THE FIRST SOFT GOODBYE

Six vaqueros slap faded leather and ride into a sunset, or maybe sunrise, driving a herd of longhorn cattle through the dust rising in the West Texas desert. They’ve been riding for weeks, and the red-raw skin has begun to callus where the seams of their pants rub against the saddle. Time has lost meaning for them, and as the cold air numbs their foreheads, they’ve lost track of whether they are heading into the particled dusk or away from a homeward dawn or are going in the wrong direction altogether. Sweat beads and salts the bandanas tied around their necks, their wide-brimmed hats, the leather uppers of their boots, and they keep tight to the edges of the herd with frayed jute ropes in hand to catch any strays. As they patrol the perimeter of the mass of cattle, the wind dulls their faces and erodes their eyes and noses until their brown and black profiles become monoliths in the history of West Texas.

*

A month before, alongside a cedar post fence just outside Gatesville, Javier Marquez cradled the walnut stock of a single-barreled shotgun in his arms as he watched the herd graze from atop his horse. His nose itched from the cedar pollen in the air and dust caked into the sweat around his collar. He felt Victor Salazar walk up beside him. 

How’s the herd? Victor asked.

Cows’re doing what cows always do. Eating and sleeping. The mama over there might be ready to give birth soon. Might be another day or two.

That’ll make for some excitement.

It’ll make for something, I’m sure. Be a bit of stress for the mama. And for old Bill Blessed.

She’ll live. She’s tough. Bill too. But how are you doing out here all by yourself?

I’m alright. My leg’s a little sore. 

Victor placed his hand on Javier’s thigh and began to massage it. He continued to rub as the two men sat in silence and the herd continued to graze until eventually Frederick Campos showed up with his horse and took over watch. Javier dismounted, Victor took hold of the reins, and the two men walked side-by-side in the direction of the tents they’d set up that afternoon.

*

The cattle stop under a crystal sky. The sunlight refracts in strange angles. One ray branches skyward. Another towards the mountains to the vaqueros’ right, fading out halfway. Another, shaped like a broken shard from a mirror, shoots straight into the ground. Each of the vaqueros, their chins lifted upwards like cactus blossoms in an orange glaze, stare into the contorted sunlight filtering through the fractured veil while a few solitary moos can be heard echoing at intervals amongst the cattle.

The lead vaquero dismounts and moves to the rear of the herd. He whispers into the raised ear of a bull, strikes its ass, begs it to move. The bull stays still. The vaquero whistles for the other vaqueros to join him at the back. 

Each takes a turn trying to drive the herd forward, lashing at cow asses with leather whips, tugging with lassos wrapped around cattle necks, firing shotgun shells into the air, but the cattle simply stare into the barren canvas of West Texas flatland reflected in front of them, unmoved by the vaqueros’ efforts.

*

Javier closed the gate behind the herd in Odessa and Juan Rodriguez locked it shut. Bill Blessed unsaddled his horse, walked to the train depot where an older man with a brushy white mustache and a blue-and-white striped cap greeted him from the freshly built wooden platform, the lightness of the wood unstained, unweathered. No trains coming through for a few months, he told Bill.

Well, damn. They told us this depot was up and running.

It was, but now it’s not. You can thank the Texas Legislature for that. You’ll have to push north or head down to Mexico if you want to sell this herd.

Alright. Thank you kindly. 

After Bill delivered the bad news, that they’d be out on the trail a bit longer than he’d promised, he asked his crew what they thought they should do.

Mexico, Victor said.

Mexico, Frederick said.

Mexico, Timothy said.

Mexico, Juan said.

Let’s go north, Javier said.

Looks like we’re headed south, Bill said. Sorry, Javier.

That night, the moonlight drifted downwards with ice, and Javier waited until the fire died in the middle of the camp before walking to Victor’s tent. He passed through the folds in the entrance, slid his cold body inside Victor’s sleeping bag. Victor shivered at the glacial touch of Javier’s skin but pushed himself further into the folds of the sleeping bag, pressed himself tighter against Javier.

*

One of the vaqueros unholsters a silver pistol with a copper inlay on the handle and fires in the air. The herd finally breaks into a stampede but halts after a few feet. 

The vaquero with the gun fires again. 

The herd stampedes again.

The herd stops hard against the veil, the lead bull running head-first into the transparent hardness. His horns bump into a thin, unyielding sheet of something like pure quartz rising above the firmament, and he stops, seemingly stunned by the barrier he’s encountered.

The vaquero fires his pistol one more time and the herd trudges forward. The expanse of triangular heads become a massive battering ram breaking against the barrier between our world and the next. The cattle keep running forward, stopping, stampeding, over and over again.

*

The morning after they left the water stop in Marfa, Javier rode his horse next to Victor, who pointed out that Bill might notice how close they’d become, that he didn’t want to end up buried in the vast emptiness of the West Texas desert. 

They already know, Javier said. This sort of thing happens all the time on the trail.

Yeah, but I just don’t know if I’m ready for this, Victor said, gesturing the invisible, intangible current running between them. His shoulders dropped and his grip on the reins loosened, the leather of his gloves softening in concert with his eyes.

The windburn on Javier’s face grew redder. He steered his horse back out to the edge of the herd and guided a calf who’d strayed from the herd back toward his mother. When the calf was safe, he shot a glance in Victor’s direction, watched Victor’s nose droop downward through the ice-bound particles rising in the air. Victor’s horse stumbled a moment and Victor lost his balance, fell shoulder-first into a clump of cow shit. 

When Javier reached him, Victor had taken off his suede gloves and was holding his left wrist. I’m fine, Victor said, go back to tending the herd. Maybe visit me in my tent tonight. I might feel better then.

*

The horizon cracks, the red-orange dusk shatters into shadows, the setting sun becomes a fractal on the dusty horizon. The cattle disappear one-by-one, each member of the herd walking through the fracture in the air. Once they have all entered the fracture, the dust thins and settles, and the silence of the desert encroaches on the patch of land where the cattle were just standing.

The vaqueros collectively scratch their heads under their dirt-rimmed hats and begin to walk towards the broken veil which separates the living from the dead, through the dust and dusk and friction of a horizon in flux. 

*

The night in Victor’s tent, after Victor had hurt his wrist, as he lay stomach-down on a spread-out wool blanket, Javier dug his palms into Victor’s back. The muscles released and pockets of tension gave way to his movements and Victor flinched at the dryness inherent in the friction between their skin. I heard they have parlors up in Dodge City where the women use oil to keep from rubbing the skin raw, Victor said.

Javier nodded as his hands continued the circular motions. Yeah, he said, and they tug on your cock too. Turn around and I’ll show you. 

Victor flipped over and exposed his belly to Javier. 

*

The vaqueros walk in the direction of the fissure in the sky. They remove their hats as though in a sacred ceremony, backs bending slightly forward in elevated crouches, and they toe their way closer and closer to where the cattle had disappeared.

Javier watches Bill lead his fellow vaqueros through the crack in the air. He breathes in deeply then yells at Bill to stop, to consider the consequences of disappearing into a broken reality. Bill shouts back that they need to sell the cattle or the whole trip would be pointless anyways. Someone’s gonna get them sooner or later, he claims, and he’d worked too hard to see someone else make a profit off them.  Bill walks through the crack in the veil, followed by Juan, then Frederick and Timothy.

Javier grabs Victor by the wrist just before he enters the fissure. He holds it between his forefinger and his thumb, pulling without much pressure. Don’t go, he tells Victor, his voice desiccated and gravelly, but Victor brushes him off and jerks his head towards the crevice. 

Victor disappears behind Timothy and Javier calls for Victor, for Bill, for the other vaqueros, but no one answers. There is only silence, then the fluid atmospheric pressure pulling the wind into the fissure. The wind has begun to pick up again. 

Javier saddles up his horse and rides back towards the water stop at Marfa.

**

A century-and-some-years later, as the sky grows blank, five lights rise in the West Texas sky. A pickup truck drives through the vast emptiness on the road between Alpine and Marfa, a young man behind the wheel, a map in the passenger seat. He pulls the truck over to the side of the road and sketches the red, blue, and white lights rising above the horizon with colored pencils from the package on the seat next to him. The lights in the distance fade in and out, slowly blinking as though they are caught in some kind of atmospheric distortion. 

When he is finished drawing, he continues his drive through the soft sand and dirt billowing under his tires. He’s almost made it to Marfa.

​