BUSTING UP

by JoJo

(a preamble to The McCreedy Bust)

"Now listen," said Heyes, but that just seemed to make the Kid angrier.

It felt like they were re-playing the oldest argument they'd ever had, one which had punctuated their youth like a series of un-necessary exclamation marks in a text otherwise straightforward.

"Don't tell me to listen," Kid Curry said. "Don't tell me anything."

"There's no need to get all riled up, Kid."

"Why's that? Because you're right, and I'm stupid?"

"I never said that ... for crying out loud, I never said that!"

"You were working up to it, Heyes."

Heyes flung his arms in the air, and let them fall.

They'd stopped to take on water, and now they both realised how much they ached, how dry their veins felt, how light their heads were. They were facing each other over the saddles, suddenly too strung out to get back up and carry on riding.

The Kid was tired, Heyes reasoned. Trail-sore, hungry, thirsty and exhausted. Deprived of sleep and basic comfort for too long and he became cranky. It really was like travelling with a kid in that respect, but underneath it all, Heyes knew that his own uncanny ability to practice mind over matter was something that riled the Kid more than anything. As if it pointed out his own inferiority somehow.

Not that he wasn't tired himself. He was. And all those other things. It just took him a sight longer to be brought low than it did the Kid. He couldn't help that, could he? Didn't mean the Kid had to get so all-fired irritated with him.

There was a town called Parnell behind them, where they'd quickly discovered there was no work to be had, only trouble. And there was a border town called Red Rock in front of them. In between there was maybe twenty miles and an argument.

An argument, Heyes could not help feeling, that the Kid had started all on his own by squaring up to the mean-eyed character in the Livery stable at Parnell, and all because the character was ornery and the Kid didn't want to put up with it. Down the years, Heyes reckoned, this trait of Kid Curry's had caused them more grief than anything else.

The Kid wouldn't agree of course. He'd say that it was Heyes being too clever for his own good and everyone else's.

Heyes knew, he really knew, that the worst thing he could do was to get angry himself.

"Maybe we should just by-pass Red Rock," he said. "I don't think you're in any mood to get employed by anyone."

Kid Curry pursed lips over his teeth. "And what's that supposed to mean? What you angling at, Heyes?"

"Just that when you're all bent outa shape ... well, you're just going to make folk nervous. Who's gonna give work to some feller that makes 'em nervous? A fast draw may be pretty but it's not going to impress someone into giving you a job."

"I've had enough of this, Heyes," the Kid growled.

"What?"

"You poking at me with your stick. You're treating me like I shot the guy's foot off or something."

"You drew your gun, Kid," Heyes said, and Curry could not fail to notice the little ice that had crept into his voice all of a sudden. "You gave him cause to dislike you. To wonder about you. And to go and complain about you. All I'm saying is that we can't survive if you keep doing it."

"Well I don't know how you can stand to let jackasses like him make you look like a fool."

"I'm talking about survival, Kid!" Heyes snapped.

Kid Curry ranged his eyes over the dusty terrain they had yet to cross. "So your brilliant deduction is that we by-pass the nearest place where we can find food?"

Heyes figured he'd failed because now he felt the stirrings of annoyance in his gut. His acid and empty gut. He blinked gritty eyes, counted to ten.

"Why won't you get it?" he muttered. "Or is that you do get it but you just can't change?"

A spark of triumph ignited the blue-sky gaze. "Well I've told you that more than once, Heyes, starting back in Porterville. You coulda been rid of me then."

"You don't have to be so proud of being ...."

"Being?" The spark was crackling now.

Heyes did actually want to say what he thought the Kid was being, but he knew his weak spots inside out and didn't ever enjoy exploiting them. He could tell that Curry wasn't going to soften up on this, not for a while. So he decided to change tack a little.

"Damn I'm thirsty," he said. "And not for water." He ran his tongue over his dry lips, imagined the burning sensation of whisky tipping down his throat, giving him a lift good enough that he'd not mind the headache that would surely follow close behind.

The blue sparks slitted. As well as Heyes knew him, the Kid knew Heyes just as well.

"So we're going on into Red Rock?" he asked.

Heyes shrugged to denote that there was a lot more he could say but that he wasn't going to.

Kid Curry shrugged too, for the same reason. He watched Heyes mount up, noting how stiff he seemed, how peaky he looked, and he remembered that Heyes hadn't complained any over the last days, just kept riding, encouraging, shaking his head with a small smile every time the Kid muttered and groused.

"You think I like it?" Curry said, as he got up in his saddle. He had reached a hand over to stop Heyes from immediately swinging his mount around and setting off down the road. "Cos I don't. I'd like to be ... you, you know that? A man who could make something of himself one day. But I won't, Heyes, because of this, because this is who I am. For good or bad."

Hell. This argument would never go away, Heyes knew it.

But for now he was flooded with affection, however despairing he might feel deep down inside. He tapped his hand on top of the Kid's, cracking a big smile that hurt his wind-stiffened face.

"Two or three drinks," he said. "Unless the barman's a crook or somebody doesn't like your face."

"We'll be fine," the Kid said, letting go Heyes arm. He didn't have a smile himself yet. That would maybe take a few more hours, perhaps even the two or three drinks and a long sleep.

They set off down the road in the direction of Red Rock, the atmosphere between them lighter than it had been, both of them concentrating on the idea of a drink to draw a line under the debate for now.

By the time they got into town, Kid Curry was completely ready to be drawn back from his sulk by the warm nudge of Heyes' shoulder as they stumped towards the saloon.

The bartender saw them coming.

Two candidates for Mr McCreedy's cheap, watered-down whisky, he thought, and plucked the bottle from under the counter.