Tim Washburn - Powerless

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” the woman shouts over the rain.

“I was hoping to bed down in the barn for the night. I was going to ask permission but no one answered the door.”

“So you were just going to make yourself at home?”

“Well…” He pauses, struggling for the right answer. “Yeah, I guess I was. At least, at home in the barn.”

“Who are you?” she shouts. The rain is dripping from her beautiful face, but the rifle never wavers, tucked tight against her narrow shoulder.

“My name’s Zeke Marshall. I’m on my way to bring my sister and her family back home to Oklahoma. They’re in Dallas, and I expect they’re in dire straits by now.” His arms are weary from holding them skyward so he lowers them to his side and gives them a quick shake to get the blood back in his hands. She hasn’t shot him yet, so he continues. “Ma’am, I mean you no harm. I was just looking for a dry place to bed down and feed the horses.” He steps up to Murphy and puts his foot in the stirrup. “I’ll move along,” he says over his shoulder.

The rifle lowers and the woman takes several tentative steps in his direction. She stops about twenty feet away. “Go ahead. But I want you gone by morning.”

“Thank you, ma’am. I’ll be out of here at first light.”

He returns to the gate and leads the three horses through and closes it behind him. The woman stands in the downpour, watching his every step. He slides the large barn door open just wide enough to lead the horses inside. Musty-smelling, but dry. Stacked in the corner is a good supply of hay, while the other side of the barn is dedicated to an assortment of old machinery and other items collected from a lifetime of farming. He removes the saddle and blanket from Murphy’s back and unloads the supplies from the two mares. After untying the horses from one another, he pours a generous pile of oats onto the hay-littered floor and all three hungrily eat.

Zeke digs through the saddlebag to find something for him to eat, his first meal of the day. He discovers two peanut butter sandwiches his mother had packed, as if she were packing his school lunch so long ago. He carries the sandwiches over to a corner of the barn and sits gently on one of the hay bales. His ass is sore from being in the saddle and the densely packed hay offers little comfort, but at least the bale is stationary. He wolfs down one of the sandwiches and follows it with a long drink from his canteen. The little remaining water sloshes near the bottom, and he realizes he needs to water the horses again and refill the canteen.

The second sandwich he eats at a more leisured pace as he looks over his surroundings. It’s like stepping back in time, seeing some of the old tools arranged on the pegboard hanging above an old workbench. With sandwich in hand, he stretches the kinks from his back and strolls over. Most of the tools are much older than he is, and some he can’t determine their use, but many he’s familiar with. He saunters toward the barn door and slides it back far enough to peek at the house. The woman is gone, presumably back indoors out of the rain. He turns his head the other way and spots a stock tank full of water. An old-fashioned hand pump stands nearby. Not knowing if his stay in the barn allows him access to the other accommodations, he’s going to have to take a chance and pray she doesn’t shoot him from the sniper’s perch he envisions in his mind.

Zeke walks back to the horses, clips a lead to each of their halters, and grabs his canteen. After zipping up his jacket, he eases the door open a little wider and glances back at the house before stepping out. The rain has lessened and the horses, thirsty from the coarseness of the oats, nearly send him tumbling in their haste to get to the water tank. After another glance over his shoulder to make sure a gun barrel isn’t pointing in his direction, he walks to the old hand pump and pumps the handle. A clear stream of water jets from the end of the pump. Zeke refills his canteen and takes a long pull directly from the cold, clear stream, dislodging the peanut butter clinging to the roof of his mouth.

The horses finish drinking and take the opportunity to do their business, as three fresh piles of horseshit drop. He wonders whether his gun-toting host would like him to pick up after the horses. But how? It’s not like you can bag it. Other droppings are scattered around, but he hasn’t seen any other animals. He makes the decision to leave the horseshit where it landed and leads the horses back into the barn. It’s now nearly dark, helped along by the dense cloud cover, but it’s not too late. Zeke guesses the time is somewhere around six.

The aroma of a wood fire and what smells like cooking meat rides the wind through the cracks of the old barn, making his not-yet-full stomach rumble. He walks from one side of the barn to the other, looking through the gaps in search of the source. He finds a standard-sized door at the back of the barn and steps outside to see the gun-toting woman at the back of the house cooking over a smoky fire. She’s probably a hundred yards away, so he snuggles up next to the barn and observes.

Her movements are precise as she stirs whatever’s cooking. Zeke doesn’t know if she’s cooking for one or if there’s a house full of people to feed. He didn’t get the sense that a large number of people inhabited the house from his brief peek, but they could have been hiding. She’s not yet looked in this direction and he’s fairly certain that she couldn’t see him even if she did. She pushes her wet hair out of her face as she returns inside.

Zeke takes advantage of her absence and sends a steamy stream of piss into the tall grass bunched up near the edge of the barn. The temperature, miserably hot in the afternoon, has dropped maybe twenty degrees, the dampness making it feel downright cool.

He returns inside to search through the dimness for a lantern or some other light source and comes up empty. Anything of use was probably transferred to the house days ago, he reasons. He steps back over to his stash and stretches out on the floor, using a bale of hay for a backstop. He digs into one of the saddlebags and retrieves one of the two paperbacks he had packed. This one is a Louis L’Amour western from his father’s collection of books. He opens to the dog-eared page and has just enough light to make out the words. The reading helps to take his mind away from the miserable accommodations.

Eventually, the gloomy dusk gives way to full dark. He stows the book and starts thinking about tomorrow’s journey. If all goes as planned he should be in the northern part of Dallas by sunset. That would put him at Ruth’s house by midnight or early the next morning if he beds down one more night. Of course his planning is based on a steady pace with no interruptions—surely a fool’s plan. His scheming is interrupted when a slash of light flares between the cracks of the old barn siding.

He tugs down the zipper of his jacket and checks to make sure his pistol is still riding in the holster. He makes no effort to stand and assumes his least threatening pose. The light slashes again and from the pattern he can tell that it is someone walking his way waving a flashlight. He turns toward the squeal of the barn door to see the woman enter. Her silhouette is all that is visible behind the bright beam. She slowly advances, holding something in her other hand. Zeke moves his hand to the butt of his semiautomatic. Did she come to shoot him for his horses?

She stops a good distance away. “Do you have something to eat?”

“I have a peanut butter sandwich if you would like it,” he says.

“No, that’s not what I meant. Would you like some food?”

“If it’s what I smelled cooking earlier, yes.”