(c) 2011 Joel T Johnson
Nathan was at one with his car. The dash lights of his BMW were dimmed to perfect level. The six parameters of the motorized seat were adjusted to his precise size and posture and locked into both memory settings. He was cruising North on the 101, slicing through the night without apology. His automobile was so responsive, it was like merely thinking his way around the scattered traffic, like he himself was the car, gliding and sliding from lane to lane like, a speed skater. The slower cars (all of them) were like static objects to slalom around; there just to make things more interesting. No music; late at night with the warmth of two martinis in his blood, he preferred the sound of the road. Driving at over a hundred with the windows and moon roof cracked open was entertainment enough.
Nathan's phone was powered down and packed away in his attache. The deal was done, slam dunk! He could almost feel the back slaps on Monday. Once again he had saved their sorry asses. After weeks of wining and dinning degenerate aldermen, getting them laid, he could take a breath and think about getting himself a piece of ass for a change. For now, his reward was the silence and peace of a late night drive to nowhere the anticipation of what—or who—was to come. He had all weekend; maybe he'd end up in San Francisco or some nice Inn along the coast, as long as there was a bar and some lucky bimbo.
No one saw her emerge from the dark surrounding the gas station off a remote section of freeway. She walked as she might along a path in park on a sunny Saturday. She whistled a little tune. The clerk didn't notice that there were no cars in the spaces or at the pumps when she paid for her Camels and a Bic with a fifty.
“I can't take a bill like that after midnight.” he said.
“Keep the change,” she said.
“You don't understand, I can't drop that bill in the safe, I'll get in trouble.”
“I'll tell you what,” she said, articulating, “I'll pay you fifty dollars to let me walk out of here with cigarettes,” she held them up, “and a lighter,” she held it up. “You can figure out the rest without my help I think.”
The clerk slowly pulled the Jackson off the counter and stuffed it in his pocket.
Nathan pulled turned off the freeway ramp and into the gas station. The island lights made elongated, aerodynamic amoeba patterns on his sleek 750i. An attractive woman smoked a cigarette just outside the door., the fingers of her free arm hooked on her elbow.
She didn't look at him, she didn't avoid looking at him. He found an excuse to go into the store after he replaced the pump. He smiled when he passed her.
She did not.
She was young but dressed smartly, a business person of some sort, cool, confident, sexy as hell. He'd seen heels like those on women getting out of Bentleys, she was not for want of money. If Nathan had dreamed up a girl more his type to encounter in the middle of the night, in the middle of nowhere, he wouldn't have done as well.
He came back out of the store with a package of beef jerky and cup of coffee. He stopped outside the door. He stared out into the night towards the silent freeway. The woman glanced at him after a while.
“It's possible that I'm waiting for someone.”
“That's nice.” Said Nathan. He laughed nervously. “I didn't, um...”
“Didn't you?”
“Okay, a little curious--girl like you.” He looked around.
She didn't respond. Nathan took a sip of coffee and rocked back in a mock stretch.
“Car trouble? Boyfriend coming to pick you up?”
“There's no car, but I suspect there's trouble out there somewhere. To be honest, I'm not sure who I'm waiting for. It could even be you 'Robb Report'.”
“Oh hey, hey, I'm not looking for...”
“Oh please, do I even look like that?”
“Not remotely.” He laughed. He offered her a piece of jerky. She only stared at it.
“Nice car... Yours?” she said.
“Yeah, of course.”
“Let's get out of here Robb.” She stepped on her cigarette and started walking towards the black beemer.
Nathan almost choked on the coffee he had just sipped.
He pressed the start button. The instrument panel came to life and chimed. The engine roared somewhere deep inside itself, but was barely a whisper where they sat.
“I just wrapped-up a honey of a deal, on little victory drive, you know? I'm headed North... just wherever.”
“Fantastic,” she said. She extended her hand. “Annabelle Jude.”
“It's Nathan, not Robb Report.” He shook her hand.
“Yeah I know.”
“You know my name?”
“I know you're a still few paychecks short of making the cover.”
She winked.
She had a champion handshake. This girl has closed a few deals of her own, played the big leagues in one commodity or another.
The freeway was empty. Radar on, he took her up to ninety. Annabelle said nothing.
One-Oh-Five.
Nothing.
Traffic was starting to show up again. The passing lane filled with cars passing a wide load. Nathan slowed to eighty. Without hesitation he eased off the pavement to the left shoulder around the other cars. The driver's side wheels sped on the gravel like it was glass. A Ford focus had cleared the truck but was clearly offended by Nathan's bold maneuver and did not yield the lane. The Ford accelerated for all it was worth, attempting shut out Nathan. Nathan hit the floor and his car easily out-gunned the the Focus. Just before Nathan sacheted back onto the pavement, a good sized rock pinged his undercarriage.
He flinched, as if he himself had been wounded. “Damn it!” He eyed Annabelle without looking. She reached up and adjusted the temperature for her side for the car.
“What is it with you type “A”s and Beemers?” she said after a while.
“I dunno, only make I've ever driven,” he said. “Borrowed my dad's old 320 through college. Got my first after graduation, an eighty-nine, terrible shape. I spent more time under the hood than behind the wheel. God I loved that car! This is my third, the first one dealer new. By-the-way: true BWM folks never call them 'beemers'.”
“Adorable,” she said. “But why a Beemer? What's wrong with a Porsche? Stud like you.”
“The car is part of the image, you should know that. A Porsche—at least you pronounced it correctly—it, says that a man is more interested in his own dick than doing business. Mercedes: old money, says your inflexible. 'adventure' weekend vehicles, Jeeps and shit, say: not enough commitment, SUVs and crossovers, too many, Hummer's and custom pickups are no different than driving beat-up Japanese piece of crap; no dick, no self respect. Volvos; too political, Subarus; way too political—you've got issues bro. Audis; close, but no cigar.”
“Does this have the V8 four-point-four, or the V12 six liter?”
“This is a 750i, the V12 is the 760.” He looked at her. “Wow, I think I just fell in love. You know the 7 Series?”
“In my business I find it's good to know men and the things they love, what they're afraid of.”
“What business is that?” said Nathan.
“Lost causes, one could say”
“Junk bonds huh?”
Annabelle laughed. “Similar.”
Nathan gave her a nice long up and down. It was time to test the waters a bit. Was this foreplay, or 'chore-play'. She certainly felt his eyes on her but said nothing. Her eyes, like the headlights, looked only foreward.
“You're very beautiful Annabelle.”
She smiled.
Headlights.
Nathan took a breath.
“What are we doing here?” he said.
“I hope you're not this quick and eager on all your closes.”
“Well sweetheart, a strange, very beautiful woman gets in my car in the middle of nowhere, and believe me, I'm good with it all. I'm just not sure what to call it.”
“Call it kismet... or maybe 'George'.”
“Yeah? You gunna respect me after 'George'?”
“You assume I respect you now.”
“And she's funny too. I just gotta wonder just what kind of woman turns up at a gas station without a car in the middle of the night.”
Annabelle leaned over and gave him a kiss on the cheek. “You worry too much.”
“What me worry?” Nathan made a face.
She laughed.
“You gotta wife?”
“Divorced, you?”
“Nope, no wife,” she said. “Kids?”
“Yeah, I have a... Oh crap. I can't believe it. Shit!” He smacked the steering wheel and waited for her to inquire.
She said nothing.
“My son, it's his birthday tomorrow...” Nathan looked at his Rolex, “today now. I promised... Ah shit.” Nathan flicked the steering wheel. “I've broken a bunch of those lately.”
“It's not too late. You could head back now, be there by morning.”
Nathan glanced over.
“How do you know where he is?”
“If you're not LA from head to toe, I'll shave my head.”
“Damn, rely on stereotypes much?”
“Every day. So do you handsome.”
Nathan for waited a prescribed amount of silence to pass.
“So, where are we going Annabelle? Where are you from?”
“Neither of us are going very far,” she said, “look!”
On the next hill, brake lights were multiplying. The mist over the rise glowed a steady red.
“Awe crap!”
Nathan held his speed and dodged cars. At the crest of the hill they saw it: his freeway, the surging veins of a young man, had crumbled into the angina of road construction. Yellow lights flashing arrows closed the right lane half a mile ahead. Nathan continued to dispatch the cars in front of him at speed.
“You've got to act while you can, before we get blocked in,” he said. “I could be saving us hours right here.”
“Please! Do you think I'm from the past or something?”
Ahead, an old Honda crept into the passing lane next to a Hyundai with dealer plates. By all indications they were moving at the exact same speed.
Nathan flashed his brights at the offending car as he closed-in fast. The Honda was unmoved. Nathan braked hard.
“Whoa Nelly!” laughed Annabelle.
This pissed him off a little, he was doing battle here. Was she making light or making fun? He flashed his brights a few more times and laned back and forth twice behind the slow movers trying to pick a winner.
“You morons... C'mon tards, somebody do something for fuck's sake.”
The Honda progressed like a minute hand despite helpful comments from Nathan. The moment there was a car length of space behind the Honda and in front of the Hyundai, he dove into the free lane and rocketed away. Nathan dodged around a few more cars then took to the right lane as everyone else had merged left in anticipation of the closed lane. A red pickup with a patriotic bumper sticker was halfway between the lanes, holding his place in line while policing the empty lane from anyone bold enough to poach their way to the end. Nathan merely past him on the shoulder without slowing and gunned his way to the bitter end where the road cones sliced into the lane. He nosed his way in front of a white hatchback like a gear in a cog.
In line: the part Nathan hated, cattled into a chute with no way out. His view would not change for a while now and it was one he grew to despise in under a minute.
A mini van, worse, an Astrovan, dusty and faded, inched along in front of him. It's right tail light cover was missing and replaced with red tape. The light itself wasn't working anyway and the working one seemed twice as bright as it was supposed to be. When the brake light was not blinding him, his entire view consisted of Jesus bumper sticker in Spanish, a radio station slogan in the same and a line-up of tall-to-short decals of a family, plus two dogs and a cat. They took up the entire rear window. Cartoon Miguel, Felicia, Hector, Edgar, Martin, Juanita, Pilar, Miedo, Sisi and Tigre stared at him, all grinning from ear to ear, smug that they were one place ahead of him in line.
The traffic moved slowly forward; not slow enough to stop, but not fast enough not let it idle along without hitting the brakes every few seconds. Nathan shifted in his seat and hung his wrist over the top of the wheel. He adjusted his visor repeatedly to block out the beaming single laser bright brake light. It didn't work.
“Tell me about your son,” Annabelle said.
“Good kid.” Nathan exhaled.
She looked at him, waiting for more. “Yeah... apparently.”
“No, I mean... Well, I was just thinking... he's getting big, so fast.”
“How old?”
“Seven... no wait, eight... or is he turning eight? He starts third grade next week. Geez!”
“Got a picture.”
“On my phone I do, it's turned off.”
“So, you know the specs of your car and give me a life history of all your beemers...”
“BMWs.”
“Beemers... and I have to ask you about him to get two words about your son and you have to stop and think about his age.”
“You think I love my car more than my son?”
“No, no I don't think so, but the car is a lot easier, isn't it? ”
She redid her pony tail, holding her hair band in her teeth while she ran her hands through her hair. He was grateful she didn't push the issue. He was already feeling trapped. It was pretty obvious she wasn't going to reveal much about herself so he didn't push either. He didn't want to kill his chances for later. Even the damn traffic didn't seem so bad with those legs to look at. There was a serenity to her as well that calmed him a bit. She was as un-phased by his take-charge driving as she was by being stopped dead in some God forsaken field. He wanted to tell her she was beautiful again but he held his tongue.
The K-rail moved them across the right lane then off onto the shoulder where a quickie paving job made a temporary third lane which lasted for only two miles, but the thirty minutes it took made it seem like a whole zip code. The K-rail disappeared, thin orange barrier markers took it's place. He chit chatted with Annabelle, hoping to learn something about her but her pleasant redirects always brought the conversation back to him and before he knew it, he had revealed another chapter of his life to her.
An orange sign up ahead, he couldn't read it yet, not an official sign, just a four-by-two piece of plywood written on with spray paint by some construction worker.
“What's that sign say?” he asked.
“Detour.” Annabelle said.
“Shit, really? This is going from bad to worse. You can really see that far in the dark?”
“What else would it say?”
Closer to the sign he could seen the traffic moving off the shoulder and down an incline. Nathan steered his auto between the cones. They left the pavement and guided the traffic onto two tracks of well-matted grass. The road cones ended and the traffic was guided only by the tracks in the grass. The tracks led the cars and trucks downhill away from the freeway, through a hedge row via a mound of dirt and continued on matted grass. The world was black outside the headlights and tail lights. Nathan opened his window to see if he could get a better look at his surroundings. He got a face full of exhaust fumes.
“Man, this just sucks.” Nathan said, coughing.
The minivan ahead of him came to a halt. Nathan inched forward with several jerky brake holds until the cartoon family filled his windshield.
Completely stopped.
“Shit. This is weird man, really weird.”
“What are you worried about Nathan? You got someplace to be—you know besides back to for your son's birthday? This is an adventure, enjoy it.”
“I prefer adventures I'm in control of.”
“I think you need to look up the definition of 'adventure'.”
Annabelle reached over and massaged his shoulder. Nathan would normally, almost involuntarily, have suggested something lewd. “A slap on the face is well-worth knowing if you're wasting your time,” he would tell his friends. He said nothing to Annabelle. His shoulder was tight, he needed the rub.
Part II of “Detour” next Saturday.
