by Scott Fowler
“That worked!” I said excitedly.
“Now can you reach the pedals with your right foot?” she said.
Uh-oh. I hadn’t thought of that. I straightened my leg and pointed my toe as far as it would go, but still couldn’t touch either of the two pedals on the floor. When I stretched a little harder, I did touch the pedal, but I slid off the quilt and banged the horn with my arm.
“Ho-o-o-onk!”
We all jumped.
“I can’t reach the pedals!” I said, starting to get panicky. “What are we going to do?”
“Salem,” said Miss Swann, “you’re going to have to….”
But Salem had figured out what she was going to say. He was already climbing up into my lap. He pulled the quilt out from under me, threw it into the passenger seat, and sat on top of me.
“We’re going to drive it together, Chapel,” he said. “I’ll do the top part. You do the bottom.”
“Yes,” said Miss Swann. “That’s it. Chapel works the pedals. Salem steers the wheel.”
“OK,” I said. Normally, I would have asked more questions. But we had to get going. I knew how to turn the key, at least – I had seen my parents do that many times.
The engine roared to life. “Which pedal is which?” I shouted.
“The right one is gas,” Miss Swann said. “The left is brake. Use your right foot for both – don’t use your left foot at all.”
“Go, Chapel, go!” Salem said. He had gripped the steering wheel tightly in both hands. I had to scoot down so far to reach the pedals that I couldn’t see anything except the back of his head.
I pushed with my right foot. First, I barely touched the pedal at all. Then, because nothing happened, I pushed a little harder. Then even harder. Still, nothing.
“Nothing’s happening!” I shouted.
“Oh, goodness,” Miss Swann said. “I’m forgetting something.”
“What about the stick thing coming out of the steering wheel?” London said from the backseat. “I think Mom and Dad use that somehow when they drive.”
“OK,” Salem said. He took his right hand off the steering wheel and yanked down on the stick thing.
My right foot was still mashing the gas pedal as hard as it could when Salem pulled down on the stick, and it was like uncaging a hungry tiger. The truck leaped forward out of the carport and up the driveway, startling all of us.
“Too fast!” Miss Swann yelled. Panicked, I took my foot off the gas and jammed it onto the other pedal – the brake. I guess I hit it a little too hard, as we stopped like he had run into a brick wall. Salem hit his head on the steering wheel.
“Owww!” he said. “What are you doing?”
“I don’t know!” I said. “I don’t know what to do!”
“It’s OK, boys,” Miss Swann said. “Now just go more gently with the pedals, Chapel. And Salem, there’s going to be a right turn out of the driveway. Get ready for it.”
I pushed the gas pedal – nice and easy this time. I saw Salem above me, his tongue poking out of the corner of his mouth, concentrating on making the turn. I felt the truck turn, turn, turn… and then there was a scraping noise on the passenger’s side. I took my foot off the pedal.
“Did you hit something, honey?” Miss Swann said. “I can’t see.”
“He ran into some bushes,” London announced. “Get Salem immediately in….”
“It’s OK,” Miss Swann interrupted. “Try to keep going. The truck doesn’t matter, as long as we’re OK.”
“Kay, kay,” Georgia babbled. She was happy to get another car ride.
“OK,” I said. “I’m going to push the gas again. Tell me if you want to go any faster, but whatever you do, don’t have a wreck. We can’t afford another one of those.”
Salem kept steering and I kept pushing the pedal. The scraping noise started again, then stopped as we got clear of the bush.
“We’re on the road now,” Salem said.
I rose up for a moment to see and sat beside him. We were on a slight downhill slope, so the truck coasted while I looked. The road appeared to be straight for the next little while. There was snow on both sides, but it had mostly melted on the road.
“All right,” I said. “I’m going to go a little faster.”
I scooted back down to work the pedals. Salem kept both hands on the steering wheel. London, Georgia and Miss Swann were quiet in the back seat as we worked together, easing the truck up the road.
“Not so fast, Chapel,” Salem said. “There’s a turn coming up.”
I slowed the truck down when he told me to and popped up occasionally to check our progress. Together, we guided the truck up one hill and down the next. It was starting to be fun.
“You’re doing good, boys,” Miss Swann said. “Not much longer and we’ll get to Clarksville – that’s the closest town.”
“How come you don’t live there?” London said. “You’re old.”
I winced, but Miss Swann didn’t seem to mind. “I did live in Clarksville for most of my life,” she said. “But my husband and I liked to be by ourselves in the woods. We moved outside of town 20 years ago, when we retired, to the house you came to today.”
“What happened to him?” London asked.
“Six years ago, Sam died,” Miss Swann said. “We had been married 58 years. Now Arthur – he was our only child – he wants me to come live with him. But I like where I am. Maybe one day, yes. But not yet.”
Salem and I kept on driving. We were getting the hang of it. And then we had this weird thing happen, the sort of stuff they say happens to twins when your brains appear to be connected by some invisible wire for a few seconds. We had the same thought at the same time and suddenly said together: “Let’s switch!”
So we did. It turned out I couldn’t sit on Salem’s lap – his feet were too short to reach the pedals – but we got around that. Instead, I just got on my knees in the front seat – I could see fine that way – and Salem got all the way down on the floorboard, his back against the driver’s seat, and mashed the gas and brake when I told him to with his right foot. He was very careful, and so was I. And for the first time since the wreck, I was glad we weren’t seeing any other cars.
“This road doesn’t lead much of anywhere anymore,” Miss Swann said. “It used to be well-traveled. But then they put the new highway in, and the state just let it wither away. Now it doesn’t even show up on most maps.”
“Why not?” London said. “It’s still a road.”
“I guess because it’s a road to nowhere, really,” Miss Swann said. “It’s blocked off on one side. Not a single other house on it. There used to be some people who lived in a mobile home not too far away – that sounds like where you spent last night – but they left five or six years ago. There are a lot of days I never hear a single car except for Arthur’s. Even the deer hunters don’t come out this far anymore. Why was your dad driving on it, anyway?”
“He knew about it from when he was a kid or something,” I said. “He thought it was a shortcut.”
After only a few more minutes, I could see that the pine trees were starting to thin out. “I see something!” I said. “Keep pushing the gas, Salem – we’re almost there.”
We rounded a gentle curve and then I saw the first road sign of our journey. It was on the right side, with white letters on a metallic green background. It read: “Welcome to Clarksville. Pop. 847.”
CHAPTER 14
“We’re coming into Clarksville,” I said excitedly to Miss Swann. “Where should we stop?”
“Let me think,” Miss Swann said. “We could go to Arthur’s store, but that’s kind of in the middle of town. We’ll pass a number of things before that….”
London pointed out the window. “Look,” he said. “Another kid!”
“I want to see!” Salem said from down below, where he was still in charge of the gas and brake. “I want to see!”
“OK,” I said, feeling good after my turn after the wheel. “Let’s switch back.”
He climbed back onto my lap and I started working the pedals again while he controlled the steering wheel.
Before I slumped down to press them, though, I got a good look at the kid. He looked to be about Salem’s age. He was riding a red bicycle on the road by himself.
“I bet he got that bike for Christmas,” Salem said.
Christmas. It was Christmas morning, wasn’t it? I kept forgetting that. This didn’t seem anything like Christmas. It was all too weird.
“Let’s not stop,” I suggested. “We need grown-ups for this, not kids. Grown-ups and ambulances and stuff.”
So I sank back into the seat and stepped on the gas. Salem guided us slowly past the kid.
“He’s stopping his bike and watching us,” London said. “Now we’re going past him.”
I couldn’t resist popping up again to take one more look. London and Georgia were both waving at the kid from the backseat, but he didn’t notice them at all. Instead, the kid was staring at Salem holding onto the steering wheel as we went by. I thought I knew what the kid’s look meant: “Man, all I got was a stupid red bicycle for Christmas! That kid’s my age, and he got a truck!”
Miss Swann spoke up from the backseat. “I know where we should stop,” she said. “We’ll go to the volunteer fire department. It’s on this road, on the left – one of the very first things you see when you get into the town.”
Only about two minutes later, Salem said, “I see it. Slow us down, Chapel.”
I let off the gas pedal and lifted my head back up as we coasted. The fire department was on the left. It looked like there were two fire trucks parked inside a big garage. There was a gravel parking lot right beside the fire department. A red truck was the only car in the whole lot. There was a big sign that said “Clarksville V.F.D.”
“OK, turn in there,” I said to Salem. I scooted back down and touched the brake a little with my foot. I could see Salem turning the wheel to the left and then heard the crunch of our tires rolling over the gravel.
“Stop, stop!” Salem said. “We’re about to hit another truck!”
I slammed the brakes down and we all jolted forward. Salem immediately got off my lap and moved to the passenger seat, where he started trying to open the door to get out.
I let off the brakes, and suddenly we started to roll again. “How do you make it stop for good?” I asked Miss Swann, pressing the brakes with all my might.
“Oh, it’s been so long since I’ve done this,” she said. “Let me see…”
“The stick thing,” London said. “It kept us stopped at the beginning. Push it back up!”
I reached up and tried to. At first, it wouldn’t go anywhere, but when I jiggled it back and forth a little while pushing straight up, it did move. Then I heard a clicking sound and the truck seemed to rock in place for a second. I carefully took my foot off the brake and the truck didn’t move anymore. We had barely missed hitting the red truck in the parking lot, ending up about six inches short of the truck’s bumper.
“Everybody out!” I said, turning the key off just like I’d seen Mom and Dad do. “Let’s go inside.”
We started unloading. But it was a time-consuming process with an 85-year-old woman and a baby in our group now. So well before we even got inside, a man stepped out of the fire station and met us. He looked to be a little older than my Dad, maybe about 50. He was a little shorter than Dad and looked strong and stout, with a mustache and hair that werer both jet black. He was wearing a heavy black coat that matched his hair and was looking at the tiny gap between our truck and his.
“Merry Christmas,” he said. “And nice parking job.”
His face looked like it was about to smile for a second, but then it decided to stay blank. “Who exactly was driving your truck, anyway?”
“We were,” I said, pointing to myself and Salem. “But…”
“You were?” he interrupted, his eyes narrowing. “You think letting kids drive a truck is funny?” His eyes cut over toward Miss Swann.
“No sir,” I said. “But we’ve got an emergency.”
“What sort of emergency?” he said, moving a couple of steps closer to take a better look at us. “Is this woman hurt?”
“I’m just fine,” Miss Swann said. “This is my truck. I let them drive it because their parents are hurt.”
“Where are they?” the man said.
“You know the road that used to lead to Springfield before the new highway came in? Davis Church Road?” Miss Swann said.
“Yeah,” said the man. “But that’s blocked off now. There’s a barricade 18 or 20 miles up the road. Nothing down Davis Church Road anymore but trees.”
“I’m down that way,” Miss Swann corrected. “The only house on the road – at least the only one anybody lives in.”
I interrupted, worried we were losing time. “My dad used to live around here,” I said. “He went around that barricade yesterday. He knew he wasn’t supposed to, but he said it would be a shortcut. Then he had a wreck trying to miss hitting a deer. My Mom and Dad were pinned inside the car. They sent us to get help, but they’re still down there trapped. They’re still down there right now!”
The man started moving then. I wouldn’t have thought he could move that fast. But suddenly he had a radio in his hand and he was calling out numbers and names so quickly I couldn’t understand all he was saying. I heard the word “Dispatch” in there a few times, and it sounded like he told whoever was on the other end of that radio that the volunteers on call needed to be paged, including the rescue squad people.
“I know it’s Christmas,” the man said to whoever it was on the other end of that radio. “But I need ‘em.”
The rescue squad was apparently located in another small town 15 minutes further down the road – that’s where the closest ambulance was – but they would have the proper “extrication equipment.”
Then he said to us: “One of you needs to ride with me. Ma’am, do you know where this wrecked van is?”
“Oh, Lord, no,” Miss Swann said. “I wasn’t there. You’ll need to take Chapel for that. We’ll pray for you from right here.”
“OK,” the man said, and he started taking charge. “My name’s Butch. All the rest of you go inside the firehouse. There’s a couch in there, and a TV, and it’s warm. Help yourself to whatever you can find to eat. There’s not much, but there may be some leftover Christmas cookies or something. I’ll get someone else in here soon as I can to keep you up to date.”
Then he turned to me, his big black boots crunching on the parking lot gravel. “OK, Chapel,” he said. “You’re going to ride in the fire truck. And you’re going to help me find your parents. We’ll find them first so the rescue squad will have one less thing to worry about. C’mon!”
I followed Butch to the big fire truck on the right – he said the other one was a “tanker” that was just for hauling extra water. “This truck is 20 years old,” he said, climbing inside and patting the dashboard proudly. “But it’ll get us there.”
I sat right beside him in the passenger seat. Mom and Dad never let me sit up front, but Butch didn’t seem to mind. The fire department’s see-through garage door opened automatically. Butch flipped some switches, turned a key and the truck zipped out, siren blaring. I glanced back and saw Salem holding the door that led inside the firehouse for Miss Swann, who was holding Georgia in her arms. Georgia was looking back at me, waving. I could see her lips mouthing the word “Bye-bye.”
“You were lucky I was here,” Butch said. “This is an all-volunteer fire department, and we don’t always have someone in here on holidays. We just carry pagers. I had hidden some presents near the fire truck for my kids, though – they are always snooping around the house – and I’d stopped in to get them before we had Christmas dinner.”
In the fire truck, I told Butch our story. He turned off the siren once we got on the deserted road and listened while he drove, although sometimes I had to stop talking because he kept getting back on the rad
io to talk to other people. I got the idea that a lot of people were going to be on Davis Church Road before long. The road to nowhere would be filled up.
Butch asked me about directions and distances a few times, and I guessed as best I could. He asked me if I thought my parents were warm enough and if we had left them anything to drink and whether either one of them could talk when we had gone. I felt proud when he said it sounded like we had done a good job trying to cover them up and putting the water nearby. But I could tell he was worried about finding the van. All I knew for sure was that it was going to be a few miles after we passed Miss Swann’s house.
“OK, Chapel,” he said just after we went by Miss Swann’s house on our left. “You’re really going to have to guide me from here.”
I started to worry. What if I couldn’t find the van? We were so close now! But there had been new snow since then that may have covered the tire tracks. It would be terrible if we just kept driving up and down this road, wasting precious time.
We went past the abandoned mobile home where he had spent the night a few minutes later. None of this seemed nearly as far apart as it had when we were walking it, one step at a time.
“It can’t be much further than this, can it?” Butch said, slowing the truck down considerably. “You four couldn’t have gone much longer – not with that baby and the 5-year-old.”
“But we did,” I insisted. “That’s where we spent the night, but we walked almost five hours before we got there. I was guessing in my head it would be seven more miles.”
Butch checked the thing on the car dashboard that tells you how many miles you’ve gone. “I don’t think it could possibly be that long,” he said. “But we’ll know soon.”
The next 10 minutes crawled by. We both kept turning our heads back and forth, trying to see down in the ditches on each side of the road. I knew the wreck had been on the right side when we had it – so that would be our left side now – but I could tell Butch didn’t quite believe me on that. He kept swiveling his head from one side to the other, like the barn owl at the Raptor Center where we like to go to in Charlotte.