Drifter

 The sun hung over the Arizona Territory like a bloodshot eye, staring down at the desolate stretch of dust they called the creek. The drifter spat a glob of tobacco juice into the red earth and shifted his weight, his worn leather holster groaning in protest against his hip. He wasn’t a man of many words, mostly because he’d buried most of them along with the three men who’d tried to jump him in the city.

The wind howled through the gulch, carrying the scent of sagebrush and impending gunpowder. Ahead, the saloon stood like a crooked tooth in a rotting mouth. The drifter pulled his hat low, his eyes—hard as flint and twice as cold—fixed on the swinging doors.

Inside, the outlaw was waiting. The man was a devil who wore his sins like a badge of honor, his hand rarely straying far from the pearl-handled revolver that had brought terror to every stagecoach line in the territory. He’d killed the drifter’s brother over a disputed hand of poker, and tonight, the ledger was going to be balanced in lead.

The drifter kicked the doors open. The piano player vanished beneath the keys, and the room went still enough to hear a spider spin its web in the rafters. The outlaw sat at the corner table, a bottle of rotgut whiskey halfway to his lips.

"I reckoned you’d show your face eventually," the outlaw rasped, his voice sounding like dry leaves skittering over a tombstone. "I thought you were smart enough to stay buried."

"I am a patient man," the drifter drawled, his hand hovering over his iron. "But my patience expired three towns back."

The outlaw smiled, revealing teeth stained yellow by tobacco and malice. "There’s plenty of room in the boot hill. Might as well dig your own grave while you're still limber."

In a blur of motion that defied his years, the outlaw reached. But the drifter was faster—a specter of vengeance forged in the fires of the frontier. Two shots barked in the cramped room, shattering the stillness. The first slug caught the outlaw in the shoulder, spinning him like a top; the second found its mark in the center of his chest.

The outlaw slumped forward, his glass of whiskey shattering against the floorboards, mixing amber spirits with the dark, copper scent of blood. He died as he lived—looking for a fight he couldn’t win.

The drifter didn’t wait for the law. There was no law in these parts, only the cold comfort of a smoking barrel and the long ride into the setting sun. He stepped back into the heat, the dust already swirling to cover his tracks. He was just a shadow in the desert, moving on to the next horizon, forever chased by the ghosts of his own making.