East of the Mountains by David Guterson

Author:David Guterson [Guterson, David]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: General Fiction, (¯`'•.¸//(*_*)\\¸.•'´¯)
ISBN: 0156011042
Publisher: Vintage
Published: 1999-01-01T07:00:00+00:00

—sat two more gaudy tractor-trailers, one inscribed with the name Glory, the other painted pearl-black with jaunty purple roof faring. Ben crossed in front of them, tied Rex near the inns doorway, and settled him on the blanket. "Wait right here," he said softly; "I'm going to get you to a vet."

He pushed into the foyer with its Pepsi machine and inert, still video games. He pressed on through to the heat of the place—a snug, agreeable cookstove heat—and holding his rucksack at his side, waited in front of the glass cashier's counter where a painting of a black Lab was displayed for sale, another of three elk poised in a field, a third of an iridescent waterfall.

Ben drew off his cap and entered the dining room. A mother and daughter were playing cards and eating a plate of onion rings. A man with a gray high pompadour scrutinized Ben with what looked to be a casual ill will for strangers. A wind-furrowed farmer in a flannel shirt trembled over his coffee cup and worked on a wedge of pie. At a table nearby sat a crowd of young people eating hamburgers and french fries. One was swellingly pregnant. She pulled on her soft drink, then on a cigarette. A name was tattooed on her shoulder.

Ben washed in the bathroom. A vaultlike dispensary sold glow-in-the-dark condoms, the directions for their purchase inscribed on a decal in both Spanish and English. Ben combed his hair, brushed his teeth, and cleaned the lenses of his glasses. He dried his face and hands on paper towels, then paused to look at himself. His eye had blackened obscenely now. He looked, he thought, horribly old, as smashed and bruised as a boxer.

It was difficult to accept that the face in the mirror belonged to him and could not be altered, the ravages of time reversed. But he gathered himself, pressed his hair into place, and tried to appear presentable. He dried his neck with a paper towel and examined his face in profile. His clothes were still wet from that mornings rain, and in the heat of the place he felt chilled.

He strode onto the restaurant floor, set his rucksack against his leg, worked his wallet free of his pocket, and holding three twenty-dollar bills high, announced in the firmest voice he could muster that his dog waited, injured, outside, that he needed to get him to a vet right away, and for anyone willing to take him up to Quincy there was sixty dollars in it.

A man stood up. Tall, thin, and hollow-eyed, he wore pointed, black sideburns. He wiped his lips with a napkin as he rose, then dropped it on his table. "I'll do it," he said. "Let's go."

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