Just After Sunset

The blur beyond the screen shifted. “Been a while?”

“Yes,” Monette said. It was something.

“Want me to give you a hint?”

“No, I remember. Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.”

“Uh-huh, and how long has it been since your last confession?”

“I don’t remember. A long time. Not since I was a kid.”

“Well, take it easy-it’s like riding a bike.”

But for a moment he could still say nothing. He looked at the typed message on the pushpin and his throat worked. His hands were kneading themselves, tighter and tighter, until they made a big fist that was rocking back and forth between his thighs.

“Son? The day is rolling by, and I have company coming for lunch. Actually, my company is bringing lu-”

“Father, I may have committed a terrible sin.”

Now the priest was silent for a while. Mute, Monette thought. There was a white word if there ever was one. Type it on a file card and it ought to disappear.

When the priest on the other side of the screen spoke again, his voice was still friendly but more grave. “What’s your sin, my son?”

And Monette said, “I don’t know. You’ll have to tell me.”

2

It was starting to rain when Monette came up on the northbound entrance ramp to the turnpike. His suitcase was in the trunk, and his sample cases-big boxy things, the kind lawyers tote when they’re taking evidence into court-were in the backseat. One was brown, one black. Both were embossed with the Wolfe amp; Sons logo: a timber wolf with a book in its mouth. Monette was a salesman. He covered all of northern New England. It was Monday morning. It had been a bad weekend, very bad. His wife had moved out to a motel, where she was probably not alone. Soon she might go to jail. Certainly there would be a scandal, and infidelity was going to be the least of it.

On the lapel of his jacket, he wore a button reading, ASK ME ABOUT THE BEST FALL LIST EVER!!

There was a man standing at the foot of the ramp. He was wearing old clothes and holding up a sign as Monette approached and the rain grew stronger. There was a battered brown knapsack between feet dressed in dirty sneakers. The Velcro closure of one sneaker had come loose and stuck up like a cockeyed tongue. The hitchhiker had no cap, let alone an umbrella.

At first all Monette could make out of the sign were crudely drawn red lips with a black slash drawn diagonally through them. When he got a little closer, he saw the words above the slashed mouth read I AM

MUTE! Below the slashed mouth was this: WILL YOU GIVE ME A RIDE???

Monette put on his blinker to make his turn onto the ramp. The hitchhiker flipped the sign over. On the other side was an ear, just as crudely drawn, with a slash through it. Above the ear: I AM DEAF! Below it: PLEASE MAY I HAVE A RIDE???

Monette had driven millions of miles since he was sixteen, most of them in the dozen years he had been repping for Wolfe amp; Sons, selling one best fall list ever after another, and during that time he had never picked up a single hitchhiker. Today he swerved over at the edge of the ramp with no hesitation and came to a stop. The St. Christopher’s medal looped over the rearview mirror was still swinging back and forth when he used the button on his door to pop open the locks. Today he felt he had nothing to lose.

The hitchhiker slid in and put his battered little pack between his damp and dirty sneakers. Monette had thought, looking at him, that the fellow would smell bad, and he wasn’t wrong. He said, “How far you going?”

The hitchhiker shrugged and pointed up the ramp. Then he bent and carefully put his sign on top of his pack. His hair was stringy and thin. There was some gray in it.

“I know which way, but…” Monette realized the man wasn’t hearing him. He waited for him to straighten up. A car blew past and up the ramp, honking even though Monette had left him plenty of room to get by. Monette gave him the finger. This he had done before, but never for such minor annoyances.

The hitchhiker fastened his seat belt and looked at Monette, as if to ask what the holdup was. There were lines on his face, and stubble. Monette couldn’t even begin to guess his age. Somewhere between old and not old, that was all he knew.

“How far are you going?” Monette asked, this time enunciating each word, and when the guy still only looked at him-average height, skinny, no more than a hundred and fifty pounds-he said, “Can you read lips?” He touched his own.

The hitchhiker shook his head and made some hand gestures.

Monette kept a pad in the console. While he wrote How far? on it, another car cruised past, now pulling up a fine rooster tail of moisture. Monette was going all the way to Derry, a hundred and sixty miles, and these were the kind of driving conditions he usually loathed, second only to heavy snow. But today he reckoned it would be all right. Today the weather-and the big rigs, pulling up their secondary storms of flying water as they droned past-would keep him occupied.

Not to mention this guy. His new passenger. Who looked at the note, then back at Monette. It occurred to Monette later that maybe the guy couldn’t read, either-learning to read when you’re a deaf-mute had to be damn hard-but understood the question mark. The man pointed through the windshield and up the ramp. Then he opened and closed his hands eight times. Or maybe it was ten. Eighty miles. Or a hundred. If he knew at all.

“Waterville?” Monette guessed.

The hitchhiker looked at him blankly.

“Okay,” Monette said. “Whatever. Just tap me on the shoulder when we get where you’re going.”

The hitchhiker looked at him blankly.

“Well, I guess you will,” Monette said. “Assuming you’ve even got a destination in mind, that is.” He checked his rearview, then got rolling. “You’re pretty much cut off, aren’t you?”

The guy was still looking at him. He shrugged and put his palms over his ears.

“I know,” Monette said, and merged. “Pretty much cut off. Phone lines down. But today I almost wish I was you and you were me.” He paused. “Almost. Mind some music?”

And when the hitchhiker just turned his head away and looked out the window, Monette had to laugh at himself. Debussy, AC/DC, or Rush Limbaugh, it was all the same to this guy.

He had bought the new Josh Ritter CD for his daughter-it was her birthday in a week-but hadn’t remembered to send it to her yet. Too many other things going on just lately. He set the cruise control once they’d cleared Portland, slit the wrapping with his thumb, and stuck the CD in the player. He supposed it was now technically a used CD, not the kind of thing you give your beloved only child. Well, he could always buy her another one. Assuming, that was, he still had money to buy one with.

Josh Ritter turned out to be pretty good. Kind of like early Dylan, only with a better attitude. As he listened, he mused on money. Affording a new CD for Kelsie’s birthday was the least of his problems. The fact that what she really wanted-and needed-was a new laptop wasn’t very high on the list either. If Barb had done what she said she had done- what the SAD office confirmed that she’d done-he didn’t know how he was going to afford the kid’s last year at Case Western. Even assuming he still had a job himself. That was a problem.

He turned the music up to drown the problem out and partially succeeded, but by the time they reached Gardiner, the last chord had died out. The hitchhiker’s face and body were turned away to the passenger window. Monette could see only the back of his stained and faded duffle coat, with too-thin hair straggling down over the collar in bunches. It looked like there had been something printed on the back of the coat once, but now it was too faded to make out.

That’s the story of this poor schmo’s life, Monette thought.

At first Monette couldn’t decide if the hitchhiker was dozing or looking at the scenery. Then he noted the slight downward tilt of the man’s head and the way his breath was fogging the glass of the passenger window, and decided dozing was more likely. And why not? The only thing more boring than the Maine Turnpike south of Augusta was the Maine Turnpike south of Augusta in a cold spring rain.

Monette had other CDs in the center console, but instead of rummaging through them, he turned off the car’s sound system. And after he’d passed through the Gardiner toll station-not stopping, only slowing, the wonders of E-ZPass-he began to talk.

3

Monette stopped talking and checked his watch. It was quarter to noon, and the priest had said he had company coming for lunch. That the company was bringing lunch, actually.

“Father, I’m sorry this is taking so long. I’d speed it up if I knew how, but I don’t.”

“That’s all right, son. I’m interested now.”

“Your company-”

“Will wait while I’m doing the Lord’s work. Son, did this man rob you?”

“No,” Monette said. “Unless you count my peace of mind. Does that count?”

“Most assuredly. What did he do?”

“Nothing. Looked out the window. I thought he was dozing, but later I had reasons to think I was wrong about that.”

“What did you do?”

“Talked about my wife,” Monette said. Then he stopped and considered. “No, I didn’t. I vented about my wife. I ranted about my wife. I spewed about my wife. I…you see…” He struggled with it, lips pressed tightly together, looking down at that big twisting fist