“Wouldn’t miss it, Lee.”
“At the con you debuted your new book, Lines of Sight: A New Perspective on the Construction and Meaning of the Lines of Nazca, and What It Means for Us Today. How have you been received with these new theories?”
“Lee, the response has been overwhelming. I can’t tell you how many letters, emails, tweets, and even telegrams I’ve gotten from supporters.”
“Now, you spent a lot of time in the field while doing the research for this book.”
“Six trips to Peru in as many years, Lee. I made thirty flights over the lines and many overland visits. We’re still waiting to get special dispensation from the Peruvian government and UNESCO to do more accurate surveys.”
“For those who haven’t read the book, can you give us a brief synopsis of your theories?”
“Absolutely. Reiche believes that the lines and figures were entirely the creation of the Nazca people as a religious astronomical calendar. And of course von Daniken theorizes that the lines were a landing field for ancient astronauts. I fall somewhere in between. The problem, Lee, is that the figures and lines don’t correlate with anything we know in our own sky, even when we roll back the star positions a few thousand years. Nor do the figures correlate well with the common religious imagery of the Andean tribes at that time.”
“That leaves us with a bit of a mystery, doesn’t it?”
“I postulate that the lines are actually a map, created by the Nazca people at the direction of extraterrestrial visitors. It’s not a map reflecting the sky of Earth, but the sky of the visitors’ home world. The lines are meant to orient and provide spatial coordinates. The figures are constellations seen in that other sky, but rendered as local animals as a mnemonic device.”
“So it’s your assertion that if we locate these constellations, it will reveal the visitors’ home.”
“Exactly. I’m working on a computer program that will…”
~ * * * ~
Thank you for stopping at Lockwood Town Pump Conoco.
Step 1: Select Pay at Pump/Credit or Pay Inside/Cash.
Step 2: Swipe card.
Credit, Debit, or Fleet Card? Enter fleet card PIN.
Would you like a receipt? Y/N
Would you like a car wash? Y/N
Step 3: Select grade.
85.5 Regular Unleaded
88 Mid-Grade Silver Unleaded
91 Premium Platinum Unleaded
Step 4: Lift handle.
Step 5: Begin fueling. No smoking. Do not top off. Report spills to attendant.
A little after five in the morning a few weeks later, a familiar Lincoln Town Car floated into the gas station. The driver’s-side window rolled down. “Yo, Screw Man, I got one of your nails in my tire,” Jeffrey called. He got out and swiped his card in the opposite pump.
“Morning, Jeffrey,” Martin said with a yawn.
Jeffrey set the nozzle in his ride. “You working Billings today?” he asked.
“No, I gotta do Columbus, Absarokee, Red Lodge, Joliet, Bridger, and maybe Laurel if I can get there.”
“That’s a lot for you, isn’t it?”
Martin rolled his eyes. “Company’s pushing me on expenses.”
“Sorry, man. Too bad. I’m heading up to Molt for lunch. That café up there. Have you been?” Martin shook his head. “Great place. Hey, how’d it go with that Brixton chick? You talk to her?” Martin gave Jeffrey a sour look. “Sorry, I shouldn’t pry.”
Martin watched his expense dollars drain away into his deep and thirsty tank. If he called a couple of accounts and arranged to come in over the weekend, he could probably swing lunch with Jeffrey. And Rick could bite him. “What time are you going to lunch?” he asked.
~ * * * ~
The waitress should have been pledging a sorority rather than taking orders at a quaint café in an old general store with nothing but high prairie for miles around. She set their meals down with a smile and spun on the spot to take the order of a couple at the next table.
“Looks good, no?” asked Jeffrey. He indicated the waitress’s jeans and winked.
“And here I planned to scarf down a Subway sandwich on the road,” said Martin, keeping his eyes on his food.
Martin was about halfway through his meal when Jeffrey asked, “Why don’t you tell me what’s on your mind?”
“Is it that obvious?” asked Martin.
“You look like you’ve been carrying that truck around on your back,” said Jeffrey.
“I’m thinking of getting out. Company’s pushing for more and more with less and less. I work seven days a week. I spend more than forty hours a week in that truck.”
“I thought you enjoyed it, especially with Lee Danvers there all the time,” said Jeffrey.
“I’m being serious,” said Martin. “I don’t know if I can keep doing this, but I also don’t know what else I’d do. I’d love to get on with a bigger company, something with a little more recognition than FastNCo., but the job market now scares me to death. And this whole thing with Cheryl up in Brixton has gotten me thinking. I don’t even have time in my life for her. All I have time to do is work. And for what? To pay for the crappy apartment I never sleep in? To afford the two-week vacation I don’t take so I can make bonus? To make the payment on the Subaru I never drive? What can I offer her that’s anything like a normal relationship?”
“You own a Subaru?” asked Jeffrey.
“How do you do it?”
“Who says I do?” said Jeffrey. “Maybe I’m just as angst-ridden as you.”
“You seem to have it all together,” said Martin.
“It’s my naturally cool demeanor,” said Jeffrey. “Plus, I’m a workaholic.”
“Have you heard of any openings anywhere?”
“What makes you think another company is going to be any better?” Jeffrey asked. “I’m getting all kinds of pressure from the head office now. The grass isn’t going to be greener anywhere else, just a different shade of brown.”
Martin sighed. “I gotta do something. One of these days I’m going to hit a deer, or go sliding off in a snowstorm, and I’m going to die out on these roads. And for what? So FastNCo. can meet analyst expectations for the third quarter earnings reports?”
“You’re not going to die,” said Jeffrey. “Stop being depressing. I’m trying to enjoy my catfish.”
“Sorry. I’m definitely going to start searching for a new job.”
“I’ll keep my ear to the ground for you,” said Jeffrey.
Martin shifted in his seat. He couldn’t believe he’d poured all that out in front of Jeffrey. How did it come to be that his best friend in the world, his only confidante, was a smarmy candy salesman he met around the state a couple of times a month? He didn’t know his neighbors. All his high school and college friends were off having lives with wives and kids, at least according to Facebook. I can’t even get a dog, he thought. I’d be hunted by the ASPCA.
“You still jogging?” Jeffrey asked.
“Not really,” said Martin.
“I suppose we make the time for the stuff we really want to do.”
“Is that meant to be insightful?”
“It’s meant to be an excuse to get dessert,” said Jeffrey, waving to their waitress.
Chapter 4
“But how can we trust the CIA about what’s really going on over in Iran? You know they lied to us about the assassination attempt on the pope in ’83.”
“Did they?”
“Of course they did, Lee. They wanted Pope John Paul II dead because he was reaching out to the Eastern Bloc. The CIA was actively trying to start World War III. That was their job. They couldn’t have the pope preaching peace and understanding to the commies.”
“Do you agree with that, Colonel? Was the CIA involved with the attempt to assassinate the pope?”
“That’s a new one to me, Lee. As far as I’m aware, the CIA never had any active operations targeted against the Vatican or the pope. The pope w
as an outspoken critic of the communists and their treatment of the church in his native Poland. I doubt the CIA would have wanted to do anything to hinder him getting his message out.”
“Thank you, caller. Next up, Charleston, West Virginia. You’re on with Colonel Timothy Mumford, author of The Secret History of the CIA.”
“Wow. Hi, Lee. Longtime sleeper, first time awake.”
“Glad to wake you up. What’s your question for Colonel Mumford?”
“Sure. Um, Colonel, I was wondering about the fact that the Reptoids of the Babylonian Brotherhood have taken control of the CIA in order to bring the United States into the New World Order, and if your access to the archives gave you any additional insight into this?”
A car had pulled over on the side of the road, hood open, with its flashers blinking red into the night. Martin moved into the other lane to pass, as FastNCo. policy forbid him from offering roadside assistance in the company truck. Then he caught a glimpse of a red hoodie by the front bumper. He slammed on the brakes and caught his makeshift radio before it slid off the seat. In the back, the full load of fasteners shifted noisily.
“…when George H. W. Bush became president, but that didn’t materialize. The archive referenced several documents, but I wasn’t able to loc…” Martin turned off the radio. The person in his side mirror was definitely wearing a red sweatshirt, but was it her? Now that he’d stopped, he couldn’t just drive off. He levered his truck into reverse.
He stopped twenty yards away. The truck’s exhaust billowed into the dim extent of the stranded car’s headlights. The roadside at night felt like an alien world, something meant to be streamed by at seventy-five miles per hour. He shouldn’t have been walking along the corroding edge of the asphalt. He shouldn’t have been able to see individual tufts of grass. He shouldn’t have been able to touch a reflector post. The insects should have been splats on his windshield, not noisy, living things, drawn by the light.
“You need help?” he called.
“There’s no cell coverage out here,” she called back. Cheryl. Not at the store, not at the motel. But out here. Martin checked his own phone. Not only were there no bars, but the phone helpfully added, “No Service.”
“Me neither,” said Martin.
“It’d been making a funny noise for a while,” said Cheryl. “Then I came around the curve there, and it made this horrible sound, then just stopped wanting to go. The engine revs, but it doesn’t drive.”
“Hate to say it, but it sounds like a transmission problem,” said Martin, wondering if he’d oversold his masculinity. “But you probably shouldn’t take my word for it.”
Cheryl sighed. She lifted the hood, took out the brace, and snapped it carefully back into place. Then she let the hood down easily, letting it drop only the last couple of inches. “Poor little thing,” she said, putting a hand on her white Pontiac Grand Am. “I suppose I need a ride. Do you mind?”
Martin thought in mumbles and sputters but somehow managed to say, “No problem.”
“I need to bring a few things,” she said. She popped the trunk. A dozen green oxygen tanks had been laid out on towels. “I have to go to the clinic over in Lewistown to have them filled every couple of weeks,” she said. They loaded them into the back of his truck.
Martin invited Cheryl into the cab, in flagrant violation of FastNCo.’s policy. Only the plywood radio box separated them. If he drove his usual five miles over the speed limit, they’d be in Brixton in twenty minutes. He set the cruise control for a safe and legal pace.
“I’m glad it was you, and not some stranger,” said Cheryl. “Are you staying in Brixton tonight?”
“Yeah.”
“You can just take me to the motel, then.”
“I’ll take you home,” said Martin. “It’s no problem. How’s your stepfather?”
Cheryl sighed. “So stubborn. I’ve tried everything to get him to go down to Billings and get checked out by real doctors.”
“But he won’t go?”
“Says it won’t do any good,” said Cheryl. “I’ve spent so much time on WebMD, they should give me a medical degree.”
“He’s lucky to have you around,” Martin said, instantly regretting it. But Cheryl didn’t seem to take it as any sort of double entendre.
“Yes. He is,” she said.
“How’s Lester doing? Has he upgraded that mechanical till to a computer yet?”
“Are you kidding?” said Cheryl. She began to dig in her purse, a cloth thing hung around her neck and shoulder. Oh my god, she’s looking for pepper spray, Martin thought. Or a taser. Cheryl popped the lid off a tube of ChapStick and quickly smeared a bit on both lips. She snapped the lid back on and zipped her purse closed. Martin felt as if she had tased him, but he had no time to sort out the implications of her lip moisture. She poked at the plywood box with her elbow. “What’s this thing?”
“Satellite radio,” said Martin. “Company won’t let me install the upgrade, so I had to make do.” Don’t ask me what I listen to, Martin prayed. Don’t ask me what I listen to.
“What do you listen to?”
“Talk, mostly.”
“Stewart listens to Beyond Insomnia religiously,” said Cheryl.
“Who? Oh, your stepfather?”
“You ever listen to it?”
“Will you hold it against me if I say yes?” asked Martin.
“As long as you don’t believe all the crap.”
“I take it you don’t.”
“If even half of the stuff were true, we’d all be neck deep in weirdness. And that Lee Danvers, you can tell he’s laughing all the way to the bank.”
“He’s always said he’s a skeptic,” said Martin.
“Skeptic. Don’t give me that,” said Cheryl. “And Stewart buys anything that man advertises, like a sucker.”
Garmin GPS, national sponsor. The caffeine pills in the ashtray, frequent advertiser. The wind-up emergency radio behind the passenger seat, Lee Danvers recommended. The shake-up LED flashlight in the glove compartment, no Waker should be without one. Had she noticed? “It’s a funny show,” Martin offered. “And Lee’s one of the last guys who really knows how to do radio, you know?”
“The fastener guy before you, he definitely belonged in the tinfoil hat crowd. He’d come in talking about conspiracies. The guv’ment’s out to get us. Lester told him off one day. You came along a couple months after that.”
That had been five years ago. That meant that Cheryl had registered his presence, had mentally tied it to a positive, albeit inconsequential, change in her life. And in those five years, he’d managed to become “not some stranger,” but a regular and slightly welcome presence.
“No tinfoil hat for me,” said Martin. “I want them to read my thoughts.”
Cheryl smiled at this, and laughed briefly. And then after a silence, she asked, “How much do you think a transmission repair costs?”
About a mile south of the co-op, before the pavement ran out, a tiny cluster of lit windows and porch lights appeared amid the black fields. Cheryl had Martin rumble across a cattle guard into a gravel court of about a dozen mobile homes and pull into the third driveway on the left, behind a beat-up Buick Skylark.
As Martin got out, the door of the trailer opened, and a large, hunched form filled the aperture.
“What’s going on?” the man called in a gravelly voice, and then coughed.
“I’m fine, Stewart,” said Cheryl. “The car broke down. Martin Wells picked me up and drove me into town.”
“FastNCo.?” Stewart asked, leaning over the rail of the little porch of untreated lumber. Martin stepped into the light so Stewart could see him. After a strained breath, Stewart greeted him with a begrudging nod.
“Hello, sir. The car’s about twenty minutes west, up 15,” said Martin.
“I’ll call Hank, get his rig rolling,” said Stewart.
Martin helped Cheryl carry the tanks into the trailer. Stewart had settled into an ancient plaid r
ecliner with a phone pressed to his ear. On a table beside the chair, among magazines and newspapers, a portable radio played Beyond Insomnia. The TV flickered a detective show, muted.
“Why didn’t you do the dishes, Stewart? Or take out the trash?” said Cheryl. She tutted over the empty Keystone Light cans on the kitchen table as she took the last of the tanks from Martin.
“Thank you again. Can I give you some money for gas?” she asked, following him out.
“No, no. It all goes on an expense report,” he said.
“Okay,” she said.
“Good luck with your car,” he said.
The truck was idling, but he’d never wanted to get into the cab less than he did at that moment. “Cheryl?” he heard himself say. He stepped back into the porch light. “I know this is kind of out of the blue, but I wondered if I could take you out sometime.” He almost said more but found the sense to keep it simple, mature even, wrapped in some shred of confidence.
“That’s very sweet,” she said, “but I don’t think it would be a good idea.” She wagged a thumb behind her, but whether she meant to indicate her mobile home, her stepfather, or her life in general, Martin couldn’t say.
“Okay,” he replied.
“I’m sorry. Thanks again, though,” she said, and left Martin alone in the driveway.
~ * * * ~
Wake Up to the Perfect GOLDEN SUNRISE(TM) Waffle and the Woman Who Rejected You But Still Made You Breakfast!
Step 1: Eschew self-pity in favor of masculine self-confidence.
Step 2: Fill cup to line with GOLDEN SUNRISE(TM) waffle batter as if nothing were awkward or amiss.
Step 3: Don’t ask for GOLDEN SUNRISE(TM) Griddle Spray, which doesn’t seem to have made its way to the counter this morning. Trust that your waffle will peel right off the residue of a thousand previous waffles.
Step 4: Pour batter evenly onto griddle.
Step 5: Close griddle and Flip! Feel white-hot presence of woman dropping individual yogurts into bowl of ice!
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