monday - six

They sat in the bed of the pickup as the sun set quietly behind them, painting the sky hues of purple and gold and fiery orange and red. She fidgeted, holding on to the camera in her lap, trying not to look at the old man. He studied the clouds as the old man had done, trying to draw memories and smells and sounds and life from the inanimate blobs two thousand miles above his head, but failed miserably.
"What do you think his name was?"
Rhys shrugged. "Does it matter?"
"Of course it does. Someone has to remember him."
"So we'll remember him as the crazy old guy who drove fast and fell in love with the pine trees." He looked at her. "Names are just words for someone that's so much more complicated and real than words could ever convey."
"But what about his family?"
"They know him as 'daddy' or 'grampa' or as a set of images and smells and memories, or something. Names don't mean anything to anyone except for people who want to classify everything."
They sat quietly for awhile. Rhys turned back to the ever darkening sky. Maura climbed out of the bed and jumped into the dust and walked over to where the old man still lay and looked down at him, her camera hanging down from her neck, craning for a closer look. For a man that had driven at breakneck speeds and ranted quietly about a life that was beyond them, he looked incredibly fragile lying in the desert sand. In his cold frail hand he still clutched to the scented palm tree, the only connection with his past he'd ever have again. He had a content smile on his face, as if something warm and wonderful had just happened, and a similar aura hung around him; Maura could feel it the moment she gazed into his tired weary face.
She pulled the camera up and set her eye against the viewfinder. The lens focused and adjusted, and the shutter slipped closed, sealing the vessel of his soul forever and ever amen. The film advanced and the camera fell back to her chest.
She stood up and looked over at Rhys. "Are we sleeping here tonight?"
"Yeah, if you want."
"What do we do about him?"
She looked down at the old man. "I don't know. We could bury him, or maybe take him with us."
"To where?"
"Whatever's down there." She motioned down away from the way they came.
“We can’t leave him here?”
She shook her head. “It doesn’t feel right.”
“Okay. Then we’ll take him in the morning.” His stomach growled; it echoed dully in the desert landscape around them.
Darkness fell. Crickets a million miles away chirped, and that was all the noise there was.