Under the Cottonwoods

by Douglas H. Thayer
Originally published Fall 1972 (07:03)
Paul kept both sweaty hands on the steering wheel and breathed through his mouth. Her diaper dirty, Lisa lay just behind him in the back of the station- wagon on the mattress. Valerie was asleep farther back and Richard lay over behind Beth. Richard had stopped crying for Lisa’s bottle, but he still whimpered. They had just passed the Lehi turnoff, and from the elevation of the freeway Utah Lake glared to the west like a huge aluminum roof in the afternoon August sun. The air conditioning on the new Buick had gone out just after they left Reno, but now Beth was afraid that if they rolled down the windows another hornet might get in and sting one of the children. He had had to stop and kill a hornet just before they came to Lehi, and since then the only circulation had been the air vents.
Paul glanced over at Beth. Five months pregnant, she sat sweaty and flushed, silent, one of her church books open on her lap.
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