Mango Motel

by Bill H Myers

  The reporter in the copter threw it back to the news desk where the senior anchor, a man in his late fifties, took over. His co-anchor, a blonde in her forties, was nodding her head as he spoke.

  “We'll continue to show a live feed from Eagle Eight throughout the evening, but for those who have just tuned in, here's the latest from DOT.

  “Around four forty-five this afternoon, a sinkhole opened up on the northbound shoulder of I-75 near mile marker 335. A state trooper notified DOT and we immediately shut down both sides of the highway between exits 329 and 341. Since then, we have dispatched our investigators and when we determine the sinkhole's size and depth, we will consider our next step.

  “In the meantime, we have routed both northbound and southbound traffic onto service roads. Traffic on those roads is moving but very slowly. There's a lot of congestion, so if you can, avoid this area.”

  When the DOT spokesperson ended his report, the news anchor looked at his female co-anchor and asked, “Are there any updates from Eagle Eight?”

  She smiled. “Yes Jim, there are. They are now above the sinkhole and we can see the damage it has done to the highway.”

  The screen filled with video from the copter showing the gaping hole below it. The reporter in the air was saying, “This thing is pretty big. There's no way they can let anyone drive close to it.”

  He continued his reporting, showing the long line of cars on the south side going far into the distance.

  In mid-sentence, the anchor interrupted the airborne reporter and said, “This just in from DOT. Cars stuck in the southbound lanes will soon be moving. DOT will keep that part of the highway closed, but with the help of state police, will be guiding the stopped traffic onto the shoulder until the next exit.”

  He looked at his co-host; she nodded and took over where he left off. “DOT says that with more than nine thousand cars backed up on the south side, it will take a few hours to get them all through the area. But at least they will be moving.”

  “Here's the bad news. Those stopped on the north side between the named exits will not be moving until DOT examines and fills in the hole. No estimate was given for how long that would take.”

  She closed her segment by saying, “It'll be a long night for those stuck on the north side of I-75.”

  As I watched the story unfold, I was thinking, ‘Only in Florida’. I-75 had been shut down due to accidents involving beer trucks, alligators, and now sinkholes. I wondered what would be next.

  Seeing that I had plenty of time on my hands, I muted the TV and went back to my fridge. I'd stocked it with enough food for two people for a week. Even though I hadn't planned on spending the night on I-75, if I had to, I wouldn't starve.

  I wasn't hungry just yet, so I headed to the couch and settled in for a nap.

  It wasn't long before Bob joined me.

  Chapter Nine

  Sometime later, I woke to the sound of tapping on my side door. It wasn't a loud knock and no one was telling me to come out with my hands up, so I figured it probably wasn't the police.

  But Bob wasn't so sure. In his mind, whoever was there had come to get him. So when he heard the tapping, he jumped up and headed to the back bedroom. About halfway there, he looked back at me as if to ask, “Aren't you coming?”

  When it became apparent to him that I wasn't, he turned and took off. I couldn't see where he went, but I was pretty sure he had decided to hide in his pillow fort.

  With Bob in his safe place, I walked over to the kitchen and looked out the small window over the sink. From there, I could see a young woman holding a child near my door. The woman looked to be in her mid-twenties, she was waif-thin, had short black hair and neck tattoos. She was wearing jeans and a Def Leppard tee. The child she was holding looked like it had been crying.

  When she saw me looking at her, she pointed to the child and said, “We need your help.”

  I didn't see anyone else hiding in the bushes behind her, ready to jump me if I opened the door. In fact, there weren't any bushes to hide behind. Just a few feet of recently mowed grass leading up to the chain-link fence separating the highway from the fields beyond.

  The woman looked relatively harmless so I opened the door to see what she needed. She looked tired, her eyes were red, and her hair uncombed. She smiled and said, “I hate to bother you, but I wonder if you have any juice. For my baby.

  “We've been stuck out here for hours. Nothing to eat or drink. If you have apple or grape juice or even water that you could share, I'd be eternally grateful.”

  I had juice in the fridge. Water too. Even an unopened box of wine. What I didn't have was someone to talk to other than Bob and so far he hadn't said much during the trip.

  I invited her in.

  Her first question after stepping inside was, “Do you have a bathroom?”

  I did and pointed to it in the back of the coach. She nodded and handed me the child, saying, “You hold her. I'll be right back.”

  The child, who had been crying when held by her mother, got quiet when she landed in my arms. She studied my face then pointed to the bathroom and squeaked out, “Mommy?”

  It sounded like she was asking if I knew where her mommy had gone. Or maybe she was asking if the woman who had been holding her was really her mommy. Maybe she wasn't. Maybe she'd kidnapped the child and was on the run.

  Chances were she hadn't.

  She was just another one of the thousands of unlucky people stuck on the highway that day. The child was most likely hers.

  When the child saw that her mommy wasn't coming back right away, she turned toward me. She stared at me for a few seconds then pointed over my shoulder and said, “TeeVee!”

  I'd left it on with the volume down. Bart Simpson was now on the screen, running from Homer.

  I was glad the sound was muted.

  The child didn't seem to care whether she could hear the Simpsons or not. She just wanted to watch. To her, it was fascinating. Or comforting. Or maybe that's how her mother had raised her. In front of a TV.

  When her mother came back from the bathroom, she took the child and thanked me profusely for inviting them in. She apologized for the way she looked, saying, “I'm Sierra. My baby's name is Tasha. We've been on the road for six days. We started in Seattle and are heading to Fort Myers. It's been a long trip.”

  Still holding the child, she pointed to the couch behind me and asked, “Mind if I sit?”

  I didn't and she sat, putting the child on the couch beside her. She looked around then asked, “Are you here alone?”

  “Yeah, just me and my cat.”

  She smiled again. I wasn't convinced it was real. “We used to have a cat. Had to leave him back in Seattle. With my ex. We'll get another one after we’ve settled in.”

  She pointed to the kitchen sink. “You have running water?”

  I'd forgotten she'd asked about juice; she'd said she and her child were thirsty.

  “Yes, there's water. And juice. Apple, orange, white grape. Whatever you want.”

  She patted her child on the head. “If it's not too much trouble, apple juice. In one cup, so we can share.”

  I grabbed a Tervis insulated plastic tumbler from the kitchen cabinet, filled it with apple juice and handed it to the woman. She took a long drink then helped her child sip from the cup.

  When the glass was empty, she handed it back to me and stood. “Thanks so much for your help.”

  She picked up her child and headed for the door.

  I could have invited her to stay or offered her something to eat. But I didn't. I just watched them leave. She opened the door, stepped out and started walking south.

  I didn't check to see which car she got back into.

  I should have.

  Chapter Ten

  About a half-hour after Sierra and her child had gone back to their car, I heard the whoop, whoop, whoop of a large helicopter. It was a sound I recognized from my time in the sandbox. It was a heavy lifter. The kind used to deli
ver tanks and artillery pieces to hot zones.

  Looking up to confirm my suspicions, I was surprised by what I saw. Underneath the copter, a heavy-duty tow strap connected to a large canvas bag swinging slowly in the wind. I was sitting high enough up in the motorhome to see over the row of cars and watch what happened next.

  The chopper lowered the bag and it dumped what looked like wet cement into what I assumed was the sinkhole. When the bag was empty, the copter went back the same direction it came from, its rotors again making the familiar whoop, whoop, whoop sound as it passed overhead.

  Ten minutes later, it returned with a second load and dumped the contents of the bag in the same place. It reeled the bag in, turned and headed south as before.

  Being pretty sure that the copter's runs were sinkhole related, I turned on the TV to see if there were any updates. Back on the same channel as before, the lead anchor was doing a voice-over of a video showing the copter dumping its contents into the sinkhole.

  He was saying, “Well folks, it looks like it won't be long before they have that sinkhole taken care of. The DOT geophysicist who examined it said it was stable and had been caused by an irrigation line failure at a nearby agricultural facility.

  “DOT filled the hole with a mixture of concrete and silica to create a plug. They said they will soon reopen one lane of northbound traffic letting those who have been stuck there finally leave.”

  This was good news. We'd soon be moving again.

  I turned off the TV and went back to the bathroom to get ready for the road.

  When I went in, I noticed the door to the medicine cabinet was slightly open. I knew I hadn't left it that way. If I had, everything in it would have spilled out onto the floor the first time we took a corner.

  But there was nothing on the floor. The cabinet hadn't been open while we were moving. So either Bob or I had opened it; or someone else had.

  I was pretty sure it wasn't Bob's doing. He's crafty but wouldn't have a reason to jump up on the sink and try to pry open the medicine cabinet. I knew I hadn't opened it either.

  That left just one person. Sierra. The woman who had asked me to get juice for her child.

  She had gone into the bathroom and stayed in there for at least five minutes. I didn't ask her about it at the time. It wasn't any of my business.

  I opened the cabinet door and saw that the two bottles of prescription meds I had in there were gone. One was a thirty-day supply of painkillers and the other an anti-seizure drug.

  She had taken both bottles, leaving me without my medication.

  I should have been upset. Not at her but at myself for keeping the drugs in an unlocked cabinet. That was my mistake. I should have locked the drugs away. But in my defense, I never planned on strangers spending time in my bathroom.

  I checked to see what else might be missing; everything else seemed to be in order. I was relieved until I remembered that I kept my wallet upfront on the center console between the passenger and driver's seats. It would be in plain view of anyone in the RV.

  I took a deep breath and headed up front fearing the worst.

  If she'd taken my wallet, she'd have my credit cards, my driver's license and all the cash in it.

  Chapter Eleven

  My wallet was exactly where I left it and it appeared to be untouched. My cash and credit cards were still in it. My phone, which had been next to my wallet, hadn't been taken either. Both were where I had left them on the console over the engine.

  That was the good news. The bad news was she had stolen my meds. The ones prescribed by my doctor to help with my recovery. The pain pills I wouldn't miss much. I had stopped taking them two weeks earlier. But I was still taking the anti-seizures and I wasn't sure what would happen when I stopped taking them.

  Each of the pill bottles had a label with my name, my street address, the RX number and the phone number of the CVS that filled the prescription. Just about everything an identity thief would need.

  She knew I was on the road and if she was so inclined, she could go to my home. The address was on the pill bottle. But if she went there intending to break in, she'd be disappointed. There was no home there. Only the cement slab I parked my motorhome on when I wasn't traveling. There was nothing there for her to steal.

  But if she called CVS claiming to be me, being able to give them my name, home address and the RX number from the bottles, she might be able to get a refill on the meds. I needed to make sure that didn’t happen.

  I grabbed my phone, scanned through my recent call list and found the text from CVS telling me my prescription was ready. The message included the phone number of the store in case I had questions. I called it.

  After waiting on hold for seven minutes, I was able to speak to Phil in the pharmacy department. I told him what had happened. That my meds had been stolen and I was worried the thief might try to get an early refill.

  Phil said he understood and after I gave him my birth date, phone number, and CVS card number, he put an immediate hold on both prescriptions. They could not be refilled under any circumstances by anyone, including me.

  I understood why they handled it that way. If they did it differently, drug addicts could claim their pills were stolen and get refills almost any time. Even if they had stolen the pill bottles themselves.

  I wasn't a drug addict and didn't need a refill on the pain pills. But the seizure drug was a different story. I wasn't sure what would happen if I suddenly stopped taking them.

  I asked the pharmacist what he thought and he said if my doctor had prescribed the pills, I should take them as indicated. He said to call the doctor and have him write a new prescription and they would fill it.

  It was Saturday evening, almost closing time at the pharmacy. There was no chance I could reach my doctor and get him to write a new prescription on a weekend. I didn't need to explain this to Phil; I just thanked him for his help and ended the call.

  I made a mental note to call my doctor on Monday and to get a lock for the medicine cabinet in my bathroom.

  Cars in the lane to the left to me had started to inch forward and I knew that as soon as that lane cleared, we would be next.

  I moved up to the driver's seat from the couch and watched the parade of cars slowly passing by. I was looking for the woman who had been in my motorhome. If I saw her in a car, I'd get her plate number. I wanted to have it in case something came up with the missing drugs.

  I checked the occupants of each car as it passed but didn't see her in any of them. The sun had set two hours earlier, and it was pretty dark. The street lights didn't help much; they just created a reflected glare on the windows of the cars as they went by.

  If she'd been in one of them, I hadn't seen her. But maybe she was behind me, in the same lane I was in. If that were the case, my only chance of finding her would be to pull over and watch as cars went by.

  I didn't want to do that. I just wanted to be on my way. But then I remembered she'd said she was heading to Fort Myers. If that were true, she'd be in the southbound lane, not the north one like I was. When traffic was stopped in both directions, she could have easily walked across the median to get to my motorhome.

  Or maybe she was in the northbound lane all along and someone else was driving her car. She could have ducked down when they went by and I wouldn't have seen her.

  Either way, I'd spent too much time worrying about her. She was gone, the pills were gone, and I probably wouldn't be seeing her again. I had to write it off as a mistake. One I wouldn't make again. No picking up strangers, at least until the meds in the bathroom were secured.

  When the last car in the next lane over went by, a state trooper at the head of the lane I was in started directing us over onto the far left lane. It was single file and slow, but at least we were moving.

  As we got close to the sinkhole, just about every car slowed to take a photo of the army of emergency vehicles with flashing lights surrounding the newly poured concrete. I tried my best not to look but fai
led. Like everyone else, I wanted to see the hole that had held us up for nearly six hours.

  After passing it by, the highway opened up to three lanes, moving fast going north. I stayed in the far right lane, knowing I'd soon be taking the exit to highway 301 after passing Ocala.

  I figured that being that late in the day, the back road to Saint Augustine wouldn't be too busy.

  I was wrong.

  Chapter Twelve

  Driving the back roads of Florida after dark is never a good idea because that's when the animals come out. The big ones like wild boars that can weigh up to three hundred pounds and travel in packs. And gators moving from one water source to another. And deer that often run out directly in front of you then freeze creating an unmissable target.

  Hit any of these while rolling down the road at sixty plus and you're looking at some major damage. To both you and the critter you hit.

  I wanted to avoid that, so my plan was to stop at the first Walmart I found and spend the night in their parking lot. I'd been up since six that morning and on the road twelve hours. Most of those had been spent waiting for traffic to clear. But they still added up.

  The back road I was on didn't have any street lights. Plenty of woods and swamp on both sides. Great hiding places for the kind of wildlife that could ruin the rest of my night. Or put me back in the hospital.

  That was something I wanted to avoid, so I was happy when I got to the Walmart Super Center in Palatka and saw several RVs parked in the lot. That meant the store allowed overnight parking, and it was something I needed to do.

  I pulled in and parked close to a truck camper on a white Ford diesel dually, being sure to leave plenty of room between us. He wanted his privacy and I wanted mine.

  After getting the motorhome closed up for the night and making sure Bob had food, water, and a clean litter box, I headed across the lot to Walmart's front doors. I was hungry and didn't want to fire up the generator which I would need to run the microwave to heat up a frozen dinner. I wanted something quick and easy and knew that Walmart had just the thing.