Status Updates From Leaving Cheyenne

“Why did you marry that sorry bastard you married?” Gid had been wanting to say it 20 years. “Why didn’t you marry me? It’s just about ruined my life, Molly!”

It had just about ruined his life. I was to blame. Jimmy’s too. And Gid was going to quit me. That was the way.

“I wish I knew what all was involved in this loving somebody,” he said. “Mostly a lot of damn heartbreak, I know that.”

She swung her head to get her hair out of her eyes and it fell all over my face. I lay for a hour smelling her and listening to her breath. She was a mystery to me, but I was glad I had finally pleased her someway. After that the sunlight came right on the bed, so we were lying in a shaft of it, with a million little dustmotes in the air above us. Things looked lovely and funny for a change.

I was beginning to get a little excited from her walking so close to me that way. I never could understand how a little thing like Mabel could get me so excited, but she sure could. She was so thin you wouldn’t even notice her if she was standing sideways to you, but once she got near you she sure did make herself felt.

DAD WAS STANDING BY THE BED SHAKING my foot. I opened my eyes, but he never stopped shaking it. He shook it like it was a fence post and he was testing it to see if it was in the ground solid enough. All my life that’s the way he’d wake me up—I hated it like poison. Once I offered to set a glass of water by the bed, so he could pour that over me in the mornings and wake me up, but Dad wouldn’t do it.

She said, don't bother comin' home
By time you get here I'll be long gone
There's somebody new and he sure ain't no rodeo man
He said, I'm sorry it's come down to this
There's so much about you that I'm gonna miss
But it's alright baby
If I hurry I can still make Cheyenne
Gotta go now baby
If I hurry I can still make Cheyenne

Songwriters: Aaron Gayle Barker / Ervine Woolsey