Five minutes of lotus-smooth highway later the other man is asleep too.

I look at the woman in the rear view mirror. I imagine my thought is a butterfly that flies out of my forehead and lands on her nose. She looks out the window at the desert that begins at the outskirts of the city. The red rocky hills are spiked with cactus and cholla and creosote, nothing kind there, nothing soft. She won't meet my eyes. She seems unhappy, like she is involved in some kind of tremendous mistake. She seems sad and tired, as if she is asking herself why she didn't just stay home and be thankful.