It Was Very Unfamiliar - Elizabeth Weld Nolan

She hurried along the dirt road, stepping in the pale bands the moon threw between the pinyon trees, toward where the mountain rose rounded and black against the night sky. She passed the Bensons’ red mailbox shaped like a rooster that always made her smile in daylight, but tonight it reached for her with a sinister beak, the points on its comb sharp.

She had been afraid to set her alarm clock for fear of waking her parents and so had overslept. She didn’t know if her would wait for her. She came to the arroyo that she loved in daytime, the flat, white sand studded with chamisa and the red dirt walls rising above her head to the top where pinyon trees grew. Every New Mexican child knew not to play in an arroyo when there was rain far away in the mountains because the water traveled like a secret train, rushing around the dry corner to sweep children away. Tonight, the sky was clear with clouds edged with white from the big moon.

He wasn’t there. She stopped and let all her breath out. He had gone, or, maybe he hadn’t come. She turned into the arroyo and found the rock where she usually sat out of the sun. It was empty. She eased on to it, feeling the chill stone come through her jeans, and shivered in the night mountain air. She should have worn another shirt. She heard a dog bark faintly, over by Sun Mount, no, maybe a coyote, and her boots crunched the sand. When she stopped moving, she could hear only bits of wind in the trees, and she smelled pinyon. It was so very still. She didn’t think she would go further alone.

She heard boots walking toward her from up ahead and she stood, ready to crouch behind the rock where the shadow was deep, but, she recognized the walk. It was him, and he was alone.

``Hey, Rob, no horse?’’ she said when his dark figure came around the curve. ``Where’s Gopher?’’

``I left him. I’d rather you ride him in the daytime anyhow. Come on, let’s go up the arroyo.’’ She looked at his face in the moonlight. He looked sleek and grinning in a way that reminded her of animal masks in pueblo dances. She had come to meet the Rob who was helping her learn to ride without her parents knowing. A cloud moved across the moon, and he appeared to grow taller, and completely unfamiliar.