Read Online The Ghost Lights of Marfa by Maeve Alpin - Free Book Online

 
Chapter One
     
    The car will die. And hungry . . . stranded . . . we’ll die.
    This thought blared in Kristy’s head during  the endless stretch of road thorough the bare west Texas desert. Finally driving past the 'Welcome to Marfa' sign, she released a sigh of relief.
    “Are we there yet, Mommy?” Cody’s high-pitched voice pulsed with energy.
    “We sure are.” Kristy glanced in the rearview mirror at her six-year-old son. Framed by two dimples, the corners of his rosy mouth turned up into a bright smile. His brown eyes snapped with merriment and dark curls fell across his forehead and his plump cheeks as he banged his plastic sword against the car seat. Cody couldn’t have been happier and she wanted to keep it that way.
    As a golden oldies station played Bennie and the Jets , she turned onto South Dean Street. “This is Marfa. We’ll see the lights soon.” She glanced at the fuel gauge. After a six-hour drive from San Antonio, it pointed near empty. “We made it.”
    “How do those lights come on?” Cody squeaked from the back seat. “What time do they come on?”
    “Tonight, after it’s dark.”
    The town reminded her of a western movie set as she drove by rows of white wooden houses and one-story adobe buildings. The peach-toned courthouse towered above them. Its gray dome caught her eye, along with its blanket of green lawn, adorned with bushy crepe myrtles and old pecan trees with sprawling branches. Driving down the narrow road, she soon spotted the white, rectangular building and the prominent black sign with white script, El Paisano.
    “Cody, famous movie stars, James Dean, Rock Hudson, and Elizabeth Taylor slept in that hotel when they made Giant here, a real famous old movie.”
    “Who?” His brows arched over his wide brown eyes.
    “You’ll see it on TV one day, maybe on Turner Classic Movies. It doesn’t matter, we’re not staying there.” No money for that. “We’ll camp out tonight, sleep in the car. Won’t that be fun? I’ve got pillows in the trunk.”
    “I get to sleep in the car.” He jerked his head, ruffling his mop of black hair.
    “We’re going to have so much fun, Cody.”
    As Kristy peered in the rearview mirror, she found the wide smile on his face contagious and her mood grew buoyant. She would try to get a job as a desk clerk or a maid at the El Paisano. Kristy had come to see the dusty ranch town as her last hope. In the middle of the vast desert, under the big Texas sky, Marfa—a place of consistency and peace—remained untouched by the economic crisis.
    Just what she needed after discovering many family shelters only allowed a month before they kicked you out. You can’t keep your children, if you can’t feed them. Simple words, with less stuck on the end, like homeless, jobless, didn’t explain all that. All the languages in the world can’t explain that Mommy, the only person who takes care of you, can’t. Lost her job and no one wants her. At six, you’re on your own, in foster care. Kristy vowed that wouldn’t happen to her son.
    She glanced at a square, white building on West San Antonio Street with El Cheapa in large, red script letters. “The town is so cute.”
    When the constable tacked the eviction notice to her apartment door, the only idea she came up with was to take Cody on a vacation . Show him the ghost lights of Marfa, the giant horseshoe, and the place James Dean made his last movie.
    Like a rebel without a cause, she threw her kid and some clothes into the car and took off. She had nothing left but a few coins and dollar bills. What would it be, gas or food? Knowing eight dollars’ worth of gaswouldn’t get her far, she chose food.
    “I’m hungry, Mommy.” Cody opened his mouth wide, signaling he was ready to eat.
    She spotted the familiar white, red-roofed restaurant. “There’s the Dairy Queen.”
    After parking, she finger-combed her shoulder-length, auburn hair. She retrieved a kohl pencil from her purse and lined her