Casket for Sale, Only Used Once (5 page)

"I don't think his engine's on," said Roger.

Samantha moved up to the front and looked through the windshield. "What's up with this guy?"

"Is he awake?" Roger asked.

"Yeah, his eyes are open," said Samantha. "Honk at him again."

"
I
will make all decisions about the use of the horn." I waited for several seconds to prove I was making the decision on my own, and then honked at the truck again.

No response.

"Jeez, I hope he didn't have a heart attack or something," I said, putting the camper into park. "Everybody wait here, I'll go see what the deal is."

I got out of the vehicle and walked toward the truck. The engine was on. The driver was a guy in his late thirties or early forties, with at least a week's worth of beard growth and unkempt long black hair. As I got closer to his truck, it was clear that he was very much conscious and watching me closely.

But as I walked up to the driver's side of the truck, he stared forward, watching the camper. "Hi there," I said, waving to get his attention.

No reaction.

"Hello?
Sir?"

Nothing.

What was wrong with this guy? I hesitated for a moment, and then knocked on the door.
"Sir?"

He didn't move.

Now, I could tell the guy was watching me when I approached the truck, so why was he ignoring me now? "Sir, I really need for you to move your truck. We can't get around you."

Again, no response.
Now I was getting irritated. I knocked on the door again, harder this time. "Hey! I need you to move the truck, okay?"

Very slowly, the man turned his head to look at me. He narrowed his eyes, and then very slowly returned his attention to the camper.

I got ready to pound on the door, but decided that perhaps this was a gentleman I didn't want to make mad. Did I really want to piss off a guy who was acting this strange, and who could easily have a shotgun resting on his lap?

We could always return to our original plan and drive back the way we'd been going before the wimp-out. Of course, there wasn't nearly enough room on the road to turn the camper around until we reached the store. I wasn't quite comfortable enough driving the motor home to relish the idea of driving in reverse for three miles, but what was I
gonna
do, throw open the door and drag this idiot out of his truck?

I rapped my knuckles against the window.
"Sir?
Is something wrong? Do you need me to get help?"

He looked at me and rolled down his window. "Quit touching my goddamn truck." He said these words in a surprisingly articulate manner.

"Sorry about that, but you're in the way."

"What way?"

"The way of my camper.
We need to get past you and you're in the middle of the road."

"No kidding."

"Uh, right.
So could you move?"

The man opened his door and slowly climbed out of the truck. He wore filthy blue jeans and a T-shirt bearing the faded slogan "Quality Counts!" He was tall, at least six-two, and lean but muscular. He had an ID badge clipped to his pants pocket, which featured his picture and the word "Goblin."

"You can't go down that road," he informed me.

"Yes, I realize that. That's what I've been saying. Your truck is in the way."

"I
know
my truck is in the way."

I wanted to grab him by the shoulders, give him a good shaking, and scream "Then
move
it!" but wisely refrained. "Okay, well, since we're both aware of that, maybe you could move it?
Just a bit?"

"A tree fell, about a mile up ahead. It's blocking the road. It's right as you go around a corner, and I didn't want you to crash into it."

"Oh. Well, that's very nice of you. Maybe we could help you move it."

The man (Goblin?) shook his head. "The tree's too big."

"We have a couple of people in the camper who could help." Technically, Helen wasn't far enough in her pregnancy to be exempt from manual labor, but regardless, I wasn't going to let her engage in any. "It's just a tree, right? We should be able to get it off the road."

"Nope."

"C'mon, four people should be able to move a tree." Never having moved a tree in my life, I had no idea how much manpower was required, but none of the trees close to the road seemed anywhere near large enough to provide much difficulty.

"What did I just tell you? It's too big of a project. Go back the way you came."

"There's nowhere to turn around."

"That's not my problem. You bringing an oversized vehicle down this narrow road
doesn't
constitute an emergency on my part."

Clearly, this guy was not going to move his vehicle. "All right, well, thanks for not letting us crash into the tree."

"Not a problem."

Goblin got back in his truck while I returned to the camper. "What'd he say?" asked Roger as I shut the door.

"He says there's a fallen tree blocking the road, and we have to turn back."

"So why was he just sitting in his truck like that?"

"Because he's an extremely odd individual.
I think his name is Goblin, by the way."

"Goblin?"

"That's what his badge said."

Roger stuck out his lip in a mock pout. "Everybody else gets all the cool names."

I turned around and spoke to Helen. "I'm
gonna
have to drive backwards until we get to the store, so I'll need you to watch through the window and let me know if I'm getting too close to the side of the road."

"I'll watch, too!" said Kyle, excited.

"What did I tell you about talking?" asked Helen. "Not one word!" She got up and walked to the back of the camper to look out the rear window. Samantha opened one of the side windows and stuck out her head.

I put the camper in reverse and slowly applied the gas. This really sucked.
Stupid store owner and his stupid warning.
This was my punishment for being responsible.

"You're okay on my side," Samantha announced as we backed up.

"Yeah, you're fine," said Helen. "Just keep going straight and ... oh, crap, someone's coming."

In the
sideview
mirror I saw a truck drive up behind us.
A filthy dark-green truck identical to Goblin's.
It moved toward us until it was no longer visible in the mirror.

"The jerk stopped two inches from our rear!" Helen informed everybody.

Then the truck in front of us moved
,
driving forward until it almost touched the camper's bumper.

We were boxed in.

Chapter Five

"EVERYONE STAY CALM." I turned off the camper's engine. "They've got identical trucks, so they're probably just part of the same ... I don't know, fallen tree warning squad or something. Helen, what's the guy in the back doing?"

"Nothing.
He's just sitting there."

"Does he look homicidal?"

"Not really."

"Good."

I honked at the truck in front of us, trying to get Goblin to back up. He didn't move.

"Okay, let's just wait and see what they want," I said.

We sat there, trapped between the two trucks, waiting for something to happen. The drivers stayed in their vehicles, silently watching us.

"Do you want me to get out?" Roger finally asked.

I shook my head. "Helen, make sure the kids aren't near the windows."

"I'm scared," said Theresa.

"You don't have to be scared, honey," I assured her. "It's just that these people are acting kind of goofy, that's all. Everything will be fine, I promise."

Samantha picked up her purse and reached inside. "I think we should call the police."

"Good idea," said Roger. What a brownnoser.

Samantha took out her cell phone and punched a couple of buttons. "Damn it! The battery's dead. Roger, I thought you said it was charged!"

"I plugged it in last night!" Roger insisted.

"Did you plug it in right?"

"Yes, I plugged it in right. I'm pretty sure I did. I don't know. I've never plugged one in before. I don't like cell phones."

Helen got her own purse and retrieved her cell phone. She looked at the display in disbelief. "My battery's dead, too!"

"Are you serious?" I asked.

"No." Helen gave a half-smile and dialed.

Something else Helen never did was joke during moments of stress. I got in trouble all the time for doing that. This personality change was starting to become scary.

Seconds later, Helen's half-smile disappeared. "I'm not getting a signal."

"Nothing?"
Samantha asked.

Helen held up the display for her to see then tried again. "No signal. It's not working."

"How can that be?" I asked. "We're not that deep in the woods, are we?"

"Maybe the camper's too tightly insulated or something," said Helen.

I frowned. "A camper wouldn't block cell phone reception, would it?"

"I don't know!" Helen snapped. "I'm just saying it isn't working! Where's your phone?"

"It's ... I left it at home," I admitted. "It's on the counter.
Next to the spatula."
I'd only owned the stupid thing for three weeks, and I avoided its use as much as possible.

"Damn it, Andrew, I thought you were going to try to be more responsible!"

I couldn't believe this. "I
am
being more responsible! Look, the gas tank is almost full! I turned away from
Wreitzer
Park
on the word of a crazy old man! So I forgot my cell phone ... we had two others in the camper! If you're going to get mad at somebody, get mad at Roger! He forgot to plug in Samantha's phone!"

"It was a funky plug!" Roger insisted.

"Then you should have asked!" Samantha said.

"It looked like it was working!"

"Stop fighting!" Theresa shouted. "You're acting like babies!"

All of the adults shut up. Yes, a nine-year-old who only a short time earlier had been at war over a tiny block of tooth-marked chocolate had successfully put us in our place.

"Let's get the kids out of the way," I suggested, quietly.

Samantha took Kyle's hand. "Here, Kyle, why don't you come up and snuggle with your Aunt Samantha in the top bunk?"

When did she become "Aunt Samantha?" That woman didn't get to appoint herself an honorary aunt without my permission! Who did she think she was? Dear God, if Roger stuck with her he would be whipped beyond all reasonable human--

I put that out of my mind and focused on much more pressing matters, such as, say, the lunatic truck drivers. Samantha helped Kyle onto the upper sleeper, and then climbed up there with him, while Helen huddled down with Theresa on the floor. I left the driver's seat and walked to the rear of the camper to get a look at the guy behind us.

Like his buddy, he was unshaven and had long dark hair. However, this guy was morbidly obese, a fact that was obvious even with most of his body hidden from view. I couldn't make a weight estimate, but he was clearly enormous.

He stared at me, looking almost bored.

"I think Roger and I should go out there and talk to them."

"Andrew, no!" said Helen.

"Maybe they're just playing a joke. Seeing how long we'll sit in here. I mean, what else could they possibly be doing? They're not attacking us or trying to steal our camper or anything like that."

"Maybe they're waiting for somebody else."

And then the guy behind us began to back up. He pulled back nearly ten feet then stopped.

"He's moving," I announced.

"The guy up here is saying something," Roger informed everybody. "Not to us, he must be talking into a walkie-talkie or something."

"It damn well better not be a cell phone," I muttered.

The truck in front of us honked. "Roger, switch places," I said, and we crossed paths in the middle of the camper as I returned to the driver's seat.

The truck honked again.

I honked back and gave him the finger.

Goblin grinned. It was
not
a grin that left me with a warm fuzzy feeling inside.

I started up the engine. "I think he wants me to back up," I said. What I really wanted to do was floor the gas pedal and
knock
the grinning prick off the road, but even though our vehicle had the size advantage it would never work, at least not without wrecking the camper.

I slowly backed up. The truck moved forward to match my progress.

"The guy behind us is backing up, too," Roger told me.

We continued moving, blocked between the two trucks. Maneuvering around the first corner was tricky, but I did it without us going off the road.