Saddle Dust

Chapter 19

Casey opens her eyes to find herself lying twisted in a pile of sheets on a bed in a room she doesn't ever remember entering. Bright sunlight cuts through the thin white curtains soured grey with age. She her head throbs and every inch of her body aches. Casey feels like she had been tossed from a horse, fallen headfirst down a rocky slope, and been run over by a trolly on some cobbled city street. She slowly shifts her arm out from under her and winces at its stiff soreness. 
A cobbled city street... That's where she had been. Most of yesterday comes back to Casey in sharp, hard to hold fragments. She remembers being tossed out of the sheriff's office and wandering the citrus scented streets before walking into a saloon and... She puts her palms to her eyes and rubs them vigorously. Dad above. How long have I been drinking? When did I start? Was it... "Oh yes." A wheedling, nasty little voice whines in her head. "You started because of Steadfast. Because Hadley humiliated you in front of Maxine and the men just laughed. Because those men shot your only remaining family. Because you shot and killed those men even though you promised Sundance, your father, that you would never kill anyone. You still did it. You're a mur—"
"Stop! Shut the hell up. I—I had to I...I..." Casey realizes she is talking to no one, and groans, nearly on the edge of tears. She feels as if someone has run her nerves over a cheese shredder, and left her with the tattered strings. She rolls over onto her side and holds back a wave of nausea that threatens to take hold on her stomach. Slowly, Casey raises herself into a sitting position. She has to close her eyes take a deep breath to stop the swimming that peripherates her vision with tiny black dots. That's when she notices the clothes she is wearing.
"What the..."  Casey looks at the buttons on the white shirt she is wearing which aren't quite lined up with each other. She runs a hand over the dark red lightly patterned vest she is wearing and looks at the comfortably worn out work pants which somehow replaced the disgusting roping pants she had been wearing— or at least thought she had been wearing. Maybe she had walked in here with these clothes on after all. The past few weeks were blurring together. But no. Casey didn't think so. These clothes were much too nice to have been in her recent posession. Sure, she could afford them but she had barely been capable of washing her face over the past few weeks let alone buying herself new clothes. Casey suddenly remembered her mill bag with her money in it.
She lept to her feet, placing a hand on the side table to stabilize herself as her eyes darted frantically around the room there was her bag with the money and few possessions she owned but where was— her hat was sitting patiently on the side table her hand was bracing itself against. Casey let out a breath of relief, her shoulders slumping back. Casey plops back down on the bed and buries her head in her hands. Rubbing the sleep out and some form of alertness back in. Casey takes a better look at the room she finds herself in. It appears to be the room of a hotel or boarding house. The room is very clean and tastefully decorated with the few ornaments its owner's obviously tight budget allows.
Casey feels the sheets under her hands and balls up her fists in the cool linen. She feels clean. The grit and sweat she hadn't noticed accumulating on her body and clothes is gone. She lifts her hands and examines them. Flipping them first to one side, then the other, then back again. Her nails are pink again and the callouses on her palms are free of grime. She runs her hands through her loose, tangled hair. Her scalp prickles with its newfound state of being grease free. Casey tears loose a piece of thin twine from her mill bag and braids her hair back, tying it off with the piece of twine.
Feeling better now, Casey puts her feet (feeling much better after being cleaned) back into her boots and buckles her gun holsters back on along with her belt. She takes her mill bag, and puts her hat back on her head. She has a hand on the door handle when she stops, and takes off her hat again. She thinks back to not ten minutes before.
Her hat had been placed on the side table upside down. On it's crown. Whoever had brought her here last night knew the old hat superstitions and had respected her, a filthy drunkard, enough to flip her hat upside down on the table. Whoever had brought her here had saved her another night of wandering the streets unaware of her surroundings and what she was doing. They deserved a proper thank you. Casey did not replace her hat on her head, but kept it in her hand. Maybe the owner of the saloon or hotel, wherever she was, would remember the person who brought her here and paid for a bath and bed.
Casey's room opened onto a wood-planked hallway with a thin strip of old red carpet stretching off and ending at the lip of a staircase down to the right. She steps onto the carpet and pulls her bedroom door shut tight. Casey cautiously makes her way down the hallway and places a booted foot onto the first wooden step. Her free hand is on the smooth-worn banister, and she is balancing half on the landing above, and half on the first step below. She doesn't know what makes her pause at the top of the stair. Maybe it's a memory from the night before. Casey has the same feeling she had when she first met Hadley and signed the contract which later turned out to be fake. She feels unsure of herself and uncertain that what she is about to do is in her best interest. But like the phony contract, she doesn't know if what she feels is all good or all bad.
Casey decides that whatever the feeling might be, she can't help it because there is someone (almost certainly another boarder) coming out of his room and looking at her oddly. Casey's face flushes as she realizes that she is standing awkwardly still, and blocking the stairs down into the main room. She walks down the stairs feeling like her body is made out of shards of glass and splinters of wood. She realizes that she hasn't felt this sober in a long time and isn't sure she likes it. She stabilizes herself on the smooth, wooden handrail as she descends to the main level.
There are tables scattered in a sort of organized randomness around the saloon (and it's clearly a saloon because of the polished bar at the back). Tidy wooden chairs sit conversationally around each of the round tables, most of which are empty except for the small handful of customers that sit and smoke quietly. It must be afternoon to be this slow...I must have been out for quite a while. Casey suprises herself by wondering about the time of day and how long she had been out. Those minor details of life were something she hadn't thought about in what feels like a lifetime.
None of the customers look up or show any sign of recognition so she walks to the bar where a tall black man (Casey notices his race with some suprise as black bar tenders are more scarce than female outlaws) stands polishing the counter and occasionally taking a sip from a mug of coffee. He looks up at her approach and raises his eyebrows but does not smile as Casey braces herself against the counter.
"You'll be looking for Ms. Romero. She owns this place." Casey thinks she vaguely remembers the name from the day before, but can't be sure since she wasn't paying attention to much more than the glass in front of her.
"Thank you. Would she know who brought me here last night and paid for my room?"
"Ms. Romero let you the room. You brought yourself in here yesterday afternoon."
The bartender's voice stays matter-of-fact and Casey feels embarassed at her poor memory. The bartender seems to sense her embarrassment and lets Casey sit in silence for a moment longer before speaking again in a gentler tone.
"She left a little while ago to collect the mail from the post office, and to run a few errands. I expect she'll be back shortly. If you're looking to get some fresh air while you wait, there's a small yard out back." The bartender nods his head in the direction of a short hallway leading to the wooden door of the kitchen.
"Go through there. There's a screen door in the kitchen which goes out. It's not much of anything to look at, but there's sun." Casey nods and stands.
"Thank you, Mr..."
"Maxwell. Harry Maxwell. May I ask yours?" Casey smile is small and tired.
"Long. Casey Long." Harry nods slightly.
"Hmm. I think I heard that name a long time ago when I was still living northeast. You used to run with Butch Cassidy's, right?"
Casey's reply is toneless.
"Yeah. I did, once." Harry nods as if he understands and smiles at Casey. "You're safe here, Ms. Long. I'm not looking to turn you in, and I think Ms. Romero would say the same."
"Thank you. That's all I can ask for right now, although I don't know what's left for me out here." Casey turns away from the counter and steps carefully across the floor and down the hallway. Harry shakes his head and takes another sip of his coffee. She's just like Anita, somehow. I can't quite put a finger on it, but she is. Just like her. A warm smile tugs at the corners of his mouth.