Wishbone

We met in the southwest, close to the border. She was silhouetted before a crime-scene sunset, blood and plasma seeping into a workshirt-blue sky darkening to ink. She smelled of road dust, weariness, and shallow-buried things.

"So what's your name?"

"Blanche. Blanche Warren."

"Don't sound too Mexican."

"No."

"You live around here, Blanche Warren?"

"For now." She poked the dry dirt with her toe. "What's yours?"

"Huh?"

"Your name."

"Cole Franklin."

"Don't sound Mexican neither."

"It ain't."

She lifted her...