“That, my friend … is what you can call an attempted hijacking … It’s the first time it’s happened to me … I’m sure glad that you came along when you did,” James said, between gasps of catching his breath.
“My pleasure … actually, really,” Hugh said. “By the way, what do we do with these guys?” Their would-be assailants were still out cold or incapacitated, sprawled out all akimbo where each of them lay when their part of the fight was over.
“I’m not a medic, so there isn’t anything I can do for them. We can get cleaned up a bit, and then go into the driver’s lounge to use a pay phone to call an ambulance ... anonymously,” James said, looking at the results of the carnage at their feet.
On the way back to their truck, James put his hand on Hugh’s shoulder. “You know what, kid? You’ll do to ride the river with,” he said.
“You too, old man. You too.”
Back in the truck, as James stripped off his bloodied T-shirt, Hugh couldn’t help but notice numerous scars. He guessed they were combat scars. He chose to not say anything or ask questions at this time. He knew that James would be forthcoming with information when he was ready.
After all, Hugh had his own battle scars, both physical and emotional, to deal with.
Once cleaned up, they walked to the travel center together, made the phone call, then ordered up a couple of sub sandwiches. James hadn’t gotten a chance to make it all the way to the travel center earlier, and Hugh had no idea where his sandwich had ended up during the fight. He wasn’t about to go back and look for it.
Hugh pulled out his wallet to pay for his sandwich, but James stopped him, “Not this time, pal. It’s on me.”
They ate their subs on a picnic table outside the travel center entrance.
“Something’s bothering me,” James said.
“Go on.”
“Well, kid,” James said “From what I saw back there, you didn’t spend your whole time in the Marines hauling boxes of toilet paper around in a warehouse, did you.”
“No, not exactly.”
Hugh had told James earlier about his last station working in a warehouse at the Marine Logistics Base just outside of Barstow, California.
“So, where did you see that kind of action?”
Hugh remained silent.
“MEU in the Sandbox?” James guessed, referring to the military veterans’ colloquialism for the Middle East. MEU stood for Marines Expeditionary Unit.
“Yes.”
“Would you care to elaborate on that?” James asked.
“No.”
“OK. Fair enough.”
While eating, they had a ring-side seat to the excitement that followed. They saw two ambulances, lights flashing and sirens blaring, rounding the corner into the truck stop entrance. It took the ambulance drivers only a moment to find the location of the injured men, as James had given a fairly good description on the phone of where they would be.
They finished their sandwiches before the medics had gurnied all five brutally injured men into the ambulances, so James and Hugh casually walked right past the scene of the mayhem, looking for all the world like two innocent truck drivers who were mildly curious about what was going on.
A sheriff’s deputy was there questioning passersby, but nobody had seen or heard anything in this dark, remote area of the truck stop. Many drivers at a truck stop leave their engines idling, the rumble of the big diesels killing any possibility of them hearing sounds outside their big rigs.
The deputy, seeing James and Hugh, motioned for them to come over.
“Did either of you guys see anything here tonight?” the deputy asked.
“No, officer, we were eating sandwiches in the sub shop,” James answered innocently, averting his bruised and cut face slightly to keep it in shadow. “Why? What happened here? Someone have an accident?”
“Yes, some accident,” the deputy said. “It looks like these five guys tangled with a Mack truck. But, it’s strange.”
“What’s that?” James asked.
“They look like they were taken down with military precision. I haven’t seen anything like it since leaving the Marines,” the deputy said.
Hugh leaned over, and whispered to James. “Let’s get out of here.” Hugh still had his high-and-tight haircut, and he was nervous that it might be cause for the deputy to take a closer look at the two truck drivers.
As they walked back to James' truck Hugh thought this was an interesting day, hardly what he was expecting as he thumbed the ride from James just that morning.
Sleeping accommodations in James’ truck were better than Hugh thought they would be—not that he had hoped for much. James pointed to the upper bunk in the condo unit of the sleeper cab. When Hugh climbed up there he found a clean mattress and a sleeping bag. The night wasn’t too cold, so he crashed out on top of the sleeping bag, using his small bag of spare clothes for a pillow.
Hugh lay on his back, his hands clasped together behind his head, staring up at the sloped ceiling of the cab. His mind raced with thoughts from the excitement of the evening, but also with the possibilities that presented themselves since getting picked up by his new friend, James.
He had enjoyed riding in the truck for the very short time that he had done it, and he definitely wanted to learn more about it. And, he thought, if a trucker’s life is anything like what they had gone through today ... well ... he could get to like that too. It certainly wouldn’t be boring.
For the first time since leaving military service a month earlier he felt like he might have some direction for his life. He knew he had a lot of
