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  Cooney then brought up the attachment. It was a close-up photograph of himself, above the waist, sitting on a bronc in the chute, hat pulled down, rein in hand. She, or somebody else, must have taken it the moment she had crossed her eyes behind the chutes during the match ride in Tucson because Cooney appeared to be laughing out loud!

  She had gone to a little trouble to find his e-mail. But just why was she writing? To be friendly? To wish him luck? To show him the photograph? To get better acquainted? No matter, it suited him fine.

  He tried to picture her in his mind. That first flash behind the chute had turned into a giant smile in his memory. Red lips, white teeth. He tried to recall their second and last meeting at the party after the match ride. That memory was all backside: big hair and hip pockets.

  Her physical memory was not as strong as the emotional imprint: that same feeling that she had reached out and touched him without laying a finger on his skin. It felt good.

  Cooney’s chest tightened. He considered sending a reply, but he couldn’t just dash off a “Wish you were here” postcard. He would need to give his reply serious thought.

  Austin is not a town that minds its own business. It thinks of itself as inclusive, encouraging diversity, a melting pot. But true to its uptight underbelly, it was, and remains, squeakily politically correct.

  A small contingent of animal rights activists was condemning the Austin rodeo in the local paper. Columnists floated the word cruelty editorially.

  Waiting to pounce after the rodeo ended were twelve activists standing inside a thirty-by-twelve-foot rectangle marked by a chalk line on the sidewalk outside the Travis County Expo Center, where the rodeo had been held. They were chanting vitriolic slogans and carrying signs that displayed cows in bondage, dairy calves in small crates, and a stuffed toy horse hanging by his head from a gallows, puppet-like.

  The majority of the departing crowd ignored the protesters, although three television news teams were there to film them. As the crowd trickled to a thin line the protesters increased their verbal attack. The cameras kept looking over their shoulders toward the dwindling line in search of a reaction.

  A gaggle of teens posed for the cameras with victory signs, “We’re number one,” “Hi, Mom,” and giggles. They walked on laughing. The two city policemen assigned to the protesters called it a night and followed the teenagers.

  “I guess that’s it?” said one of the television crew. He addressed Ernst, the leader of the protesters, a dark-haired, bearded thirty-something. Ernst was wearing a white sheet with barbed wire and blood painted across his chest and a Lone Ranger mask.

  “How do you think you did?” the reporter asked. “Was it effective? Do you wish the crowd would have been more . . . oh, more combative?”

  “We were prepared,” answered Ernst with a grin. He fished a key chain out from under his sheet, “Pepper spray!” he said, holding it up to the camera.

  “Look!” said Nara Visa, television news reporter. Coming down the wide concrete walkway toward the parking lot were eight cowboys.

  The other reporters, cameramen, and protesters followed her arching finger. Each reporter stole a glance at his or her watch: 9:12 p.m., still time for the ten o’clock news!

  “What’s goin’ on?” asked Belvidire Deer, bareback rider.

  “Protesters,” said Straight.

  “Animal right lunatics,” elaborated Izzy Bosun, bull rider.

  “Whattya say we walk on by, just go have a beer?” suggested Purple Hays, a second bull rider.

  “We can try,” said Big Bill Brown, smiling, but Cooney detected a trace of playfulness in his voice.

  The television crews placed themselves so that the cowboys would be forced to walk between them and the protesters. To do otherwise, the cowboys would have to cut through the grass and climb a two-foot wall.

  The protesters behind their lines broke into full cry: “Rodeo is cruel! Cowboys suck! Dirt bags! Animal abusers! Cowboys are full of bull! Cowboys think 8 seconds is great! Free the slaves! Blackie, your ancestors were slaves. How can you enslave animals?” That last jeer was aimed at Izzy Bosun, who was black. It stopped him.

  Izzy Bosun was five foot three, weighed 136 pounds, and looked like he was twelve years old. He turned and looked into the line of white sheets, black masks, bloody banners, and tennis shoes. Silence fell like a guillotine blade.

  “Who said that?” asked Izzy into the quietude.

  He stepped forward and crossed the chalk line. Five seconds passed until one of the news reporters whispered to the protesters, “Do something. We’re running out of time.”

  “You can’t cross that line!” said Ernst, recovering his voice.

  Izzy started for Ernst, who stood at six foot three. Purple Hays stepped up quickly and took Izzy by the crook of the elbow.

  “Leave it alone,” Purple said. “He’s not worth it. This is how he makes a living, getting his name in the papers. Let’s go have a beer.”

  “Yeah, you better take the little munchkin home,” said Ernst with a sneer. “Beer might stunt his growth.”

  Ernst never knew what hit him! He fell like a giant oak tree. Purple was trying to pull Izzy off the top of Ernst. It was like trying to tear a wolf off a newborn calf!

  Big Bill stepped between the tussle on the ground and four converging protesters. The convergers stopped in their tracks. Three others of their party had dropped their banners, shed their costumes, and were racing for the parking lot. Three cowboys joined Big Bill in the face-off while Cooney slipped over to two women protesters still dressed in their sheets, hanging back from the melee. Together they watched the ruckus. Purple was still trying to contain Izzy. Big Bill was trying to start a fight, and Ernst was out like a light.

  “We’ve only got three more minutes, Big Guy, to make the ten o’clock news!” shouted a reporter. “If you’re going to do something, do it quick!”

  “We’ve got enough, Francois. Let’s go!” shouted another newsy.

  “Can’t you stop them!” cried one of the women. “This is a peaceful protest!”

  A siren wailed in the background.

  “C’mon, girls,” said Cooney. “Let’s get out of here.”

  He took them by the elbows and turned them, and they ran for the parking lot. When they were clear of the scene they stopped. It took a minute to catch their collective breaths.

  “Better get outta those sheets,” suggested Cooney. They did. “Where’s your car?” he asked.

  “We came with Ernst. We all met at the Armadillo Plague. It’s a microbrewery. Our cars are there.”

  “Okay. We’ll take a cab,” said Cooney.

  Thirty minutes later, at 10:15, they walked into the Armadillo Plague and found a seat at one of the tall, round tables set away from the bar, where patrons were watching the television screen that hung over the tap handles on the wall. The local news anchor was saying, “And next, cowboys and animal rights activists collide outside County Expo auditorium! Stay tuned right after this message.”

  During the cab ride Cooney had gotten better acquainted with Ruta and Melda Martha. Ruta had dark, curly hair, a pretty face, olive complexion, and dark brown eyes. Cooney would have guessed that she was Italian, but her grandparents were Romanian Jews.

  Melda Martha was a Houston suburban-raised yuppie. She was a brunette with hazel eyes, a thin girl. She had a sharp tongue and soon recovered it.

  Cooney put money onto the table for the beers they ordered.

  “Did you make that riding bulls?” Melda Martha challenged him.

  “No, ma’am,” answered Cooney. To himself he thought, Riding broncs, yes, but not bulls. At least this $20 bill he justified in his mind.

  “Give it a rest, Melda Martha,” said Ruta testily.

  All eyes were on the television. The watchers cheer
ed when the line of shouting protesters appeared on the screen. Then the camera cut to the image of Ernst displaying his pepper spray.

  The next cut showed cowboys walking into the scene. There followed many quick cuts, all narrated by Nara Visa.

  They included Izzy standing in front of the protesters in an aggressive stance. Then his attack, Ernst falling, Purple Hays pulling on Izzy, the clash of Big Bill, the cowboys, and the protesters. Police came rushing into the scene, followed by medics hauling Ernst away on a stretcher, and a pullback to Nara Visa.

  She concluded, “And so the battle rages on for the heart of Austin. Is rodeo really a sport or just another example of man’s inhumanity to animals to be eliminated from our no-longer-cowboy culture like bullfighting and kosher ritual slaughter?

  “This is Nara Visa from the Travis County Expo Center.”

  “Kosher ritual slaughter?” said Ruta. “What’s kosher ritual slaughter got to do with it?”

  Melda Martha said, “Well, you know, VACUM (Voices Against Consuming Ungulate Meat) says that the way the Jew butchers do it . . .”

  “Rabbis,” corrected Ruta.

  “Yes. The way the rabbis kill the sacrificial lamb is barbaric,” stated Melda Martha rather professorially.

  Cooney sipped his beer and listened to the exchange. Apparently Ruta was a new convert to the protest business.

  Suddenly three of the now-unmasked protesters strode into the bar, followed by a limping Ernst. His head was bandaged, one eye was swollen shut, and someone had bathed his beard in Betadyne or French dressing. It was the color of an oil-on-water puddle at the auto repair shop.

  He was welcomed like a king! Cheers and shouts, drinks all around! Cooney had another beer. Finally everyone settled down, and Ernst took the floor. His speech was slurred by a split lip and loose tooth, but orating was his game, and he could play hurt.

  “A great victory . . . our mighty cause . . . savage beasts . . . prehistoric mentality . . . someday a world . . . all animals roam free . . . attacked by twenty or thirty . . . stood our ground . . . fought back . . . a Goliath . . .” he paused to take a drink from his beer mug.

  “Did he mean Izzy was Goliath?” asked Cooney. He didn’t think he was speaking loudly, but in the hallowed atmosphere of Ernst’s victory speech, Cooney’s words rang like an expletive dropping during a moment of respectful silence at a funeral.

  All eyes turned to Cooney’s table. Malevolent glares bore down on him. Now he knew how it felt to be microwaved. Cooney looked around the room. No one looked away. “Well,” he said pleasantly, “did you mean Izzy was Goliath? He’s shorter than this stool. Probably weighs 140 pounds. Maybe he’s like Mighty Mouse or the Tasmanian devil. Or maybe you meant he was David and you were Goliath?

  “If you hadn’t called him ‘Blackie’ or talked about slavery . . . he’s funny about that racial stuff. He won’t ride on Martin Luther King Day or Juneteenth. Nobody kids him about it. He’s tough, and he’s got a short fuse. We could have warned you, but I never thought about it, anyway . . .”

  “Shut up, you stain upon America! You heathen animal torturer!” roared Ernst. “Hang him from the yardarm!”

  Cooney was not a person who cared much about clothes. Muddy boots, crushed hats, dirty jeans, frayed collars, or holey socks were not taken into consideration when he entered a fray. He did not glance down to see what shirt he was wearing before he threw his beer bottle at the closest attacker!

  The butt of his Possum Finesse Lager bottle bonked a feisty-looking redheaded boy square on the nose. Carried by his momentum, Red crashed into Melda Martha, spraying the whole table with blood! She screamed as the two of them went down over her stool!

  Cooney scrambled back just to find himself in a corner. The menacing crowd was advancing. He reached back over his shoulder in search of a weapon and laid his hand on a flyswatter. He brandished it. “Stay back!” he yelled, “and no one will get hurt!”

  Someone from the back said, “He’s armed!”

  A gasp erupted from those who couldn’t see the action. The crowd fell back like the tide expecting to hear gunshots.

  “What?” yelled a handsome, fine-featured young man named Simon. He was face to face with Cooney less than four feet away. He looked around. “Who’s armed?” he yelled in a panic.

  The pressing crowd rapidly shrank to six people, including Red, Melba Martha, Ruta, Simon, Cooney, and a Goth-looking woman wearing black lipstick, black dress, and facial piercings that made one want to ask if she had fallen into her grandpa’s tackle box.

  Cooney took the initiative. He grabbed Ruta by the arm and pulled her to him. “Anybody move,” he growled, “and I’ll swat her!”

  Simon started to smile.

  “You think this is funny?” snarled Cooney. “You think I’m joking!”

  Simon was confused. All he could see was a flyswatter. But he was a Star Wars baby and was unable to easily distinguish “virtual” from reality. Could it really be a weapon? Would it turn into a cobra in his hand? Did it fire lightning bolts?

  Cooney pushed Ruta toward the door, holding the flyswatter threateningly. No one approached them. Once outside Cooney dropped the weapon and ran after Ruta to her car. As they pulled out of the parking lot they looked back to see Simon standing on the sidewalk. He was holding the flyswatter like a light saber. He looked puzzled.

  Ruta was round in all the right places.

  They lay on the sofa in the living room of her apartment she shared with two roommates who were already in bed.

  Cooney and Ruta were both breathing heavily. The pungent odor of sweat, excitement, fear, and feral instinct enveloped them like a steam bath. She had taken off his shirt and undershirt. They were sticky with beer and blood. He had untucked her shirttail.

  The exposed portions of their skin were drawn together according to the Bernoulli law of hormonal physics, which says, in essence, one does not have to be underwater to feel the current. Her skin was soft and bumpy, his was rough and hard. They rolled, rubbed, and roused, slipped, slid, and skimmed, ummed, oohed, and aahed, touched, tingled, and tasted, curled, caressed, and kissed, writhed and sighed, rose and fell, pitched and hit, saw the stars, shot the moon, and never once mentioned rodeo or saving the whales.

  CHAPTER 7

  March 17

  Cooney Awakens in Ruta’s Apartment and Rides in Austin

  Cooney woke the next morning to the sound of women getting ready for work. They were wolfing yogurt, gnawing Pop-Tarts, and sucking coffee.

  Ruta appeared, bringing him coffee in sofa. He sat up, his feet still covered by a blanket. He beard was scratchy. The hair on his chest was sticky, and his buttocks chafed.

  She was dressed in a jungle-print smock with lots of beads and a bracelet. Her freshly washed long, dark hair curled and sproinged around her head.

  “I work at a health food store,” she explained, gesturing toward the colorful smock. “Vitamins, echinacea, chamomile tea, garlic, Chinese herbs, you know.” She paused a moment and watched her roommates depart.

  “I’m not sure what to say about last night. The whole thing, the protest, then we wind up here . . . It’s, I just, uh . . .”

  He stared at her over his coffee. “You want to come to the rodeo tonight?” he asked.

  “Are you gonna ride a bull?” she asked.

  “Yup. And a saddle bronc.”

  “Is that how you got that scar?” she asked, pointing at a healed surgical incision on his right shoulder. “And that one?” She pointed at his left elbow.

  He nodded.

  Her big brown eyes softened for a moment as she looked into his. She nibbled her lower lip, then looked away, averting his gaze. “I don’t think so,” she said, more to herself. “I think you were a once in a lifetime.”

  Cooney shrugged.

  “You ca
n clean up, shower if you like. Call a cab. I’ve got to go to work,” she said.

  “Thanks,” he said.

  She opened the door to leave, then turned. “Bye. It’s been . . .” she hesitated, unable to find the words.

  “A rubbing of cultural tectonic plates,” he finished.

  “Yes,” she said, smiling. “That’s good.” She closed the door on another ship that had passed her in the night.

  I have come to believe, not in fate, but in forks in the road.

  We humans have the ability to make choices. We choose to go left or go right. You step off the curb this way, and you get hit by a car. You step off the same curb the other direction, and you meet someone who changes your life.

  You do have a choice, but there is no way to control all the ripples once the rock has been tossed. Nothing is inevitable.

  Cooney and Ruta may never see each other again, but it is quite likely they will remember each other a very long time. He will always think of her as “the Jewish girl,” and he will come to her mind everytime “rodeo” comes up. An unusual legacy for two people who don’t even know each other’s last name.

  That night at the Travis County Expo Center, Cooney stood on the catwalk behind the bucking chutes, watching the saddle broncs file in. He paid no attention to the team roping action that was proceeding at the other end of the arena.

  Ten minutes earlier in the riggin’ chute Cooney had saddled Crooked Nose and attached the plaited rein to his halter. Crooked Nose was a stout, tan and white paint off the Fort Belknap reservation in Montana with shaggy hair, a long mane, and four white feet. The horse’s name came not from a physical deformity but from the Northern Shoshoni who sold the horse to the stock contractor. The book on Crooked Nose was “out straight, bucks hard, and likes to bite.”

  Cooney splayed his boot toes 180 degrees ’til the rowels on his spurs touched. He did several deep knee bends, holding on to the inside board of the bucking chute. He stretched his back and neck.