Truck Stop

by John Penney

  Nothing. He reached the men’s room and ducked inside.

  Roger raced down the row of stalls, banging them open and looking inside. They were all empty. Roger spun around, catching his breath, his mind racing. Then he took off again for the door.

  He bolted back out into the hallway and ran headlong into Kat. “Hey!” She recoiled, startled.

  “I can’t find her. She’s nowhere around,” Roger panted desperately.

  Kat recovered, took a deep breath, and did her best to remain calm. “Roger, she’s got to be here someplace. She must’ve got out the driver’s side of the car that I couldn’t see. She probably came looking for you on her own and got lost.”

  Roger didn’t hear Kat’s attempt to reassure him. He pushed past her, shoving open the women’s room door. Kat followed him inside.

  Roger raced down the row of stalls, banging them open as he went. “Lilly?” He reached the end. The place was empty. “Fuck! How could she just disappear?”

  Kat approached him, still trying to remain calm. “All right,” she said. “We’ll find her. There’re a lot of places she could be. This is a big place. Let me tell Bart so he can take over in the diner, and I’ll help you look.”

  But Roger wasn’t listening again. He sped out the door. “Roger!” Kat called after him.

  Roger hurried down the long hallway, weaving around the buckets of rainwater. He reached the back door with the small windowpane and shoved it open.

  He stepped outside, scanned the wet darkness, and cupped his hands on either side of his mouth. “LILLY!” he screamed into the cold night.

  The drumming rain swallowed his voice. He looked over at a shadowy junkyard beyond the cyclone fence and yelled for her again. But nothing came back to him. No small cry. No “Daddy, I’m here.” Nothing.

  Roger pressed on, determined. He cut around the side of the truck stop complex to the repair garage.

  A strange, pale flickering light emanated from inside the barn-like metal structure. Roger stepped around to the front of the building; the garage doors were open.

  The mechanic he had met at the gas pumps in front of the diner when he first arrived was seated at a workbench beyond the service bays in back. A black spark shield covered his head, and he was working an arc welder. “Excuse me!” Roger yelled.

  The man didn’t hear him over the crackling and buzzing. Roger stepped through the open doors and carefully made his way across the greasy concrete floor past a large, dangling engine-hoist chain. Boxes of parts and supplies lined the walls, and closed doors led to what must be storage rooms or office space.

  As he grew closer, he could see that the mechanic was welding a crankshaft onto a sculpture made of various discarded engine parts. The sculpture was strangely elegant and almost organic-looking. It seemed alive as it danced and flickered in the smoke and flashing light from the arc welder.

  “Hey!” Roger yelled.

  This time the man stopped but didn’t turn off his welder. He looked up, his black welder’s mask still over his face.

  “I’m looking for my daughter. Seven, brown hair. Have you seen her back here anywhere?” Roger asked.

  The mechanic paused for a moment before shaking his head. Roger waited for something more, but he looked back at his sculpture and resumed his welding. Roger considered pressing the point but thought the better of it.

  He turned away and looked out the open garage doors. The truck wash building loomed nearby.

  Roger ducked back out into the rain and hurried over to the cavernous building. He stepped into the truck wash entrance and peered down the long, shadowy tunnel filled with idle hydraulics. “Lilly?” he yelled.

  Roger made his way down the corridor, past the massive, lifeless brushes and shammies. He paused halfway down, considered the eerie, shadowy tunnel. This was a waste of time. She’d never go in here. Not in a million years.

  Roger deliberated his next move, and that was when he heard it—several truck engines rumbling to life in the parking lot out front.

  __________

  Roger raced around the side of the complex in time to see several trucks clicking on their headlights; their air brakes popped and hissed. The family from the diner was piling into their minivan. Everyone was on the move at once, for some reason.

  Kat appeared at the diner doorway. “Roger!” she called.

  “What’s going on?” Roger asked as he cut over to her.

  “Word just went out that the top of the grade is going to get snowed in. This is the last shot at getting over the pass tonight.”

  Roger watched the row of trucks getting ready to leave. Their occupants were the only remaining witnesses who might have seen something.

  “Shit,” he swore, and took off.

  Kat watched him make a beeline toward the first truck as it headed out to the highway. “Hey! Roger, be careful!”

  Roger waved his arms and cut in front of the first truck as it rumbled toward the on-ramp. The massive beast slammed on its brakes and shuddered to a stop. Roger cut around to the cab and leaped up onto the side step. The annoyed, heavily tattooed driver rolled down his window. “What the fuck are you—?”

  “I’m looking for a little girl. My daughter,” Roger panted as he craned his neck and looked into the cab.

  “I haven’t seen any kids. Now come on, get off my truck,” the driver shot back.

  Roger hopped off the side step, and the truck lurched away with a grinding of gears. Roger cut over to the cab of the second truck in line.

  The grizzled old man behind the wheel already had his window down when Roger leaped up onto the side step. “You outta your fucking mind?” the old guy growled. “You’re gonna get yourself killed!”

  Roger desperately scanned the inside of the cab. “I’m looking for my daughter. She’s brunette, seven—“

  The truck behind them started blasting its horn.

  “I ain’t seen no one,” the old trucker snarled.

  Roger leaped off the side step and raced over to the last truck. But this one didn’t stop. It blasted its horn and kept rolling.

  Roger ran up alongside it, yelling at the wiry 30-something man behind the wheel. “Hey! Hey asshole!” he shouted. But the truck roared out onto the on-ramp, leaving Roger behind in the pouring rain.

  Roger staggered to a stop, catching his breath. He turned and looked back at the parking lot. Four trucks had decided to sit out the storm at the truck stop. One was the cream-colored rig with the pearly finish that belonged to the spiky-haired woman and her son Daniel. Another was the maroon-colored rig that belonged to the amiable favorite-aunt type woman. The third was the beat-up old Mack with the Georgia plates that belonged to the man with the Confederate flag and the guns, and the fourth one….

  Roger wiped the water from his eyes and focused in on the fourth remaining truck. It was the muddy old tanker truck, the truck with the cab he had looked into earlier and seen the gaunt-looking driver with the hollow, sunken eyes staring back.

  Roger cut back across the parking lot, heading straight for the foreboding old tanker. All the lights were off in the cab. He stepped up to the door and knocked.

  Thunder rumbled in the black, wet sky overhead. Roger knocked again. No answer. He climbed up onto the side step and peered into the window. The dark and mud were impervious. He used his hand to try to wipe the mud from the cab’s windows, but it streaked and smeared across the opaque glass.

  Roger gave up and stepped back down. He crossed around the front of the cab, carefully scanning the old truck as he went. There was something out of place about it; it wasn’t kept up like the others. It was as if the driver didn’t care.

  Roger considered his options. If the driver wasn’t inside his truck, then he had to be in the truck stop somewhere. Roger would at least have to track the driver down and question him the way he had the others. One thing was certain; he would have to keep a close eye on this truck.

  Roger turned away and was about to head back to the truck s
top when a flicker of lightning lit up the turbulent sky. Roger hesitated; something caught his eye in the pale glow.

  He looked down at the front wheel well of the tanker truck. Strange, thin, wet strands hung from underneath. Roger kneeled. He reached behind the muddy tire and pulled at one of the strands. It slipped away from the greasy axle. Roger held it close for a better look. It was human hair, clotted with blood and bits of pulpy scalp clinging to the ends.

  Roger swallowed dryly; his heart began to thunder in his chest. He dropped to his hands and knees and looked up under the wheel well. The rainwater dripped down through the oily engine. Roger waited for his eyes to adjust to the new level of darkness, and he saw something else caught up in the struts. It was pale, soft, and irregular, with something dark hanging from it.

  Roger scooted farther under the truck. The closer he got to the hanging object, the more details he could make out. The dark hanging shape was the cuff from a torn pair of jeans, but there was more than just fabric there.

  He squinted as he scooted closer and reached out. The second he touched it, he knew what the fabric contained. Human flesh. Cold, dead. An ankle. A toe. It was a human foot severed at the ankle; the blood was thick and oozing from the tattered flesh.

  Roger withdrew his hand, startled. He wrenched around, started to squirm away on his stomach. He was almost out from underneath when another flicker of lightning flashed overhead, illuminating the greasy undercarriage. A human face was in front of him. It was a head, severed at the shoulders, mutilated and bloody, and it was caught in a corner of the tight space. The body had obviously been ripped away from it.

  Roger cried out, horrified, and the dead eyes on the severed head snapped open and stared right at Roger. Its mouth dropped, oozing blood, and it began gurgling in desperate pain, “Hel…help me….“

  Roger froze in horror at the bizarre sight, and he closed his eyes tight. This had to be one of his visions.

  He remained for a moment with his eyes clamped shut; then he took a steady, deep breath. He opened his eyes again. Sure enough, the mutilated head was gone. There was nothing under the truck but engine parts and grease.

  Roger let out a long, steady breath. He reached up, grabbed the outer edge of the fender, and pulled himself out from under the truck. He staggered to his feet.

  WHAP! A hand slapped down on Roger’s shoulder and spun him around.

  Roger came face to face with the gaunt trucker, who was brandishing a heavy lug wrench.

  “What the fuck are you doing under my rig?” the driver asked angrily.

  “Get your hand off me, asshole.” Roger shoved the man’s hand off his shoulder.

  The gaunt trucker lunged back at Roger, cracking him in the ribs with the wrench. Roger smashed back against the fender, clutching his aching side. He looked up and saw the trucker rearing back with the wrench for another swing.

  Roger rolled out of the way just in time. The wrench clanged down onto the fender. The trucker spun around, came for Roger again. This time Roger leaped right at him, tackling him to the wet asphalt. The lug wrench clattered out of the trucker’s hand and went skittering under the engine compartment.

  Roger cracked the trucker across the jaw, shoved him aside. He scrambled over and grabbed the wrench. He was coming up with it when a voice yelled from the darkness, “Freeze! Don’t move!”

  Roger looked up and saw a highway patrolman standing several yards away, with his pistol trained dead on Roger.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Ben Clark, an African-American highway patrolman in his mid-30s, sat at a corner booth across from Roger and Kat. He had surprised even himself at how patient he had been for the last forty minutes. First, he had managed to diffuse the conflict outside with Roger and the trucker, then he had separated them, and now he was focusing on Roger’s long, twisting story.

  Ben prided himself on withholding judgment until he had all the facts in front of him. He knew that most of his buddies in law enforcement claimed that they did this, but in the end they were only human, and they usually judged people on what they looked like and how they acted; Ben had seen it happen a million times.

  Roger had looked like trouble with his rocker tattoos, hair, and clothes, but Ben had soon discovered that Roger was just a frightened father who had lost his daughter. Ben couldn’t help but sympathize; he would be out of his mind if he had lost sight of his little boy for as long as Roger had been missing Lilly. So, Ben had taken things a step at a time, and now he was trying to get everything written down as accurately as possible.

  For his part, Roger was doing everything he could to hold it together. He looked anxiously out the window at the old tanker truck as he relayed his side of things. “I saw him after I went to the bathroom,” he said. “He knew I left Lilly in the car. I’m telling you, that creep out there is the one you should be talking to.”

  Ben looked up from his notepad. “I’ll get to him, don’t worry. He’s not going anywhere.” He gestured to the trucker’s keys on the table next to him, then looked over at Kat. “So, the entire time Roger was gone, you didn’t see anyone come near his car?”

  “No one.”

  “And you watched it the whole time?”

  Kat took an anxious breath and nodded, but it was getting harder every time she went over it. After all, it had been her responsibility all along. No one had come out and blamed her for anything, but it didn’t matter. The guilt had been nagging at her, and now she felt it was about to overwhelm her. “I mean it was raining pretty hard. I guess it’s possible I….” She trailed off, feeling nauseated, then took a breath and forced herself to say what had probably been obvious all along. “I might have missed Lilly getting out, or even someone coming up to the car.”

  Kat trailed off into silence. There. She had said it herself. She had thought that it might be better this way, but it wasn’t. She felt sick about it. Lilly had probably left the car while it was her responsibility to watch it, and now she was missing. Kat looked down, unable to look in Roger’s direction. She didn’t have to see the expression on his face to know what he was feeling.

  Ben referred to his notes to find a name Roger had mentioned earlier. “Zoe. Your ex-wife,” he said to Roger.

  “What about her?”

  “You said you picked your daughter up from her house in Las Vegas. Why was she there if you have sole custody?”

  A simple question, but Roger felt an old familiar feeling creep up on him. It was the nagging guilt that had colored his entire life. “I…I didn’t have a choice. I had a gig in L.A., and I couldn’t take her with me.”

  “And you don’t think there’s any chance Zoe could have followed you here and taken your daughter?”

  Roger shook his head. “Zoe? No way. She doesn’t want anything to do with my daughter. She’s in love with her pipe. That’s pretty much what you get when you meet your wife in rehab.” As soon as the bitter words were out of his mouth, Roger felt awkward. Could he sum up such an important part of his life so quickly and callously? He used to think it was so much more complex.

  Roger had loved Zoe when they met. They had connected. Not just through the shared misery of dependency, but through a shared desire to get better. They had found strength together, and Roger began to believe that that strength was going to be enough to turn things around. Of course, it hadn’t been. Not for her. Not for Zoe.

  Ben referred to his notes again for another question. “What about this boyfriend of hers, Jack Murphy?”

  Roger felt a deeper pain stab into him this time. His whole life was being dragged out and put on an autopsy table in front of him. The God’s truth was that Jack was a motherfucker. At first, Roger had held out hope that Zoe would turn things around for herself, but then she met Jack. Jack the dealer. The crackhead who thought he was a gangster because he got his shit from some low-level mob connection in Vegas. So how much of this do I try to explain? Roger thought. He decided to downplay it. “Look, they’re both users, and they’re both ser
iously messed up,” he said.

  Roger looked at Ben then and saw the officer looking at him a bit differently. It wasn’t the look of a cop. It was the look of a father. It hit Roger then how fucked up his entire life was. “Okay, I know. I shouldn’t have left Lilly there, but I didn’t have a choice. Anyway, she was fine when I picked her up.” He didn’t mention the fact that Lilly had been waiting for him by herself, with no sign of any adult presence save the lights and the television.

  Ben considered this. It was times like this when he found it hard not to pass judgment. He managed to let it go, and he looked back down at his notes. “All right, I think I’ve got everything here. I’m going to go ahead and issue an Amber Alert on your daughter. We’ve had a lot of luck finding missing children with the system in the past.”

  “A lot? This happens a lot?”

  Ben flipped his notepad closed and tucked it in his jacket. “The sad truth is, it’s not that unusual for people to go missing out here. It’s a transient world on the Interstates. People come and go.” Ben stood up, saw the concern on Roger and Kat’s faces, and added, “But like I said, she hasn’t been missing long, and we’ve had a lot of luck using the Amber Alert system.”

  Ben grabbed his hat and turned to leave, but then he remembered another question. “What exactly did you see under the truck out there?” he asked Roger.

  The seemingly innocent question hung in the air for a moment. Roger felt Kat’s eyes on him, and he looked over at her. She had been careful in her answers to Ben’s questions. She had not mentioned the joint they had smoked together or anything about their conversation about his “gift.”

  Roger considered his answer. He knew the creepy bastard out there was guilty. Very guilty. But Roger couldn’t tell Ben exactly how he knew. He couldn’t tell Ben that every time he had an encounter with the other side, it was always at the place where someone had lost his or her life. In this case, someone had been run over by that truck. Sure, maybe it was years ago and someone else was driving, but Roger doubted it. He had a feeling about that creepy asshole, and usually his feelings were right.