He wasn’t sure how much time had passed, only that there was a lighter blue on the horizon than the darkness before. He was lying on a cot under an open-air tent. They’d tried to keep him awake during the night by shoving his shoulder every thirty seconds or so but he must have won that battle because not only did he just awaken, there was a guy sleeping in a chair right next to him.
Bang moved his nose only to find it aching and crusty. They’d reset it against his wishes earlier in the evening and he’d wanted to cry out but didn’t.
Bob ducked his head under the tent and eyed him first but then looked at the guy asleep next to him. Bang didn’t think Bob thought too highly of the guy snoring loudly because he threw a pack against his stomach and shouted, “Gus, wake up. How’s he doing?”
Gus shot up out of the chair and nearly stumbled over Bang.
Bang clenched in anticipation that the man was going to fall over him and immediately regretted it. His head and neck seared with pain from the sudden jerk.
“We’re not supposed to move him, right? That’s what they said,” said Gus.
“Just clean up his face and get some water in him,” Bob said.
Then he knelt down to Bang’s side, looking right at him. “Your nose should heal up fine. How’s your head feeling? Still feeling nauseous?”
Bang didn’t want to answer him. He didn’t want to say that he couldn’t really move his neck. And he didn’t feel like talking to this man. If he remembered right, he was the one who called the horse up short at high speed, sending him hard to the ground, just because he held on.
But Bob was expecting an answer and Bang took his time and swallowed thick saliva down his throat. “You guys are dressed like American Indians of the past,” he finally said. “And live like them, but why isn’t your same something like Plays Dirty Tricks or Snores When Sleeping, instead of Bob and Gus and Corey?”
Bob didn’t respond to that. Instead, he quirked up the side of his lip and stood up. “I think he’s going to be fine. Get him some food but don’t let him move.”