The Driver

by Alexander Roy

  OK HP MOB MISC: “—where the hell did that guy go?”

  “Maher, I might not beat you on the track, but I know how to do this.”

  “Yeah, you do.”

  We shook hands.

  “Cowbell Ground, The Weis here. Juan Nueve, the Captain, and Robin have all voted. Four out of four cross-country-race air-recon crew guys agree…that shouldn’t have worked.”

  “Dave, how come you can drive like that for seven hours and no one calls, and I do it for three minutes and—”

  “Because I’m Irish.”

  “If we make it, I’ll buy you a lifetime supply of Lucky Charms, and”—I cycled through the driver’s Garmin screens—“you were right. We only lost two minutes back there.”

  “I’ll make it up.”

  “Good. Save your energy. That storm means we’re going to have a blistering run at the end. I’ll take it up a level in a minute, make a run for Texas, and then really pick up the pace. Get on the horn with J.F. and let’s get the storm update.”

  OK HP DSPTCH: “—can you confirm not same blue BMW with antennas as last—”

  I tried not to laugh. It was surreal. PolizeiAir zigzagging over the interstate. The scanner. Maher not spotting, but typing.

  “You know, Alex, we still have a pretty decent credit. It would suck to lose it all in New Mexico and come in at 32:08. Screw it: 32:06. Even 31:08. Nobody would believe us. Not even with the movie.”

  “Thirty-one-oh-seven. Or it doesn’t count. Thirty-one-oh-seven.”

  “Or better!” Cory called out from the back.

  “Alex, where do you think we are timewise? How much credit do you think we have?”

  “Before, you thought checking the projections was a bad idea. You said it was best to just drive flat out at every opportunity. Even if we knew for sure, if we were really running out of time, I’d be really surprised if you could drive any faster.”

  “You’re right, but if the average is falling, that would be some incentive to hammer down. I’ll text J.F. and see what he says.”

  “Well, we’ve got three GPS’s up here, and all three estimates are slightly different.” I tapped the driver’s Garmin. “This one says 30:30. Factor in the storm, call it 31:30. All we need is 31:07.”

  “I want 31.” Maher lifted the buzzing phone and stared at the display. “J.F. says heavy rains New Mexico, storm intensifying. We’re gonna have to—”

  “Attack the storm.”

  CHAPTER 36

  Countdown

  We missed the last fuel stop. The final driver swap. The stage I’d trained for far beyond Maher’s ability to master it on his first attempt.

  The trip computer estimated our range at 151 miles, then 93, then 104.

  According to the Garmin, the next station, in Barstow, California, was 145.

  Neither of us spoke. We’d trusted the BMW trip computer before, and we’d run out of gas. Together. In this car. But this time there was no one to call.

  We no longer knew if any of it mattered, because we could no longer do the math.

  Although it appeared to be Maher’s fault, I was quite sure it was mine. I couldn’t be sure, because although I was not yet hallucinating, Maher had just asked if I, too, saw stars ahead. I did, and said so, and thanked God it was true, because it was the third time he’d asked.

  We’d been driving for 28 hours. I still thought we could make it. Maher did not. But we couldn’t prove or even debate it, because the inter-Garmin discrepancy was too great, and our multiple watches and clocks were set to different time zones. I remained optimistic for the strangest reason, however. I had been through this before, with Nine, and achieved an incredible 34:46 without any psychological conditioning, or even expectations. The lessons of 3446 were many, among them that we had begun slurring our words somewhere in Arizona.

  Maher and I were far better prepared and motivated, and we had only just begun drawing out our words, and the gaps between them, and we were 11 miles past the California border.

  Two hundred seventy treacherous miles remained.

  We’d all but given up trying to spot, because the thermals no longer worked.

  If only we didn’t run out of gas—

  APPROXIMATELY 10 HOURS EARLIER

  CENTRAL TEXAS

  I’d kept it secret from him, but in the immediate wake of our Oklahoma escape, I gloated. Had he been driving, had I followed his advice, the run would have ended. But Maher hadn’t seen it is a sign. His praise had been merely that, for J.F.’s increasingly frantic storm warnings only elevated Maher’s determination. When spotting, my remarks were confined to “cop,” but Maher became my first-ever copilot to call me slow.

  I had the eleventh fastest time cross-country. I’d set the world record for crossing nearly half the country—NYC to Oklahoma’s Will Rogers Turnpike Toll Plaza—1,287 miles in 14 hours and 23 minutes, broken only when Maher and I crushed it in 13:48 earlier that day. I had exceeded every projection on the driveplan, beaten Yates/Gurney, Heinz/Yarborough, and Diem/Turner, and yet, as the skies turned gray over Texas, I realized Maher was right. My record-setting first stage had been too slow. I’d been complacent. The driveplan targets were too low. I’d only factored for one moderate storm, one Oklahoma-level crisis, and moderate traffic.

  If anything went wrong, I was the one with no plan.

  So I did as told, freed of a plan that was once a ceiling, yet now a floor. The memory of endless calculations and logic and choices faded as quickly as the indistinguishable terrain blurring on both sides. I accelerated into the gray cloud obscuring the plain ahead, thundering rain suddenly spattering our roof like marbles on tin. I double-flashed cars in the passing lane a half mile ahead, passing at a differential of 30, then 40 mph, until even Maher, audibly cursing the storm’s diminution of our average, nearly choked upon having to tell me to slow down. By the time we approached New Mexico, despite all my efforts, our average fell to 88 mph.

  Maher placed no blame. He’d feared this all along. It’s what drove him. It was why he drove as he did.

  Finally, after 1,776 miles, we understood each other. I prayed it wasn’t too late.

  He became fixated on the two Garmins beside his left knee. Their projections were close, but with every power interruption or satellite-obscuring storm, they grew more disparate. Were this Gumball, I would have suggested calling technical support.

  I didn’t want to know. I had already leaped beyond what I thought myself capable of. I was terrified of what I might do out of desperation.

  “Alex, all these times and averages you’ve been throwing out, how sure are you?”

  “J.F. and I made a spreadsheet. He’s got one, and I know it pretty well.”

  “What do we need to break 32:07?”

  “With 30 minutes of stops…88 and change?

  “And 31:07?”

  “Ninety-one point five? I think.”

  The storm worsened. Our overall average fell to 87.9—32 hours, 21 minutes.

  PolizeiAir did their best to encourage the rare 130 mph sprint, but heavy cloud cover forced them off our path with increasing frequency. I got our average back up to 89, then 90, then 91, where it stayed until nightfall and our friends’ inevitable departure.

  “Cowbell Ground, Cowbell Ground, we’re all real proud of you boys and girls. We’re out of time, and we’re outta light. Good hunting, drive safe, and we’ll see you in L.A. Don’t be late.”

  It was just light enough to make out the purple-gray clouds through which the plane threaded, diminishing in size with every glimpse I could spare between the sky and road, until they were gone.

  I struggled through rain, traffic, and construction—often at 70 mph or less—to keep our overall average above 91. The slightest hesitation in passing, or 30-second entrapment behind clustered semis, cost as much as a decimal point.

  My hands, now claws, pled to be stretched, massaged, and released from the wheel as frequently as possible, but I didn’t want Maher or Cory to observ
e the first sign of the one enemy, immune to speed or logic, whose encroachment was inevitable.

  I didn’t want them to see my hands shake.

  “Alex. It feels like you’ve been driving forever. How could you stand me taking two legs back-to-back?”

  “Because, Dave…I feel strange telling you. I had a revelation.”

  “What’s up?”

  “I want this more than I need to be the hero.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’ve been team captain, head of Polizei…the main driver, ever since we met. I’d take all the wheel time on this run if I could. On every run…but that’s amateur talk. Safety called for splitting our Driveplan mileage fifty-fifty, and tradition calls for me to take the first and last stages, but if giving you even one more hour means we’ll make it, I mean break it by that much more, that’s what we need to do. That’s what I want to do.”

  “Alex, at this point I don’t think we’re gonna break it at all.”

  “All the more reason, then.”

  “If you want me to take more, I’ll do it, but I don’t think I’ll do much better than you are, not in this mess.”

  “Maher, I’m asking you, and I’m telling you, when I take the wheel at the Cali border, I intend to make a grand gesture.”

  “I sure hope so, because this storm’s throwing our credit out the window.”

  “It’s going to be close, Maher, but I think we’ll make it. Maybe not 31:07, but definitely under 32.”

  “It’s over.” He tapped at the Garmins. “Wake me when we get there.”

  “There is in about five minutes. Gas stop, you’re up.” The phone buzzed. “J.F.?”

  “Who else? More weather ahead. Worse than predicted. Worse than this.”

  We pulled over just south of Grants, New Mexico. I refueled while Maher cleaned the laser jammers and thermal camera, then inspected the tires. He was done two minutes before I would be, and took a well-deserved break to walk out to the edge of the station’s brightly lit pump area. He looked out into the darkness, then turned back to the car, the tension in his eyes and mouth released, his face strangely sad. The pump clicked. I turned to replace the nozzle, but by the time I opened my door he was already in the car, his brow furrowed in deep concentration, hands wrapped around the wheel as if he might break it off its column. In that instant I knew that if ever another cross-country race were held, I would never run against him. Not because he—given a copilot of my expertise—would probably beat me, but because I might beat him. I couldn’t bear it. I was the luckiest man in the world. For the last 21 hours my oldest friends had risked their lives to support my quest. However little they believed in it, they believed in me, and would forgive any failure out of love, but Maher was here to win, and he wouldn’t have come without the same faith in me that I had in him. Of all the reasons I wanted not only to finish, but to break 31:07, I added one more. It was the only way I could repay his trust. I wanted to share with him just one moment on the pier, time card in hand, with four digits that would mark us forever.

  We left the station, driving in silence until Maher blurted, “Are you insane? Now we’re never gonna make it!” I swallowed the half banana I’d bitten off, and offered him the other half. “Duuuuude! Bananas are bad luck!”

  “Sorry. I promise you, we’ll still make it. We won’t fail. We can’t fail.”

  “Alex, just promise me there aren’t any more bananas in the car.”

  “I promise.” That momentarily calmed him down.

  “Thermal check.”

  “Thermals…no cop…but not clear. They’re dirty, or wet.”

  Maher pursed his lips.

  “Dave, pull over. Give me 90 seconds to clean them. Two-minute net loss.”

  “Two minutes we can’t afford.”

  “Two minutes that may buy us 20. Without night vision, we’re done.”

  We stopped. I cleaned them. It made no difference. We lost two more minutes. The weather got worse.

  There was nothing Maher could do. His hands gripped the wheel ever more tightly, his knuckles ghastly white in the glow of the useless thermal display. He let go his right hand, poised to downshift, and I saw his hand shake against the vibrating shift knob. It wasn’t the engine. His shoulders were frozen. He was hunched slightly forward. His face was taut.

  But his driving was flawless. Aggressive, but flawless.

  The weather began to clear in Arizona.

  I informed J.F. of our now 89.2 mph overall average. He must have had the spreadsheet open and waiting, because he responded immediately.

  31:52.

  Traffic thinned out. The desert night’s stars rose, first over the distant mountains, then in a vast twinkling curtain of welcome, whatever our speed, whatever our time.

  After 10 hours, the storms were over.

  Maher’s face hardened, and for the next three hours I watched the Garmins’ satellite-signal reception screens dance, their projections synchronize, and our average climb.

  INTERSTATE 40 WESTBOUND

  APPROACHING NEEDLES, CALIFORNIA

  275 MILES TO SANTA MONICA PIER

  “Final refuel, Dave, first station you see. Closest one.”

  Maher’s final, superhuman stage was over. His terrifying example would be nearly impossible to match, even at my full ability. Whatever happened, I had to know and understand precisely what he had done.

  I already knew how.

  I feared distracting him by cycling through the Garmins’ colorful displays, so with jittery fingers I texted J.F., who responded ever more promptly as we approached the finish line: Miles since update 256/Time Elapsed/2:40, AvgSpd 96.

  Ninety-six mph over 256 miles.

  It was inconceivable, and yet halfway across country, somewhere before the Oklahoma incident, we’d both seen the Garmin display a 95.9 mph overall.

  That Maher had accomplished a 96 mph driving average, on the final night, given his dwindling energy, was…shocking.

  He’d paid a price. He had summoned deep forces to combat the weight of 40 or more waking hours, more than half in a fast-moving car, every second—and even Maher couldn’t conceal his awareness—increasingly fraught with mortal danger. He now spoke in clipped phrases. His eyes blinked.

  But he’d brought our overall overage up, as J.F. pointed out, to 90.1 mph.

  I began counting backward. We’d left New York at 9:26 A.M. (EST). A 31-hour-7-minute Drivetime meant arriving on the Santa Monica Pier at 1:33 A.M (PST). Our ETA was 30 minutes later.

  Raising our average even one mile per hour would require 220 miles of cruising at 110 or more, past Barstow as far as L.A.’s I-10/I-15 interchange. By then it would be too late, for the final 58 miles west across the L.A. basin were among the most heavily patrolled in the nation. CHiPs country…

  “Dave, you just missed the first exit…tons of stations.”

  “Sorry.”

  I was starting to worry. Twenty minutes earlier he’d made a pass bad enough to bump even my danger threshold.

  He missed the second exit. I wondered what he was thinking. I glanced at my Garmins. He missed the third exit. They had stopped syncing, again. But then I knew exactly what he was thinking. And I was willing to bet on it.

  “How do you feel, Dave?”

  “Okay.”

  “If you want to go a little farther, I’m okay with that.”

  “I don’t know. I kinda don’t wanna to press my luck.”

  “But you do also want to press your luck.”

  “I feel capable…and confident, but you know when your body says—”

  We passed another exit, and before we could decide, Needles was behind us.

  “Alex…I am, actually. Tired. How far? To the next one?”

  I cycled down the list. There were none within 20 miles. “Maher. Range?”

  “Just tell me. How far.”

  “One hundred forty-five miles or so. Barstow.”

  What energy he had left, bled out.

 
Maher hadn’t wanted to stop, and I hadn’t wanted to stop him.

  There were no more decisions to make, and nothing to do but count down the miles and minutes until we ran out of gas, for posterity.

  Two hundred seventy miles from the Santa Monica Pier.

  CHEVRON FOOD MART

  BARSTOW, CALIFORNIA

  34°53’14.86” N, 117°01’20.85” W

  131 MILES TO SANTA MONICA PIER

  1205 A.M. (PST) (APPROX)

  By the time we coasted in, fuel wasn’t our biggest problem. Maher was spent. What he earned in Arizona we lost to fatigue, and fatigue-compounding, single-lane construction zones. J.F. texted the Needles–Barstow figures: Miles since update 155, Time Elapsed 1:47, AvgSpd 87.

  The pump clicked. It was too late for the important numbers. I closed my door, Cory hers, Maher his. We no longer slammed them.

  “Alex,” he said as I pulled out. “I’ve done everything I can. It’s in your hands. We need to break it by one hour or none of it matters. I don’t even know if we can. It’s up to you. You need to drive like you’ve never driven.”

  I had to win this battle, tonight. I had volunteers I could never again ask to risk so much, nor would they for so futile a cause.

  It was I who had chosen to fight, selected the field, and marked the target. No one else was here. No one was waiting for me. No one was coming.

  I was at war with myself, and always had been. I, the weaker, would never win until I defeated, consumed, and became the stronger, and I had delayed the end through rationalization. I will try again tomorrow. But now I knew. I didn’t want to come back.

  There was only one way to avoid the compulsive regret of what if.

  Distance, time, traffic, fatigue—nothing was in my favor except a gift I had received over and over, yet had never opened until Maher handed it to me at the Chevron.

  I was responsible. For myself, and those who’d come with me.

  I already had everything in the world money couldn’t buy, except the dignity of having earned it.

  I was at the wheel, but no longer knew who was driving. I wasn’t the man who had left New York some twenty-nine and a half hours earlier. He was a stranger, and so was his mirror on the pier.