Page 120 of Goose

Goose

“What do you mean, vacation?” Cash asked. “Where are you going?”

“On fucking vacation,” I said.

He looked at Ally. “Where are you guys going, Shorty?”

Ally shrugged. “He won’t tell me. I guess it’s a surprise.”

Cash looked at Baker. “That’s the dumbest shit I’ve ever heard. Motherfucker’s going somewhere, and he won’t say where. Who does shit like that?”

“Someone that doesn’t you all up in his business,” Baker responded.

I gave Baker a nod. “You’re exactly right.”

“You can be an asshole all you want,” Cash said. “Hell, I’m used to it. But I’m not comfortable with you taking my little sister somewhere and me not knowing where she’s going. Give it up, motherfucker. Where you headed?”

I’d planned on going wherever felt right. I’d stop when the desire to keep going vanished. I had a few ideas, but nothing was etched in stone. “I really don’t have any idea. I’ll know when I get there.”

“Which direction?” he asked.

“There’s only one way to go out of this state. Up.”

“Oregon?”

“Hard saying,” I responded.

He glanced at Ally. “You still don’t believe in phones?”

She smirked. “I sure don’t.”

“Will you call me from the hotel phone and let me know that everything’s alright?” he asked. “You don’t even have to tell me where you are.”

“I can send you a postcard,” she said. “Each time we stop.”

“That’d be cool.” He raked his hair away from his eyes with his hand and smiled. “Let’s do that.”

“Send me one, too,” Reno said. “I like postcards. I used to get ‘em each year we went on vacation when I was a kid. They’d be on one of those spinning displays in the gas stations. I’ve got a whole box full of ‘em.”

“Add me to the list,” Tito said. “I’ll put them in my scrapbook.”

“Just as well send me one, too,” Baker said.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” I complained. “We’re not going to have any money left by the time we get there for all the fucking postcards we’ve got to buy.”

“Other than going on our club road trips and seeing my mother, I ain’t been on a vacation,” Cash said. “Ever.”

“Take one,” I said.

He stared blankly at the floor for a moment, and then looked up. “Don’t know where I’d go.”

I chuckled. “See how that works?”

His eyes narrowed. “Just send the postcard.”

“I’ll send four of them,” Ally said.

The front door buzzer rang, indicating someone was at the street-side entrance.