Notes from the road 9

Chapter 9

 

Dog sensed it before the rest of us, with his enhanced damp nose working overtime as we rose higher and higher into the mountains on the outskirts of the desert we had just crossed. He rose from being curled up on the seat to full attention in a second and started sweeping his tail in excitement, paws up on the dashboard.

 

"What's wrong ?" I asked as Madison tried to stop his tail from sweeping her face.
"Don't know. Something's got him interested though," She replied pulling dog down onto the seat to try and calm him.

 

As we crested the hill my breath caught in my throat, beneath us the valley stretched below us crammed with the deepest most verdant greenery I had ever seen. We had been encountering sparse vegetation for the last few miles whilst climbing this mountain but nothing compared to the lush landscape laid out before us.

 

Bran pulled over and we all piled out to gaze down at the scenery below. The trees covered every surface with just the thin trace lines of a road here and there like black trace work on a green sheet of muslin. The sun was shining down and aside from the occasional car shooting past we had the view all to ourselves.

 

"Do you think they know what they're missing?" said Madison, one nut-brown arm draped languidly across her eyes. She and I were perched up on the bonnet of the truck lying against the hot windscreen.

 

I looked around us at the totally unoccupied space. "Who?"

 

"These people," The arm waved vaguely in the direction of the road upon which the cars roared past that we had turned off. "Driving past this amazing view without even slowing down to look twice. Like it doesn't matter. Like its not important."

 

"Over familiarity breeds contempt," Bran said standing with his broad back to us, keeping an eye on the over excited Dog who was racing around the flat space clearly glad to be out of the confines of the car and having different scents to chase after.

 

She lowered her sunglasses at him.

 

"Hunh?"

 

I took a deep breath. "What I believe my monosyllabic friend means is that if you see this kind of beauty everyday you have to become immured to it. Otherwise it would be as stunning as it is to us right now and you'd never have the time to do anything except gawp."

 

"Hmmm," She raised her sunglasses " So you wouldn't want to stop and smell the roses if that was the only scent you encountered everyday. Even true beauty would loose its pallor."

 

"Crazy fools," I said, stretching against the warmth of the sun on metal "There are some things of beauty I could never grow tired of ."

 

"Anyone particular in mind?" She asked teasingly, a bright flash of a smile lighting her face.

 

"Could be," I mused pretending to consider it. " Could be."

 

She punched me playfully in the arm and slid off of the bonnet to chase around with Dog.

 

Bran looked at me searchingly while she found a stick in the dirt and threw it.

 

"What?"

 

His heavy expression never changed.

 

"I see rainbows between you two," and without waiting to justify himself he turned back to the dog-versus-woman tug of war over the stick.

 

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We drove into the valley after the sun had set and the chill air had surrounded us again. I was still musing over Bran's perceptiveness when we he decided to pull into a Motel for the night.