Knowing by Laurel Dewey

outlining it. Checking out the other aspens in the tight circle, she realized all of them shared the same mysterious, naturally occurring outline in the bark. How odd, she factored, that she’d never noticed it before. But now, the more she stared at the tall, slender trees washed in the luminous morning sun, that’s all she saw. “Eyes” everywhere, rimmed with black and staring at her.
    She sat back and felt the shallow breathing take over. It was a callback to the past when taking in too much air felt dangerous. Jane glanced in the rearview mirror at herself. Dark circles were evident as was a generally haggard appearance. She wasn’t bouncing back from a rough night like she used to. While Harlan continued to snore and sleep in the backseat, Jane brought out a piece of paper and jotted down what they needed. She knew there would be a lot of eyes out there looking for her classic ride. Staying off the main highways was a necessity but that would sure as hell slow the trip down to New Mexico. But first things first. She nudged Harlan in the leg. It took another harder push to awaken him. “Come on, Harlan,” Jane stressed. “Wake the hell up!”
    After he relieved himself outside the car and stretched his rotund podgy frame, Jane directed him back into the back seat and covered him with blankets, coats and anything else she could find. “No matter what happens,” she warned him, “stay under those blankets until I tell you it’s safe.”
    They motored down the dirt path and back onto the frontage road. About a mile later on the left side, Jane stopped the Mustang and told Harlan to stay put. She grabbed a screwdriver from her tool chest in the trunk and turned to the acres of trashed cars and dead trucks that littered the area. Jumping the rickety fence, she entered the lonely lot and scanned one vehicle after another. When she found a relatively clean looking, out-of-state license plate, she removed it from the vehicle. By the time she returned to the Mustang, she had four decent plates from four different states. She decided on the one from California, and carefully peeling off the tags from her own plates, Jane reapplied them to the bogus ones. After screwing the plate onto her car, she stepped back to briefly admire her handiwork. This was the beginning of the subterfuge, she warned herself.
    “We’re making a stop in about half an hour,” Jane told Harlan, who was still buried underneath the blankets.
    “Food?” he mumbled.
    “Later. We’ve got more important things on our plate.”
    It took longer than half an hour because all the side roads and back roads chewed up more time. She drove into the parking lot at 9:15 that morning where The Tat Palace was located and glanced around the vacant area. Like other areas, it had been hit by the economic downturn, leaving more abandoned businesses to choke out the ones that were still gasping for their financial futures. The Tat Palace was on life support but then again, just like bars, the customers don’t normally congregate until afternoon or evening. From what she could discern from the solo pickup truck in the parking lot, Alex, the owner of the place, was the only one inside. Jane drove the Mustang around back and parked it in a shaded spot away from any prying eyes. She donned her leather jacket and pulled out a Rockies ball cap she found underneath the passenger seat. “Wait here one second,” she advised Harlan, donning the cap and pulling it down so that it hid her eyes. She grabbed her leather satchel and got out of the car, tracing the building for security cameras. As Jane expected, there was only one by the side entrance. Returning to the Mustang, she helped Harlan extricate himself from the car and, after covering his head with a blanket so that only his eyes showed, she led him to the door of the business.
    Once inside, there was a small anteroom with a heavy black velvet curtain that separated them from the main room. Jane closed the door