Connie Hitchhikes at Midnight

The eighteen wheeler skidded noisily to a stop. It woke the passenger up.

"Christ on his throne boy, have you lost your senses? We can't pick up a stray right now."

Brice defended himself in a hypnotic staccato of curt sentences. "Augie, it look like she got beat up. And there ain't nothing for miles. Gonna storm soon. We gotta help her." It was dark outside and thunder was cracking angrily in the distance and he'd just barely seen her standing on the shoulder.

The young woman standing on the side of the mountain road had been trying to hitch a ride for hours and the first semblance of traffic was an overloaded Freightliner putting along. She looked like a lost soul, wearing fishnets and a shiny vinyl miniskirt in middle of nowhere. Her top was unremarkable because her black eye stole attention from it. Brice rolled his window down and she strutted to it.

He stuck his neck out and hesitated. "Miss, you alright?"

She was very pretty, he thought, and it made him shamefully want to help her so much more. She was relieved to see him. "Oh, thank you so much for stopping! I was going crazy standing here," she cried out. She wore high heels and had a tiny little alligator skin purse on her.

"Where you headed?"

"Anywhere!"

Augie yelled at her from the other seat, "we ain't going anywhere fast." He then addressed Brice, "tell her we ain't going nowhere fast" and pointed at her. His patience had worn thin that evening. He was normally loud, not that a stranger knew that.

"Look here, ... " Brice dry swallowed shyly, "... we ain't going anywhere fast," he parroted the line exactly to please Augie and then tried to explain, "We about to roll down the mountain. It's slow going. Be stuck doing that awhile," he apologized for not letting her escape faster.

She looked upset, but clearly at something else, "Oh, I don't care," the young woman pleaded warmly, "just please take me with you, just away from here, I don't care where you're going."

"Did you tell her we ain't going nowhere fast?" Augie yelled, repeating himself. He was slightly hard of hearing, and slightly hard of thinking and Brice stuck his head back in the cab and nodded, "Yes I did, Augie."

Brice was skeptical of being actually helpful to her because they were truly about to go snail pace and if it rained they'd have to park and wait it out. But he also truly felt sorry for her and felt she needed a hand. He shot out another burst of clipped sentences, "Well if you're sure. Sure, yeah. I mean. If you're not in a hurry. Sure, hop on in," and he waved her toward the other side and blushed in the dark. The young girl walked merrily in front of the rig and Augie whistled at her ass bouncing.

"Aw shit," Augie murmured bitterly and opened the door for her, "well c'mon in, I guess. No one tells me nothin'," he grumbled loudly. As she started climbing up in the cab, suddenly an incredibly loud thunder cracked somewhere behind them and made him jump.

"HOLY FUCKBALLS!" he yelled out wide-eyed right in her face.

She didn't even blink. Thunder didn't phase her one bit, she'd been listening to the approaching storm for awhile and worried. Augie got embarrassed for being so jumpy.

"You guys, thank you so so much for picking me up," she said instead of being startled, clearly relieved. In the lit cabin, her black eye looked even worse. Augie moved out of the way and showed her to the frayed sleeper. She sat on the narrow bed and after a moment, he too sat next to her, making her flinch, but then reached for the cooler underneath the bed and dug in it. He wiped it with his shirt tail and handed her a canned soda.

"Um, thank you, but I'm not really thirsty," she declined.

"It ain't for drinkin," Augie said gently, "it's for your shiner, it look bad." He pushed it at her and then got back in the passenger seat. He was a pragmatist, he didn't care to know what happened to her eye just as she didn't care to tell him. But he did want to help. The truck pulled away noisily heading downhill. They passed a sign that read "ALL TRUCKS ENTER SCALES."

"My name is Brice. This here is grandpa," the driver introduced themselves, "He's not really my grandpa. Nope, not mine. But it piss him off so much. Specially if I call him gramps front of others. So it stuck." He laughed at it quietly as if it was the very first time he was saying it, and it was downright charming, she thought. He'd shared private banter with her and it felt welcoming. She smiled. Augie just groaned and rolled his eyes. He looked old and scruffy but she thought Brice looked handsome. "Augie," said Augie.

"I'm Connie," she introduced herself, "and thanks again so so so much for picking me up, that was really so amazing of you, I was stuck there for hours." She was genuinely grateful and sounded relieved. Her voice sounded young and chirpy. She held the ice cold can to her black eye and it felt better. Brice started feeling self conscious about not being so articulate. Her subtle yet rich perfume had wafted throughout the cab and though he didn't recognize an orchid in it, he recognized its earthy half. Exotic, yet smelled so familiar.

They were driving on a divided highway at the top of the mountain heading vaguely toward the next town over when they slowed down for a sharp turnoff onto a narrow gravel road. The blinker relay was clicking loudly in the silence. The other road looked deceptively tricky to get on. First there was a big bump to cross over at a nasty angle and then it seemed to slope downward somewhat steeply and wind leftward at 90 degrees. Brice angled them carefully for the turn. Augie seemed to supervise, hovering over his seat, checking their mirrors. "You're clear, just take 'er slooow," he drawled. To Connie, it seemed like they overshot the turn but then swung crazily to fit.

Connie had a great view of the whole scene, and she suddenly got worried about which way they were heading. The truck looked kind of big and they were turning onto a tiny single lane road over a bumpy culvert surrounded by deep ditches. The road looked really curvy with a cliff on one side in the near distance. The moon lit it up so neatly, she could see the sea glinting far beyond the ancient guardrail, miles away. Brice got the right front tire partly in the grass but carefully cleared the entrance fences and within seconds lined them up mostly straight and came to a full stop to evaluate. The road ahead curved left after 50 yards.

"Keep it in bull boy," Augie said. Brice nodded and apparently did just that, whatever it was. This was crazy, Connie thought, Brice stomped on the clutch twice and shifted and was giving it what sounded like lots of gas but the truck was barely moving. Seconds went by. It felt like minutes. The whole cab was vibrating violently and yet they hadn't moved an inch. Five seconds went by, maybe. Maybe they were moving, she wasn't so sure. It was so loud and chaotic. The engine started sounding like it was whistling.

"Watch the boost," Augie warned him gently, "watch the boost," and Brice backed off the gas pedal a smidgen and the whistling sound quieted down. Instrument gauges were swinging widely in tune with the motor. The vibrations settled and the truck slowly picked up speed and just as it got barely moving, Brice was already pumping the brake pedal. Augie said, "raise the suspension and lock the diff," and Brice hit a few switches after settling to a stop. They regained traction and the truck was moving forward more willfully, but it seemed to lag a few seconds behind his actions. Turning left, he hugged the right side of the curve so wide and Connie covered her mouth, certain they were about to hit the rickety guardrail and drive off a cliff. Instead, they slowed down so very neatly and turned with the road, they flowed with the road.

"Real heavy," Brice said quietly. Augie looked back at her and expanded for him, "We're kinda real heavy right now, so we gotta take it real slow because the trailer can push us like we was a baby stroller." He emphasized both reals, and he looked concerned. To his credit, he knew where her eyes were located. "Just clearing the first hump, nothing to worry about." Augie didn't sound so sure of himself, Connie realized but she nodded along, wondering just how heavy they were because they had problems getting over a tiny bump at the beginning.

That particularly made her worry.

The downward road looked as beautiful as it looked scary in the dark. Moonlit rocky wall on the left, tree canopies on the right hiding the steep embankment. Brice shifted a few gears and kept the engine revving high but not whistling anymore. The next turn was barely three hundred yards away, cut in stone, a crazily sharp switchback to the right. He alternated the earlier maneuver and Connie couldn't help but be impressed with his driving. From where she was sitting, it felt like they were driving a house! Brice wasn't even watching the road, his eyes were glued to his rear view mirrors, watching the trailer clear inner edges of the road.

They picked up some speed after that turn and this time the whistling engine didn't cause grandpa to complain. Though, Augie chattered non-stop. Brice split up into high range and methodically shifted as the road flattened off somewhat. In a few hundred yards a leftward turn came up fast. Connie's swell felt a little better and the root beer warmed up, so she opened the can and drank and it turned out she was thirsty after all. Augie chuckled at that and said, "using all parts of the buffalo, hah-hah." Brice steered single handed using a spinner knob and downshifted through the turn. He looked so competent doing it, Connie thought.

At the next turn, Brice came to a complete stop and grandpa got out and walked ahead of the truck, spotting him. He checked out the ditches on either side, then guided the truck to inch forward at impossible angles, waving his arms confidently. Connie wanted to ask a question or two but realized Brice was concentrating so she kept it to herself. Just as they cleared the curve, she gasped and realized she'd been holding her breath. She thought driving this house was impossible to begin with, and yet the two of them were making it their bitch. Her heart beat fast. Riding along was surprisingly thrilling.

"Keep it under two," Augie said and Brice muttered "yep two, grandpa," and nodded. Connie got confused.

"Uh, two miles per hour? We're going like 20," she wondered outloud curiously. Augie turned back to face her and smiled. How could anyone not smile at her?

"Two thousand RPMs, we gonna be running hot going downhill the whole time. Gotta save the valves, already overdue for a rebuild," he explained. She didn't really understand, but, she appreciated the level of detail he went into because it sounded genuine and not patronizing in the slightest. She grasped that they were hurting for money and trying to cut every reasonable corner to save. That's something she understood very well. "Oh."

Next few switchbacks were sharp but didn't need a guidewalk, and then the next two did. At the last one, Connie felt frustrated because grandpa was constantly zipping left and right for clearance checks and it looked so inefficient, tiring. He was stumbling over ditch rocks in the dark and finally Connie blurted out, "Can I help? I can watch the left side." It sounded like the less complicated one. She felt reasonably confident that she could manage it.

"Sure?" Brice asked and hoped she wasn't just being polite. A second set of eyes would really speed this along.

She hopped out of the truck instead of answering, taking a cue from his silent type playbook, and walked in front of the headlights waving at Augie. He understood what she was doing right away and without questioning her returned to the harder side, now fully able to focus on the narrowing curve. Brice snuck a peek at her ass again and wondered what the hell she was doing out here to begin with. But, he was glad she was there because the two of them maneuvered the truck through the turn far faster than one person could have managed by hisself. She was fast at picking up hand signals and much prettier to look at than Augie.

"Hell yeah," Augie called out happily and high fived her as they got back in the cab. Connie grinned, feeling useful for once.

Some minutes later, they went out again and spotted another turn, and then another. Connie tripped over a rock hidden in the tall grass and screamed in surprise. She was down on the ground with her legs spread wide in the blinding headlights and both Brice and Augie called out after her, worried. She just sat there and laughed, flashing them red panties.

"I'm alright," she giggled at her clumsiness, and two of them grinned and laughed along with her, truly glad she was fine. But the scene was so absurd, a punched hooker splayed out on the ground, helping two truckers maneuver a pig. But none of them saw it that way, they were a team now. Brice flashed the brights jokingly and she mock-pretended to cover her dignity.

Out in the dark, the storm seemed to bypass them but the wind picked up. Sound of the rustling leaves was so earthy and calming, Connie realized. To have gone from her situation to this in hours, it was ... pleasant. She got up slowly and brushed dust off her ass, waiting for her night vision to restore.

They drove on for a few calm minutes after that. "Gonna have to walk that one boy," Augie warned, pointing at the upcoming turn. It looked tight and steep, downright demonic by comparison to the previous ones, and Brice stared at it in concentration. Despite the advice, he seemed to be resolved to do it a different way. Augie repeated himself, "tellin ya, you gonna squinch it," he promised.

Brice dismissed the concern stubbornly, "not gonna." But he kept thinking about not wanting to embarrass himself in front of the girl. It caused him to lose his cool by a degree.

Minutes later, the truck jackknifed. Brice, overconfident in his approach, went too wide offtrack and overdid it. His last second corrections made it worse and some loose gravel coupled with the trailer weight forced a skid and now they were stuck with the truck turned against the trailer with a boulder between them and no way to clear the edge of the turn.

"Told you you had to walk it," Augie admonished him and jumped out of the cab. Brice looked embarrassed and angry, pissed off at himself. He snapped reflexively and said something unkind about gramps. Connie didn't know what he was supposed to do earlier, but she felt sorry for him screwing up. He seemed like a nice guy, maybe just a few years older than herself.

"Don't just sit there, get out here boy!" they heard a yell and rattling metal. Augie didn't sound mad, because he had a plan. Connie ... for lack of a better word rejoiced. She was rooting for Brice, she surprised herself.

Five minutes later, Augie was gloating. "Bet they didn't teach you this in your fancy school, did they?" he taunted and grinned. Brice shook his head at the risky plan but Augie knew better, he figured. As he was moving chains he heard Augie say, "Girl, do you mind getting dirty?" and then he heard laughter.

Connie spent the next ten minutes picking up dry dirt and sand with her hands and throwing it perpendicular to the trailer's tires. She smiled and she was happy in the moment, because she was doing something useful. By the time she was done, there was an even sheet of grit covering the condensed roadway and she was sweaty. But she felt like she was contributing something to getting unstuck. She wiped her hands off her ass and exceeded vinyl's collection limit.

Two of them had lowered the landing gear, safed and decoupled the trailer and backed the truck up on what passed as a shoulder as far as they could, wedged nearly parallel to it. They carefully tied a length of chain through the trailer's rear suspension and around the hub, then passed it around a tree on that far side and secured it to the rig's towhook hole. They took turns exchanging a red comealong by sliding it underneath and ratcheting the chains tight. It all sounded so noisy.

When they were done, Augie hopped in the truck and pulled the chain gentlier with it than Connie thought possible. She was nervous watching him. He was grinning, feathering the clutch with a precision an old man shouldn't have been capable of pulling off. Slowly, the back end of the trailer got pulled sideways and Augie let it settle after each nudge. He was rocking it carefully toward the rock face, away from the boulder, and the tires slid smoothly over the dirt when they managed to. When they didn't, Connie felt scared, the howling rubber sounded terrifying enough, but the trailer tilting angrily was something eerie.

But with decades of experience behind the wheel, the trailer looked like it would clear the turn in mere minutes, and it looked like it might.

Augie ceded the driver's seat and let Brice stow the chains and reconnect the trailer while he rested. Brice worked fast and was breaking a sweat cranking the landing gear. Connie wanted to help but didn't know what she could do without creating more work for him by asking. He had strong arms, she thought selfishly and forced herself to look elsewhere. Augie came out to help finish the job while she looked around. The tree they improvised as a pulley got chewed up something fierce.

"What'd I tell you boy, huh? Didn't I tell you?" Augie gloated after they cleared the boulder and completed the evil turn. Connie giggled a bit and hearing it forced a smile on Brice's face. Even so, he nodded, "heard first time gramps."

The next segment went by more smoothly, with Connie helping out. She got more confident at each sharp turn and could read the turning radius of the trailer's wheels much better now. She broke into a sweat once or twice having to move heavy rocks out of the way but the witching hour breeze kept her cool. It felt wonderful to get back in the truck and rest after straining, listening to the sound of crunching gravel under the heavy tires. Augie let her ride shotgun on calmer portions.

As she relaxed, she admired the view. The roadway was so picturesque, even this late, it was ... so remarkable. They went slow enough to enjoy every foot of the rough road. The headlights painted cones of green leaves and ferns and the shadows they cast were mesmerizing. Even the brake lights added to the charm, lighting up rocky faces of the roadway behind them. They were nearly down the entire mountain taking these crazy switchback turns and it was so beautiful, so raw. Danger on both sides, and distant beauty shimmering below them. She sighed in relief, marveling at how life can get turned around in mere hours. Bitter hopelessness replaced by an adventure.

Dawn cracked and the beautiful colors appeared in the far distance. The sun was behind them but the distant ocean managed to capture the light and showcase it. This had been such a picturesque drive down the mountain, Connie could hardly believe it. So ordinary, yet so extraordinary.

Near the end of their dangerous goatpath journey they stopped for a bathroom break. Two of them pissed in the ditch facing the ocean and Connie squatted behind the trailer, away from the headlights. They were all exhausted and she couldn't imagine how Brice felt, having all that responsibility in his hands, navigating around harrowing cliffs. It had to be exhausting and despite him being a newer driver, Augie obviously trusted him to handle it. That meant something.

Further down they parked the truck in a clearing and shut the engine off, heater not quite needed. Connie got to sleep on the bed, two of them slumped in the squishy truck chairs. Brice gave her a blanket he claimed was his and covered himself up with a jacket he pulled out of a locker. He kicked off his boots and made himself as comfortable as he could.