Crave by Jordan Sweet Page A

small grin.  “What are you, some kind of stuntwoman?”
    I can hardly speak, I’m so flustered. 
    We’re alone in this smelly stock car that’s trundling along the countryside.  The guy can hardly be a year or two older than me, and he looks like he just stepped out of a Country Music Video. 
    “Thanks for helping me,” I say, trying to smooth down my hair, which feels like it just went into a blender.
    “My pleasure,” he says, and then he bends down and picks up a white cowboy hat, brushing it off and putting it on his head.
    “You have no idea how much you just saved my butt.”  My heart pounds- half from the frantic run and half from this man who just made my day.  My week.  My year.
    “Have some of this water and try to relax,” he says, pulling a canteen from a small satchel sitting on the floor next to him.  “The name’s Everett.”
    “Nice to meet you,” I say.  I take a big drink and almost choke trying to get it down between breaths.  “Where’s this train taking us, Everett?” 
    “You just randomly hop trains not knowing where they are going?” he returns.
    “Only when my life depends on it,” I say.
    “So what would make your life depend on going west?”
    “Well, mainly because there’s no reason to go back east.  Nothing left there for me.  But out west I’ve got a friend and a college to look into.”
    “Ah, the college girl. You’ll fit right in in Pacific Heights.”
    “What’s that supposed to mean? Where’s Pacific Heights?”
    “That, my friend, is the end of this line. That’s where all these cows get off.”
    Mention of the cows reminds me how starving I am.  “I could eat one of those cows right now,” I tell him.
    “They’re delicious, no doubt, but not ready for eating just yet. How’d this granola bar do ya?” he says, pulling it out of his front pocket like a magician.
    “Perfect,” I say, reaching for it.
    Pulling it back ever so slightly, he tilts his head lower, raises his right eye brow and says, “Well, hold on just a minute there. Since we’re both starving and I’ve only got but one granola bar, how are we going to go about sharing it?”
    Taken aback by his offer and his refusal then to pass it along, I say, “Well, you shouldn’t just go offering things up and then back out of them, but considering the circumstances and the fact that you already did me one favor,  I guess perhaps we just split it down the middle and call it even.”
    “Call it even?  No, that wouldn’t be calling it even.  Nope, not even close,” he says, turning his head away, acting like the offer is off the table now.
    Son of a bitch, I think. What is this guy’s problem?  I’ve never seen anyone do that.
    He turns back to me, with that grin and continues, “Even-Steven? Well, let me think about that for a minute… hmmm…”  And as if divine inspiration strikes him, all at once he raises a finger to the sky and says, “Yep, that’s it, we’ll just have to make a bet for it and see who gets it.  We won’t split the thing, we’ll go for all of it.  What say ya?”
    “Well, first of all, I don’t know how they treat girls where you come from, but I can tell you right now, not even in the South End of New Bedford would that-“
    “-So, the bet then, we’re on?” he interrupts.
    He might have the look of a fine country gentleman, but I do wonder where his head is at on this. It is kind of intriguing me now what he wants to bet.
    “What have you got?” I say.
    “Okay then,” he says, rubbing his hands together, winking at me, and pulling that grin even higher up both sides of his face.  His excitement is contagious and even though I questioned his treatment of girls, I can’t stop looking at his face. His gorgeous face.
    “So, here’s what we’re going to do.  This train is heading west and on the way there may be dozens, hundreds of stops for all we know.  You’ve never been on this kind of train, I reckon, and it’s sure