“Fuckin’ Indee-ans. Talkin ta spirits an all that crap.”

The driver, for all his despondency, has to laugh at this recollection of the blank-stared Indian.

“Yeah. ‘Oooooh, I zee a woo-man in your foo-cha. Wooooooo.’”

“Well, I hope she’s got big ol’ bags, at that.”

They join in a laugh that brings them back to their shared concentration over the rhythms of the road. There’s the clickity-clickity-clickity of a hubcap not completely fit into the wheel. Every now and again, the rear bed rumbles, and the driver will flick the wipers, ineffectively, across a filthy windshield, to a hair-raising squeeeeeeeak. At least the noises, regular and halting alike, are a substitute for having to talk. This suits the hitchhiker and driver just fine. Each of their minds are too preoccupied for small-talk, anyway.

Among the various squeaks, clickity’s, and rumbles –and the occasional shifting in place of each man- remains the peculiar words of the Indian: “There is a woman….was.” Neither the driver nor the hitchhiker would dare guess how deeply the Indian’s invocation still haunts the other. Nor is there any way they could know how those words, spoken through an otherworldly fog of fatality, conjured up the same exact face in the mind of each man; or almost the same face, as they were separated by a few moments before and after her death. Paula! The driver moans and lets it settle on the advancing light of morning. The despair sinks through his gut, as if it were the morning light itself soaking through the low ceiling of clouds overhead. It finds the knots of exhaustion buried in his stomach and melts them down. They unravel, leaving only the loose strings of hunger.

“Sure am hungry, though,” the driver considers.