrush flew by in the dusk. Lucy wondered why she travelled with him. He hadn’t spoken for 100 miles. A wooden sign announced a motel an hour ahead. They hadn’t worked in weeks, so maybe they didn’t have the cash. The motel was closed, anyway. They wouldn’t reach Cheyenne till noon tomorrow so they pulled behind an abandoned gas station to drink warm pop and eat peanut-butter crackers for dinner. Forty-three years old and sleeping in the back of a Lariat crew cab that guzzled the diesel down.

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