I Walk the Line - Part Four (The End... sort of...)
Avon + Scientology = .....
Read Part 1, then Part 2, then Part 3....
I blew across the lens cap, sending a micro-wave of dust toward the Scientologists' fence. I didn't alert the boys, didn't tell them my brochures evaporated like our sweat into the arid air. I leaned against the car, poured bottled water over the cap, swished it this way and that, dried it on my pink western shirt. 11 rolled down his window, threw out a crushed Frito, sunk back into the bench seat.
I glanced around the ghost town, tried to see a moving vehicle or a walking thetan, someone toting Avon goodies. Nothing. Nothing but the dead skulls of cholla cactus laying in random piles. The gentle blue flicker of a television set rolled morse code across the prairie. That ranch house is too far away. I wondering if someone hid behind the widowed church, the empty pineboard homes. The wind laughed at me, sent scattering shadows of juniper and piñon along the old truck tracks marring the ground.
"Boys, let's get outta here!" I jumped in the car and slowly backed onto the county road. I drove at a snail's pace home, wanted to breath the gold and purple sunset. I switched on the radio and the pathos of country western music filled the car, flew out the open windows to the layers of deep colored sandstone lining our road. A lone red hawk chased us, swooped high above the rocks, then fell just inches from the road. I watched him fly low to the ground, his talons extended toward invisible prey. He was missing at least two flight feathers and the remaining ones were ragged and broken. I thought I saw dry dust rise from the ground to meet him, but maybe it was our exhaust.
I know why the Scientologist's stole this mesa, I thought. They know it captures shadows, shadows of dust and ruin and feather. They rise like a Phoenix. It's a place of reincarnation, rebirth. A desert rat ran in front of my wheels, dodged death. I watched him freeze in the rear view mirror, then shake, run back from where he came.
I thought my story would end here, in a dinky ghost town bordering high strangeness. I thought I would tell you I never saw those brochures again, that I lost two dollars twenty cents in books and samples on a wild thetan chase. But I was wrong, four weeks wrong, one hundred thirty dollars wrong. My phone rang, just this past week, and I answered it though I didn't recognize the number.
"Hello, this is Birdie." I held the phone between my head and neck while my fingers typed out an email response to a friend.
"Yes. I know." The caller held her breath for a moment. I opened my mouth to speak, to ask what the heck she wanted, but she dove in, gave me a list of lotions and Avon bug spray fourteen items long. Her voice was cultured, sophisticated. She sounded Southern California. She sounded glamorous, urbane, so far from my New Mexican wilderness.
"Yes, ma'am! I can certainly get all of these products to you! Now, what's your address and telephone number, please?" I sat, poised, ready to strike, my ever-present open Avon brochure to my left.
"Sorry, I don't have a telephone. You can meet me at the Trementina Post Office, just please tell me when the goods will be ready."
I didn't know what to say. She must be a thetan! No glamour gals live in the prickly pear canyons. At least I didn't think any did. I pictured the "Post Office," a dirt driveway and a simple home that housed the boxes of ranchers and recluses on the other side of the Scientologists' mesa. I gave her a date. I gave her a time. I gave her a laugh, too, but she didn't respond.
So I deliver the stuff in a week and a half. I'm bringing a body guard! And samples! I'm leaving the boys at home and probably bringing the dog or pig for extra security. If this is a formal church call, I plan on asking what they want with all that bug spray!
To Be Continued.... if I don't land in jail!
9:04:24 PM 
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