Knight of the Road

Chapter 1 – The Coop 

With the late afternoon sun reflecting in his mirrors, the long-haul trucker was running empty and headed east in the hammer lane. The trucker’s name and hometown were emblazoned on the doors of his custom-painted ‘T2MeToo’ – Brock Floracion, Owner-Operator, Johnstown, Pennsylvania. Pride of ownership was obvious. There was not a speck of dust or a bit of tar to be found anywhere on the tractor-trailer. This large car was a real work of art, appreciated by other haulers as well as four-wheeled folk. The eighteen-wheeler was black with a sparkling chrome bumper, fenders, and smoke stacks. The head, neck, and forelegs of a rearing, white-winged horse had been beautifully air-brushed on each of the tractor’s doors. The wings on each steed swept back onto both sides of the truck’s sleeper cab. Finally passing the last car in a long line of traffic, the trucker checked his mirrors before signaling and moving over to the granny lane. He had gotten a courteous eyeball blink from the driver behind him indicating it was clear for him to pull over. He always appreciated an alert driver and thanked her with three quick winks of his tail-lights. He guessed that she was probably a trucker’s wife or daughter. 

Brock was looking forward to getting home to his small southwestern Pennsylvania farm. He had several fields to plow and the next few days promised to be perfect weather for sod busting. Rounding a bend in the road, he felt a slight bit of irritation as an electronic sign came into view indicating that the chicken coop ahead was still open. His CB buddies had failed to mention that the ‘coop hadn’t been cleaned’ and he silently chided himself for not asking them if it had. Never one to stay irritated for long, life was too short for that, he decided to have some fun with the weigh-master, ‘Old Pete’. The trucker backed off the hammer a bit and as he approached the scales he made his engine grumble and growl as if the truck were overloaded by several tons. Brock stopped just short of the scales for effect and then pulled forward slowly, all the while giving just enough gas and working the clutch so the Cummins engine sounded labored and appeared to strain under the “heavy load.” The way he made the rig heave and shudder added greatly to the effect. Old Pete was quick to appear to check the ground pressure and noted the number on the scales. The old man guffawed with a great deal of amusement and exclaimed in his guttural voice “Well, by gee! Floracion, you darned rascal – all you’ve got there is a load of dispatcher brains!” To punctuate his statement he spat out some tobacco juice, nearly choking on the plug he had nestled in his jaw. Old Pete was one generation short of the old country and had inherited the guttural inflections originating from the Black Forest region of Germany. He had also acquired the habit of “speaking with his hands” and punctuated each statement he made with brisk arm movements. Floracion flashed a boyish grin at the grizzled weight watcher and said, “I thought there’d be nobody home here by now! I’m on my way back from the ‘Gateway’. How’s the Mrs. doing – still making those famous pies of hers and got any?” Old Pete responded, “Eddie’s doing great, she’s hangin’ in there like hair in a biscuit, though she’s becoming a little forgetful lately. She was a bit put out with me last week. She’s still after me to quit chewin’ ya know. She went so far as to cut up some road apples and put ‘em in my pouch of chew. I thought the taste was just a bit off and I had somehow gotten hold of a stale batch, but that wasn’t the case and I’m still chewin’.” The old man cast a defiant look in Brock’s direction. “And yup, she’s still cooking up a storm! You’re outta luck today though. I just finished the last bite of one of her blueberry pies about a half an hour ago.” He stopped to adjust his suspenders then continued, “Besides, after that trick, you wouldn’t get any pie anyhow.” Floracion grimaced and responded, “Well, that’s okay, Pete, I’ll stop at the choke and puke before I hit ‘The Eye’ and grab a bite, though nothing will compare with Eddie’s blueberry pie.” Old Pete went back to business and said, “Well, we’re getting ‘em stacked up here, so you’d best be moving that load of sailboat gas along. I’ll run these guys through and see if they’ve got too many eggs in their baskets and then close ‘er down for the day, now that I’ve brightened yours. Remember to keep the shiny side up and the rubber side down!” Floracion responded with a salute and a grin, put the rig in gear, and pulled away. He shook his head and laughed at the story Old Pete had just shared with him about the tobacco. Brock had never met Edna or as Old Pete called her, Eddie, but had seen pictures of her. She was a tiny woman who wore wire-rimmed spectacles. Her white hair was done up in tight curls. She looked harmless and innocent, but was anything but. Cutting up dry horse manure and putting it in Old Pete’s chewing tobacco? Now that was priceless. 

Chapter 2 - Roadside Samaritan 

Floracion geared up to merge, but immediately throttled down after he checked his mirror and noticed a slow-moving driver holding up a long line of traffic in the granny lane. The trucker’s attention was suddenly diverted to a silver European sedan traveling way too fast in the passing lane, steam was pouring out from under the hood and he figured this car would be coming to a stop one way or another fairly soon. He wasn’t wrong.