John Deere must have heard the bell ring when the door closed, because his eyes rose to watch her come. She slowed then, suddenly unsure of herself, not knowing what to say or how to interpret the look on his face, somehow different than the face she’d seen inside just a few moments ago. Now he had a cigarette tucked into the corner of his mouth, the ember flaring bright in the constant wind.

He took the cigarette from his mouth and smiled again and it flooded her with warmth, like stepping in front of the barn heater on the coldest day of the year. “Heck, you caught me,” he said. “I know I’m not supposed to smoke at the gas pump.”

“You can blow this whole place straight to hell for all I care,” she said. “Where are you headed to, anyway?”

He pointed the cigarette in line with the road, west toward the mountains. His coat fell open and again she saw the pistol on his belt. “Thataway,” he said. “The land of plenty.”

She shivered again. She told herself it was the wind, cutting through her bones.

“Take me with you,” she said.

He took a draw off his cigarette and cupped it in his fist. “Where you trying to get to?”

“It don’t matter. Anywhere but here.”

He turned to look her full in the face, the way she remembered her dad looking at a new colt in the gone-away days. She saw kindness and care and a measure of soft sorrow. “Honey, how old are you?”

She drew herself up, not sticking out her chest, but not slouching to hide it, either. “I’m nineteen,” she said. “And my name’s Helene, not honey.” She took a shaky breath for courage. “Just tell me you’re not a serial killer.”

A smile teased at the corner of his mouth. “Darlin, I love cereal,” he said. “I kill a box of Cap’n Crunch every week. I’m Roy, by the way.”

“Roy what?”

“Roy Wiley.”

That was a better name than John Deere. The pump clicked off, the tank full. In the newly quiet night, she heard the crunch of boots on gravel and another guy stepped from behind the truck, zipping his fly.

He sighed deeply, as if even the fact of her was a disappointment. “Who’s this, now?”

Under the pale sideways glow of the store lights, he was very tall and thin and weirdly shirtless in the cool fall night. His hairless torso reminded her of the drawings in her freshman biology book. She could see every muscle and tendon, as if he’d somehow been run through the wash and his skin had shrunk down a size. His eyes ran across her like the old farmer who ran the mobile slaughterhouse, sizing up Bogaloosa’s dairy cows after their milk had gone dry.

That look put a pit in her stomach. She’d felt something good between her and Roy, at least she hoped she had, but another guy changed things. Maybe this shirtless guy especially.