“It took several hours for the water line to be shut off somewhere else down the street, and a new valve replaced. In the meantime, I wasn’t exactly getting service with a smile.”
Then, Hugh continued, telling Jenny that his troubles were far from over.
“After my tire was repaired, I drove around behind the building to exit where I saw a truck just like mine had done previously. Only thing is, I absolutely could not make the turn. I almost hit the building with my trailer.”
“That would have gone over real well with the shop owner,” Jenny said.
“Yeah. I was pretty shook up by this time. I backed up, and straightened out. I got out of the truck to try to calm down. It was then that I noticed what had been causing all my problems.”
“What was that?” Jenny asked.
“I had forgotten to slide my trailer tandems,” Hugh said, explaining to Jenny that a driver could slide the trailer axles backward and forward. By California law the tandems must be no farther than forty feet from the kingpin, which is about 10 feet from the rear of a fifty-three-foot-long trailer. That shorter wheelbase gives the tractor and trailer combination a tighter turning radius, able to handle corners better.
When Hugh had picked the trailer up at the shipper, he hadn’t checked to make sure the tandems were slid forward. The shipper had slid them all the way back to give more stability for when the forklift drove in and out of the trailer while loading it.
“That’s why it felt funny while I was driving it to the repair shop, why I wasn’t able to make the turn into the shop without running onto the grass strip and hitting the water valve, and also why I couldn’t make the turn around the building like countless other trucks had done before me.”
“So what did you do?”
“I moved my tandems all the way forward. That allowed me to make it around the building and onto the driveway exiting the shop property. Only thing is, during the time that I was in the shop, a lot of people had come to work, and there were a lot of cars parked along the road where I had to exit the driveway.
“It was extremely close getting out of there. I cleared the cars on both sides by only about an inch.
“As I was driving down the road I was thinking, ‘All I need to do now is run over a guy in a wheelchair, or a mom pushing a baby stroller, and my day will be complete.’”
“Don’t tell me … You didn’t,” Jenny exclaimed.
“Almost. You’ll never believe what happened. At the very next corner where I had to make a right turn there was a mom pushing a baby stroller on the sidewalk with a toddler running loose slightly ahead. And, a guy in a wheelchair was just rolling up to the corner. He sat there with his toes hanging over the curb.”
“You’re kidding?”
“Absolutely true. You never saw a truck take such a slow, wide turn as I did going around that corner,” Hugh said. “I wish I could say that was the only incident I’d had in my years of driving, but it’s not. It was just so memorable because it was literally my second day on the road as a solo driver.”
“What a funny story, Hugh,” Jenny said, smiling.
Hugh nodded, and smiled back. “Yeah, I guess it would be, if it wasn’t me it had happened to.”
Hugh noticed how easy and comfortable the conversation was between them now … so much different than when they had first met.
“So, Jenny, tell me about the decision that you made before coming back to the truck that made you happy and smiling.”
“I can’t, Hugh … I just can’t, for now,” Jenny said, a cloud coming over her expression.
Ignoring that for now, Hugh said, “Well, we’d better clean up and turn in. We’ve got an early morning tomorrow. He gathered paper plates and plastic utensils and threw them into his trash.
“Come on, I’ll walk you into the travel plaza for a final visit to the restroom,” he said. It was fully dark by now.
He left her at the entrance to the women’s restroom, saying, “I’ll wait outside for you after using the men’s.”
Hugh finished first, naturally, and then went outside to wait for Jenny.
Jenny returned after an unusually long time. She seemed to be in a somber mood, not talkative, so they walked back to the truck in silence.
As soon as they got back to the truck, and into the light again, Hugh saw that something was wrong. She had been crying, and it looked suspiciously like she had a fresh blemish on her normally flawless cheek.
“What the hell happened to you?” Hugh yelled, frightening Jenny.
“Nothing … nothing, just … nothing!” she yelled, starting to cry again.
“Something happened! Did somebody hurt you?” Hugh demanded.
“Look! I just ran into the restroom door. OK? Now drop it!” Her crying had turned to anger.
Hugh was dismayed at the sudden return of the ugly clashes that they’d had before, something that he thought was behind them.
“Fine, I’ll drop it … for now,” Hugh said.
He pointed to the upper bunk. “You obviously are familiar with how to get up there. That’s where you’ll sleep. You’ll find a spare sleeping bag that you can use.”
She climbed up into the bunk.
Hugh slid into his lower bunk and turned off the lights from the panel on the bulkhead next to his head.
“Good
