Special Delivery: Special Delivery, Book 1 (14 page)

The waitress behaved now, possibly because Mitch radiated some serious fuck-off vibes. Sam wanted to ask more questions, but Mitch shoveled food into his mouth, so Sam said nothing and ate as much as he could. He didn’t finish, and when Mitch pressed him to eat more, Sam held up his hands.

“I warn you, it will be a long time before another sit-down.” Mitch reached into his back pocket, pulled out his wallet and handed Sam a pair of twenties. “Go on to the other side and get some snacks. I’m out of everything, so get what you want. Grab me a big liter thing of water, a bag of whatever pepper jerky they got and a pack of Winstons.”

“Winstons?” Sam repeated, taking the twenties.

“Cigarettes.” Mitch threw more bills on the table and rose. “I’m gonna go dump Old Blue’s toilet and refill the water and gas and such. Sorry, but we’re gonna have to skip showers this morning. You can catch one on the road if you like.”

“Okay.” Sam stood awkwardly with the wad of twenties in his hand, watching Mitch stride purposefully down the aisle of the restaurant to the outside door.

He wandered over to the convenience store at the other end of the hall from the bathrooms, trying to remember the list Mitch had given him. Cigarettes, but he’d get those last because they were behind the counter. He hadn’t seen Mitch smoke before. It depressed him a little, but he told himself to get over it. He got the jerky and the water, and he wandered around trying to decide what else Mitch might want, but mostly he got distracted.

Sam had been to a few truck stops, but not many, and never one like this—it was as if he’d stepped into an alternate universe. The convenience store was almost a Walmart—you name it, this place had it. It had a lot of souvenirs too, mementos of Nebraska which Sam couldn’t imagine anyone would want, but some things were out-and-out odd, like clocks fashioned from segments of trees, varnished and sporting a painting of Elvis or Reba McEntire on the face. Stylized Native American stuff abounded, as well as paintings of wolves. Kitschy decorative pieces in glass and ceramic and crystal decorated the shelves, figurines of fairies and unicorns, cute little boys and girls kissing, and cows and pigs playing poker.

Then there were the Butt Buckets.

At first Sam thought they were some sort of gay joke, but no, they were serious. The thing was a container for your cigarette butts, which also extinguished them or something. There was a spit bucket too, and Sam shuddered when he saw the container looking suspiciously like something you were supposed to pee in.

Tall racks housed political stickers and American-themed items, and along a far wall boasted a selection of porn that would have made Darin weep, even though it was all straight. Portable DVD players were for sale, as well as CB radios. Sam wondered if Mitch had one.

Eventually Sam tore himself away from the cabinets of oddity and forced himself to shop. He got a couple more off-color glances from truckers, but he ignored them the same way he ignored the stares he got in Middleton. He ended up at the cash register with a bag of Cheetos, a few microwavable meals in tins, a half-gallon of milk, a loaf of bread and a jar of peanut butter. He did a few more searches in vain for mineral or sparkling water, settled for something flavored instead, and checked out.

Mitch had Old Blue parked in a new place, and the hood was open on the cab. The whole front of the truck was angled forward like a cracked nut. Mitch was engrossed in his work, so after a quick ogle of his ass, Sam slipped into the cab, put away the groceries and sat on the unmade bed as he tried to decide what to do.

He donned fresh underwear and put on deodorant. He brushed his teeth at the sink, and he straightened the bed. He poked around in the cupboards, hoping for something dirty or interesting, but mostly he found Mitch’s clothes, a bag of kitty litter and a lot of papers. A DVD player sat in one cupboard, and on top of it he found several hardcore porn videos.

Sam examined them, taking a tiny peek into Mitch’s sexual world. There were several twink videos and some college-set ones too. The underlying theme, though, was bondage and domination. And threesomes or more.

Well.

Sam closed the cupboard, aroused and slightly nervous, and continued on his search. He discovered an old laptop and an emergency flare, and most important of all, an outlet. Sam grabbed his backpack and fished inside for the cord to his phone. He’d begun to fear he’d left it behind, and then his fingers brushed the length of cable. The cord had nested around the plastic container he’d buried at the bottom of the pack. Carefully, Sam took them both out.

For a few minutes he sat with his mother’s ashes, holding the container in his lap and stroking the top of the lid.
You didn’t leave everything behind,
he scolded himself, and the little voice was right. He turned the tail of the cord over in his hand, realizing in this day and age you couldn’t fully run away, not really. Delia wouldn’t be upset, not yet, not any more than normal. She’d think he was out. She’d still be angry. Em would be worried, but not frantic. But by the end of the day, they would both start to worry, and when they inevitably crossed paths and realized neither of them had seen him—then things would get interesting. They’d also start calling.

Sam cradled the container of ashes higher on his chest, leaned over it and sighed.

What he wanted, he admitted, was to have an adventure peppered with almost nothing except what he’d had with Mitch last night. He wanted a James Lear novel: near to constant episodes of sexual encounters strung together with a bit of mystery, and maybe, for window-dressing, some self-discovery. He wanted to have woken up this morning to Mitch suggesting sex. He wanted to have sex now. He wanted to be coerced into strange sexual acts with him while on the road for the benefit of passing drivers who would also be gay, and should their escapades lead to encounters at rest stops, all their witnesses would be disease-free. He wanted a fantasy, in short. He wanted escape.

That was what Mitch had sold him, yes, but maybe it had only been a game last night and Mitch was bored already because Sam was too tame. He tried to tell himself Mitch was doing actual work today and there would be sex later, but this thought upset him more. He wanted to be Mitch’s sex toy, yes, but he wanted to be so irresistible Mitch did little else but him. He didn’t want to wait patiently in the passenger seat until Mitch had a free moment. What sort of adventure was just following him around, fetching groceries? Was this all it would be?

God, he was nothing but an ungrateful bastard. He should go home if he was going to be no better than a whiny four-year-old.

He opened the lid to the ashes with a trembling hand and stared into them, and when a tear surprised him by rolling down his nose, he let it fall into the gray silt.

“Mom,” he whispered, “I know he said not to say it, but I feel really stupid.”

He wished—oh God, he wished some soft breeze would blow up from nowhere, some subtle touch to let him know she was there.
Just a tiny bit of magic,
he pleaded to the ashes. He prodded them gently with his finger, as if this would spur something.

Nothing happened.

When the door opened, Sam startled, almost spilling the ashes. He did lose a few, but he scooped them up and put them in the container as best he could. He found some still on the floor once he closed the container, though, and he worked to gather them into his fist as Mitch stuck his head around the driver’s seat.

“Hey—you said you’ve never been to Nebraska, right?” Mitch grinned and jerked his head toward the door. “Come on.”

Sam still had the ashes in his hand, but Mitch was watching, so he clutched at them and hurried out, keeping his mom tight in his grip as Mitch helped him down, grope-free this time. Once they were on the ground, Mitch took hold of his elbow and led him with a purposeful step toward a ditch around the back of a maintenance building. As they cleared some grass, Sam realized it wasn’t a ditch at all.

It was a river.

“This is the Platte.” Mitch gestured at the water. “Well, okay, this here’s the south fork. A bit east is where the North and South Platte meet. They feed into the Missouri River, which in turn empties into the Mississippi.” He looked out across the water, and Sam watched his face. Mitch appeared pleased. “They followed this river on the Oregon Trail and the Mormon Trail, and the interstate winds along beside it. So when you travel down this road, you’re going the same way so many people went before you, all heading west, to hope.”

Sam stared at the river, not knowing quite what to say to this. It was a pretty speech, but it seemed odd coming from take-your-pants-off-and-bend-over Mitch, and he didn’t know why Mitch had delivered it to him. So he stared at the water, and he found, actually, the river was soothing. He could hear the noise of the truck stop behind him, and the interstate beyond, but here at the river he could hear birds too, and the whisper of a breeze in the grass, and the soft sound of the water as it wound its way slowly to the Gulf of Mexico. Something small eased inside Sam, a drop of water on a hot day, but for that moment it was enough.

He remembered the ashes still in his hand, and before he could think too long about what he was doing, he extended his arm, opened his palm and let them go, watching the powder drift into the weeds and the water. The ease he’d known vanished with that release, though, and he wrapped his arms around himself.

Mitch’s shadow fell over him, and the trucker touched Sam lightly on his shoulder. “Ready to go, Sunshine?”

No, Sam wasn’t ready. He didn’t want to keep going, because he felt awkward and ridiculous, and he was sure he was going to regret his impulsive decision to run. But he looked out at the water, imagined a small bit of his mother now sailing south, and said, “Sure.”

Chapter Ten

They reached Denver by early afternoon.

Sam enjoyed the drive. Mitch let him pick all the music, and after starting with safe pop artists, he eventually wandered into more of his favorite British indie bands and on into country. When Mitch seemed to genuinely enjoy everything he played, Sam put it on shuffle and let the wild, weird eclecticism that was his musical taste carry them westward.

Settling in his seat with his feet on the dash, Sam watched the landscape change from the river valley of North Platte to the scrubby plains of eastern Colorado to the Rocky Mountains rising before him like gods lifting their heads on the horizon. At first Mitch had to point them out to him because Sam focused on the landscape, wondering where the hell all the trees had gone, and it took him several seconds to figure out the dark shapes ahead were not all clouds.

“Cool,” he’d said, but he felt a little let down. He’d thought somehow the mountains would be bigger. They did grow, slowly—and then he got out a map. Shouldn’t they be in Denver by now, if the mountains were that close? Then he realized how far the mountains still were away. “
Shit,
how
big
are they?”

Mitch smiled. “That was the reaction I wanted. Now imagine you’re in a covered wagon traveling for weeks.”

Fuck.
Sam sank into his seat. “I would be staying in Denver, thanks.”

“And now you know why Denver is there.”

Sam regarded Mitch for a moment, noticing the light in his eyes, the sudden eagerness in his posture. He’d smoked several Winstons on the way into Colorado, appearing agitated and almost bored, but now he looked excited, as if he were happy to be where he was going.

“You wouldn’t have stopped in Denver, would you?” The thought of pioneer Mitch was attractive. “You’d have hiked over the mountains like Grizzly Adams.”

Mitch shrugged, but he still smiled. “I’m not much of a naturalist, and I have no desire to meet wild animals, so probably not. I’d have helped lay down the rails and saved up to ride the first train, though. Mostly I enjoy traveling. Seeing things. Learning.”

Sam went back to watching the mountains come closer and closer. He could see the snow on the tops of some of the tallest peaks. “Will we drive into them at all?”

“If this deal comes through, yes, to get to Cortez. Quite deep inside them, in fact.”

Sam tried to imagine the mountain roads, but he honestly couldn’t wrap his head around the idea. He assumed they would drive between the peaks in some winding valley. It would be fun to look up at them from so far below. “I hope you get the deal, then.”

The warehouse where Mitch took his load was on the southern side of the city, but it was out in the open, the mountains still visible in the distance. Sam offered to help unload, but Mitch shooed him into the cab. “Sit tight. Watch some TV. Stay here.”

Sam didn’t want to watch TV. He felt edgy, and bored, and nervous. He pulled out his phone and stared at it. Knowing he had to face it sometime, Sam called Emma.

At first she didn’t believe him.

“That’s funny,” she said, when he told her he was in Denver. “Seriously, where are you? Your aunt has called me twice.”

“No, really. I’m in Denver, with Mitch.” He told her about driving off, about his car running out of gas. “Actually, I need to get my car off the road. Would you mind?”

“What the
hell
? Sam—you are
seriously
in Denver? You ran off with your alley fuck?
Why?
”

“I was mad. Delia—” He bit his lip, not knowing how to explain this. “She knows about Mitch. What we did in the alley. She said all sorts of crap, Em, and she promised to make my life hell.”