Many thanks for Maggie and Beth for their beta work and for Lori and her family for their information about living in West Texas and how it smells.

Originally written for Yuletide 2006

20 West

If there was one thing Tyra Collette knew, it was that she wasn't going to end up spending the rest of her life in Dillon, Texas. She thought that every day when she passed the on ramp to Interstate 20. It headed west--away from here, away from everything this town had come to mean.

It didn't take seeing her mom in another dead-end relationship, or stopping down to visit her sister Mindy at that place by the highway where she danced for money to help her make the decision. It wasn't the way Tim rolled off her and walked away without ever asking her if it was good for her. It wasn't even the way she saw Billy Riggins look at her when he didn't think she would notice.

It was the way the town smelled.

They had only lived there for two weeks when she walked out of the little rambler that the oil company had arranged for them and wrinkled up her nose. She asked her mom what that smell was and her mom said it was the smell of money. Tyra was only eight, but she knew that quarters and even dollar bills that had been stuck in the bottom of a Hello Kitty purse for months didn't smell like that.

It wasn't like she could really describe the smell, either. It wasn't like the place they lived in Kansas that smelled like soybeans. This was different--it was everywhere.

Tyra didn't like that smell at all.

She thought a lot about leaving, just getting in her truck and heading out of town, but something kept her back. She hadn't meant to be rude to Mrs. Taylor that day when the coach's wife had called Tyra into her office to try to talk about her future, but there was a part of her that was afraid of what could happen if she didn't just leave.

If she stayed, she knew that Tim would probably have her--or if not Tim, then she could probably have Billy instead. She'd be livin' there down on Oak Street in that pathetic, torn up rambler for the rest of her life.

Married to Billy, at least she wouldn't have to be the coach's wife, though. Course, he'd probably cheat on her during trips to Vegas and his idea of entertaining would be a swingers party.

Part of her admired her sister. At least Mindy didn't take any shit from anyone. And she had gotten out of the house when she was eighteen. And she'd kept their mom's boyfriends away from Tyra. They'd never talked about it, but Tyra was pretty sure that Mindy hadn't always been as lucky.

Dillon hadn't seemed so bad when they first got there. The girls in her third grade class were nice and Mrs. Erickson, her teacher was pretty and never made her feel stupid for not remembering her multiplication tables.

Life had actually been pretty good for a while--until the bust when she was in sixth grade. At first she didn't understand what the problem was. Her parents talked a lot in their room with the door closed and then her dad stopped coming home at night. He hadn't been around at all for about three weeks when her mom came in and told Tyra and Mindy that they were moving into the trailer park.

Her mom tried to put a positive spin on it, but Tyra knew nothing would ever be the same.

It took the kids at school a little while to figure out what had happened. She wasn't the only one whose daddy had lost his job out at the field, but most of those dads had either stuck around or moved their families with them. Tyra didn't know of any other kids in her class whose dad just disappeared like hers had. Jason Street's dad worked out in the field with her dad, but after the bust he drove school bus for them and even sold cars for a while with Lyla's daddy. He still went out and practiced football with Jason every day. Tim's mom did book-keeping for the oil company, but she'd already started drinking pretty bad before the bust. Course, they never talked about that.

Her mom had really tried to make the move seem like no big deal.

She even let Tyra have a slumber party for her birthday. Tyra invited all the girls in her class: Brittney, Jenny, Krista, Megan, Lyla and the others. Everyone seemed so excited and Tyra planned for weeks--where they would sleep, the pizza they would order, what movies they would rent.

Everybody was supposed to come over at 6 pm for supper. At 6:15, Tyra wondered what had happened. At 7 pm she called Brittney, who apologized for not coming--she was sick she said. One by one, Tyra called the other girls until she got Lyla on the phone.

"Sorry, Tyra. My mom, well...she didn't think it was such a good idea," Lyla said slowly.

"Not a good idea?" Tyra asked. "What do you mean?"

Lyla stumbled over the words as Tyra tried to make sense of what she was saying.

"So, we're not friends anymore?" Tyra asked.

"No, not that," Lyla responded. "I mean, we can still be friends at school, but I don't think I can come over to your trailer."

Even at eleven, Tyra knew what it meant to be called trash. She didn't need some girl with her long ponytail and a daddy that sold used cars to explain it to her.

It seemed like a cruel twist of fate when she hooked up with Tim Riggins. Of all the guys in the school, she had to fall for Lyla Garrity's boyfriend's best friend.

Lyla stood for everything Tyra hated about Dillon. It was the cheerleading, the two parents, a daddy that loved her and believed in her, the quarterback boyfriend--all of it was everything that Tyra wasn't.

But, Tim, for better or worse, was hers. He wasn't the first guy Tyra Collette slept with, but he was the first one she wanted to wake up next to in the morning. He got her.

Tim never made her feel like trash. He didn't make her feel special, either, but she could be herself with him. There were no parents at Tim's house to make small talk with, no one to judge her.

She didn't want to be, but she was jealous of Tim's friendship with Jason Street. In Jason, Tim had a true confidant. Tyra hadn't had a friend like that since her so-called friends had shown their true colors in sixth grade.

It had always been a bit awkward with the four of them, even though Tim and Tyra hadn't done a lot of double dating with Jason and Lyla. Tim had always said he couldn't handle the thought of listening to her voice all night long. Must've been why he'd been so quick to put his tongue down her throat when the opportunity presented itself.

She should have known that was what Lyla was up to the first time she saw her with Tim. Lyla had merely tolerated Tim's presence in Jason's life. The fact that Lyla suddenly started showing up everywhere seemed fishy. But, it was so improbable--Tim and Lyla getting together was the last thing that Tyra or anyone would ever think could happen.

But when she finally found out, for sure, it was like someone had punched her in the gut. She thought it was impossible for someone to hurt her this much.

She wanted to get back at Lyla and Tim, to hurt them like they had hurt her-- to embarrass them like she had been. She could look Jason up and see if he was interested in exacting a little revenge as well. She knew she was capable of it, and that Jason was hurting as much as she was and would probably be an easy mark.

But, Tyra knew she couldn't do it. She'd said it right to his face. He was a good person--too good to be getting screwed like he was, by life and his friends. She could go down to the rehab facility and get up in his stuff, see what he was still capable of, make sure that Tim and Lyla found out--but, to be honest, it wouldn't make her feel better and it wouldn't be fair to Jason.

She wanted to not care about what happened and who got hurt, but deep down there was this thing that wouldn't allow her to lash out at Tim that way. And in some ways that was harder to bear than any of the other realities of her life. Because, deep down she knew she might care what people did think of her.

And that's why she had to get out on Highway 20 and head west--get out of this town and never look back.