When Jenny announced she was finished, Hugh secured the curtain open again. They stashed their jugs away in their secure locations, making sure they were tightly capped. Got back into their seats, and were on the road again – all in less than ten minutes.
“How did it go?” Hugh asked.
“Good,” Jenny replied. “There’s a technique. Took me a minute to get it right. But it worked just fine. And you?”
Hugh laughed. He knew Jenny knew he was an old hand at taking care of his business while on the road, something he had learned early in his career. On the first day he had spent in a truck, in fact. The day he had got picked up by James as a hitchhiker.
Chapter Twelve
“Speaking of James,” Hugh said. “Isn’t it time we gave him a call?”
He heard Jenny laugh. Hugh knew he wasn’t exactly a chatterbox, and he realized he did sometimes finish a conversation out loud he had started in his head. Jenny must have thought the James segue after doing the jug thing was funny.
“Sure, now would be a good time,” Jenny said.
She’d already added James’ phone number to the contacts on both of their phones, and had created an icon for the contact on their home screens. It was only a matter of tapping the icon on her phone, and the phone service reached out to ring James’ number.
Even though they both had Bluetooth headsets she put her phone in speaker mode and held the phone up so she and Hugh could talk to James together.
“Hello,” they heard from the speaker.
“Hey Old Man, it’s me, Hugh,” Hugh said loudly so James could hear him.
“Hey, kid. What the heck’s going on?” James asked.
Hugh had been only twenty-one when he had first met James, who was his senior by a little better than twenty years. The Old Man and Kid names went back to their first day of meeting each other fifteen years earlier.
Hugh could write a whole book about their adventures together beginning with when Hugh had killed Jenny’s father in a fight the day Hugh had met James. But, that story was better left untold. Only James, Jenny and Hugh’s immediate family knew about that. It would make Charlie the reporter’s head explode if she ever got wind of it.
“I see you’re famous. It’s all over Facebook.” James was not as social media averse as Hugh was. Somebody, probably one of Hugh’s family members, likely Mary, had put the newspaper article up on Facebook. James, being a “Friend” of Hugh’s family, had seen it there.
James had visited Hugh during his recuperation at the family ranch, and Hugh’s family had taken an instant liking to him.
“Hi James,” Jenny said.
“Well, now. Look who’s there!” James had fallen in love with Jenny the first time he had met her. He sounded real pleased to hear Jenny’s voice on the phone.
“You haven’t dumped that bum yet? You know my offer to run away with me is still good.”
“No, I think I’ll keep him for a while longer. If he behaves himself.” Jenny winked at Hugh.
“Just curious,” James said. He sounded serious. “What’s the deal with that reporter?”
“No deal. We didn’t get along well with her at all,” Hugh said.
“I mean, how are you going to arrange her ride along with you? How’s that going to work out with Jenny?”
“What on earth are you talking about?” Hugh asked. At the same time, Jenny shouted into the phone, “Say what!”
“You mean you guys didn’t know about that. You saw the article, right?”
“It was in the article?” Hugh asked. He couldn’t keep the incredulousness out of his voice.
“Yeah, at the end, something to the effect it was letting the newspaper’s readers know about an upcoming story about the hero trucker written by the reporter who was going to ride along and get a feel for a trucker’s life on the road.”
“That’s news to us. It wasn’t in the version of the story we saw,” Hugh said. He looked over, and could see Jenny shaking her head back and forth.
“It’s in the version that’s all over the internet,” James said.
“We know nothing about that. We’re definitely going to find out. You can bet on that,” Hugh said.
“By the way, we’re on 395 right now, planning to do an overnight in Twin Falls, then heading south to Phoenix. Where are you?”
“Opposite end of the spectrum from you, buddy. Just pulling out of the LA Basin with a load for Portland.” James drove for the same company as Hugh did, and was on the Pacific fleet. Occasionally, their paths crossed, and they liked to get together whenever possible.
“OK, I’ve got to let you go,” James said. “I’m getting off of 210 now. You know, where it joins I-5. Traffic’s jammed, so I’d better pay attention. Let me know what you find out about your ride along.”
“That sure is an interesting development,” Hugh said. “Get on your phone and find the Times’ website. See if you can find that article.”
Hugh had purchased unlimited data for his and Jenny’s phones. It wasn’t that much more expensive. The only downside was it came with a block preventing using the cell phone as a hot spot so all that data couldn’t be abused. But, since Hugh spent more time in the truck cab than he did in the sleeper berth, and using his laptop, the additional data was more useful. Like right now.
Jenny brought up the mobile version of the Idaho Times’ website. Since the article was still current she’d had no trouble finding it.
“Here it is,” she said. As she skimmed the article, she again shook her head.
“It’s mostly the same article we saw. The part James mentioned is in there at the end.
