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"Truckin"


Chapter 1
Truckin

By Wayne Fowler

Read the 1st chapter of "Ol' Silver and Red" at the end of this 'Truckin" chapter.
 
This is a deviation from both Ohmie, and Ben Persons. You might call it a descriptive rant born of driving frustrations.
 
1
 
 “All I can say, Dude, is to get on some of the forums and then check out, you know, whoever seems like they could do it. But good luck. But I think you should just move. Like to the country, or somethin’, away from your noisy neighborhood.”

 Clyde left the Dr. Geek shop no more disappointed than after his several other unsuccessful attempts to find an innovative electronic wiz, someone who could put together spare parts to come up with a device capable of stopping a truck, and simultaneously any of a trucker’s communication devices. He'd been using a fake story of wanting to shut down a neighbor's noise.

 “Not possible, Man.” “No way, Dude.” “Too much movies.” The responses from the electronic shops had become predictable.

 By the time Clyde decided that the forum suggestion was his best hope, he’d realized how stupid he’d been, in any case. Any one of the geeks could probably describe him. “Yes, Officer, he was about sixty, maybe sixty-five. Five foot nine, or so, about a hunnerd and sixty pounds, brown hair, no make that mostly gray, but a lot of forehead. Glasses… Oh, he looked a bit like Steven Spielberg.”

 Yeah. Nothing to do about that now, except to figure out a disguise and to be more careful. But first, to do as much research as possible. And then to find someone through a network forum.

 His goal – to lay up diesel trucks as efficiently as possible with the least peripheral or collateral damage as possible. How to ray gun, or stun gun in the more modern vernacular, and also to be able to drive away clean. He didn’t want to blow them up, or to cause collisions, just to disable them long enough to really, really aggravate the driver and his boss. He would take out his revenge against the entire industry. And Jane Ann would be avenged.

 Another consideration of equal import was that the device not also incapacitate his own vehicle. That would be awkward.

2

 “Retired, Darlin’,” Clyde said over the sixties rock-n-roll song playing on their favorite satellite radio station.

 Clyde and his wife, Jane Ann were on one of their many road trips, jaunts to famous hiking places, or simply unique adventures. It was months previous to Clyde’s search for a ray gun.

 Jane Ann’s smile said everything. Turning off the music, she turned to him, “I love you!”
 
 His smile said everything. After the briefest pause, he exclaimed, “Rocky Mountains in ten hours. Only one hour at seven hundred miles an hour.”

Jane Ann gave him one of her locally famous, within their nine-year marriage, in any event, straight-faced emoticon expressions and then replied, “You know, this whole last year, I didn’t really feel retired until you sold that trailer park.”

Clyde glanced at her, allowing her thoughts to develop.

“I know it had meant a lot to you. Your baby, and all, but…”
 
 “It was stressful, I’ll admit.” He well knew that it was not the reason Jane Ann had married him, almost being a deal-breaker. But she never pressed him to sell, even helped out as she could. Selling was his idea, putting it on the market the moment an unsolicited buyer made inquiries and then backed out. Getting so close to an offer teased visions of retirement travel with his late-in-life marriage to Jane Ann, a dream he’d never dared harbor.

Jane Ann had awaited Clyde’s response. “I’m sorry you didn’t get what you were hoping. I’ll make it up to you by never asking for diamonds, or ordering anything but the dollar menu, or the child’s plate.” Her eyes conveyed both humor and sincerity.

“I love you, my beautiful bride!”

“You’re the cute one.” Her customary, but heartfelt retort. “But I know you took the offer because of me. You’d still own it if not for me.”

“I’d rather have you. And have you happy.” After a pause, he added, “That didn’t sound just right. Not the way I mean. The trailer park served its purpose. We’re ready to move on. And the way we live, waterfall hikes for entertainment, free hotel breakfasts, popcorn suppers and kisses for dessert, we’ll be fine.”

Jane Ann knew that they would be.

Colorado was their dream, not a dream but more like their plan, their ever-on-the-top-of-the-bucket-list item. They’d both seen Colorado before, in their past lives, but they wanted very much to share the grandeur, hike the trails, and see the sights. And before the week was out, they had – mountain peaks and ranges, wild mountain streams and waterfalls, elk, moose, deer, even a bear and mountain lions, creatures they’d only dreamed of witnessing in the wild.

Their drive home was punctuated with singing along with their favorite tunes and making plans for their next adventure. Once home long enough to see family, attend to aging Mom’s needs, and tend to the house for chores and such, it would be off to a VRBO, a vacation rental on the beach. Beachfront living nearly tied for first place favorite destinations. It would be Clyde’s first VRBO/resort experience, previously always traveling more on the cheap. Jane Ann booked the beachfront property regularly favored by her extended family, knowing that it would suit her and her Prince Charming. It did.

That next winter, they luxuriated in a hot tub on the deck of a rented Ozark Mountain cabin, the snow on their heads alternating with the splendor of a star-filled sky, nearly competing with the majesty of the New Mexico and Colorado starscapes. Clyde and Jane Ann were in love, in love with one another, and in love with adventures, but mostly with one another, since even the most simple of activities solicited opportunities for expressions of their love and affection.

After a few winter months at home, the time spent largely editing photos for their many albums, and each working on their various writing projects: short stories, self-published, or never-published novels, or contest entries of which they’d both scored occasional wins. Their love waned not the slightest. Clyde wrote corny faux sonnets that delighted Jane Ann who kept her true criticisms to herself. One such, They Met at the Salad Bar, was a tribute to their whirlwind romance and marriage within five minutes of introduction. Well, that’s another thing – they both reveled in hyperbole.

Another trip to the west – Clyde’s project, the fulfillment of a bucket list to see the Rockies in all their glorious jeweled splendor – crowned and covered in snow.

On one of the first long, up-hill climbs just inside the state of New Mexico on I-40, Clyde was the first to extoll “Truckers’ Prison”, assigning the bad-driving trucker to the netherworld prison that Clyde and Jane Ann concocted as a means to deal with the many misbehaving truck drivers they’d encountered over the miles of their touring. They were in full agreement that the old Knights-of-the-Road were creatures of the past – extinct. The modern breed of trucker, as far as they could tell, were inconsiderate to say the least, and dangerous at worst. Clyde had, over the years, as had most every other four-wheeler driver, as referred to by truckers, learned to expect the worst. He’d learned to expect that they would cut a car off, pulling in front of it at the last moment to attempt a six-county-long pass of another truck traveling a half-a-mile-per-hour slower, sometimes not slower at all once hitting the previously blocked headwind. This trucker well deserved his stint in Clyde and Jane Ann’s Truckers’ Prison, not only taking an exorbitant time to pass but then taking forever to pull back into the right lane. Finally, presuming that the trucker’s goal was to remain in the passing lane to pass another, far-distant truck or motorhome, Clyde signaled and turned into the right lane, intending to pass on the right. Determining that the truck was, indeed, bent on remaining in the passing lane, another truck ahead about a half mile in the right lane, Clyde accelerated to pass.

This particular truck was designed with a low window at the front bottom of the passenger door. Clyde glimpsed through the window at the driver, Santa Claus without the red suit or spectacles, his beard a dirty gray instead of shining white, a baseball cap instead of a red, fur-lined, and ribbed hat. The trucker suddenly swerved to the right, a shocked look in his eyes as his head turned to the window a half-second after his hands had turned the steering wheel. Jerking to the right, slamming on his breaks, correcting, re-hitting his brakes, Clyde avoided a major collision. The first truck that both Clyde and Santa Claus passed was able to change lanes left and miss both Clyde and Jane Ann and the wayward trucker, who eventually stopped a quarter mile on, a day late deciding not to simply keep driving. (hyperbole here)

Clyde’s evasive action prevented a wreck, other than two flat tires that is, but Jane Ann fared not so well, striking the side of her head of the side window, cracking her skull, and causing massive brain bleeding. She never regained consciousness, breathing her last even before being unbuckled, despite Clyde’s desperate attempts to revive her. The trucker never left his vehicle, simply sitting in his seat, concocting his story for the police of a crazy four-wheeler passing him on the right just after he made a pass himself. He was a thousand miles and states away before Clyde even began to come to himself, unsure who that self even was without Jane Ann.
 
 

Author Notes No one was hurt in the formation of this 15K-word story.


Chapter 1
Truckin'

By Wayne Fowler

This is a deviation from both Ohmie, and Ben Persons. You might call it a descriptive rant born of driving frustrations.
 
1
 
 “All I can say, Dude, is to get on some of the forums and then check out, you know, whoever seems like they could do it. But good luck. But I think you should just move. Like to the country, or somethin’, away from your noisy neighborhood.”
 
 Clyde left the Dr. Geek shop no more disappointed than after his several other unsuccessful attempts to find an innovative electronic wiz, someone who could put together spare parts to come up with a device capable of stopping a truck, and simultaneously any of a trucker’s communication devices. He'd been using a fake story of wanting to shut down a neighbor's noise.
 
 “Not possible, Man.” “No way, Dude.” “Too much movies.” The responses from the electronic shops had become predictable.
 
 By the time Clyde decided that the forum suggestion was his best hope, he’d realized how stupid he’d been, in any case. Any one of the geeks could probably describe him. “Yes, Officer, he was about sixty, maybe sixty-five. Five foot nine, or so, about a hunnerd and sixty pounds, brown hair, no make that mostly gray, but a lot of forehead. Glasses… Oh, he looked a bit like Steven Spielberg.”
 
 Yeah. Nothing to do about that now, except to figure out a disguise and to be more careful. But first, to do as much research as possible. And then to find someone through a network forum.
 
 His goal – to lay up diesel trucks as efficiently as possible with the least peripheral or collateral damage as possible. How to ray gun, or stun gun in the more modern vernacular, and also to be able to drive away clean. He didn’t want to blow them up, or to cause collisions, just to disable them long enough to really, really aggravate the driver and his boss. He would take out his revenge against the entire industry. And Jane Ann would be avenged.
 
 Another consideration of equal import was that the device not also incapacitate his own vehicle. That would be awkward.
 
2
 
 “Retired, Darlin’,” Clyde said over the sixties rock-n-roll song playing on their favorite satellite radio station.
 Clyde and his wife, Jane Ann were on one of their many road trips, jaunts to famous hiking places, or simply unique adventures. It was months previous to Clyde’s search for a ray gun.
 
 Jane Ann’s smile said everything. Turning off the music, she turned to him, “I love you!”
 
 His smile said everything. After the briefest pause, he exclaimed, “Rocky Mountains in ten hours. Only one hour at seven hundred miles an hour.”
 
Jane Ann gave him one of her locally famous, within their nine-year marriage, in any event, straight-faced emoticon expressions and then replied, “You know, this whole last year, I didn’t really feel retired until you sold that trailer park.”
 
Clyde glanced at her, allowing her thoughts to develop.
 
“I know it had meant a lot to you. Your baby, and all, but…”
 
 “It was stressful, I’ll admit.” He well knew that it was not the reason Jane Ann had married him, almost being a deal-breaker. But she never pressed him to sell, even helped out as she could. Selling was his idea, putting it on the market the moment an unsolicited buyer made inquiries and then backed out. Getting so close to an offer teased visions of retirement travel with his late-in-life marriage to Jane Ann, a dream he’d never dared harbor.
 
Jane Ann had awaited Clyde’s response. “I’m sorry you didn’t get what you were hoping. I’ll make it up to you by never asking for diamonds, or ordering anything but the dollar menu, or the child’s plate.” Her eyes conveyed both humor and sincerity.
 
“I love you, my beautiful bride!”
 
“You’re the cute one.” Her customary, but heartfelt retort. “But I know you took the offer because of me. You’d still own it if not for me.”
 
“I’d rather have you. And have you happy.” After a pause, he added, “That didn’t sound just right. Not the way I mean. The trailer park served its purpose. We’re ready to move on. And the way we live, waterfall hikes for entertainment, free hotel breakfasts, popcorn suppers and kisses for dessert, we’ll be fine.”
 
Jane Ann knew that they would be.
 
Colorado was their dream, not a dream but more like their plan, their ever-on-the-top-of-the-bucket-list item. They’d both seen Colorado before, in their past lives, but they wanted very much to share the grandeur, hike the trails, and see the sights. And before the week was out, they had – mountain peaks and ranges, wild mountain streams and waterfalls, elk, moose, deer, even a bear and mountain lions, creatures they’d only dreamed of witnessing in the wild.
 
Their drive home was punctuated with singing along with their favorite tunes and making plans for their next adventure. Once home long enough to see family, attend to aging Mom’s needs, and tend to the house for chores and such, it would be off to a VRBO, a vacation rental on the beach. Beachfront living nearly tied for first place favorite destinations. It would be Clyde’s first VRBO/resort experience, previously always traveling more on the cheap. Jane Ann booked the beachfront property regularly favored by her extended family, knowing that it would suit her and her Prince Charming. It did.
 
That next winter, they luxuriated in a hot tub on the deck of a rented Ozark Mountain cabin, the snow on their heads alternating with the splendor of a star-filled sky, nearly competing with the majesty of the New Mexico and Colorado starscapes. Clyde and Jane Ann were in love, in love with one another, and in love with adventures, but mostly with one another, since even the most simple of activities solicited opportunities for expressions of their love and affection.
 
After a few winter months at home, the time spent largely editing photos for their many albums, and each working on their various writing projects: short stories, self-published, or never-published novels, or contest entries of which they’d both scored occasional wins. Their love waned not the slightest. Clyde wrote corny faux sonnets that delighted Jane Ann who kept her true criticisms to herself. One such, They Met at the Salad Bar, was a tribute to their whirlwind romance and marriage within five minutes of introduction. Well, that’s another thing – they both reveled in hyperbole.
 
Another trip to the west – Clyde’s project, the fulfillment of a bucket list to see the Rockies in all their glorious jeweled splendor – crowned and covered in snow.
 
On one of the first long, up-hill climbs just inside the state of New Mexico on I-40, Clyde was the first to extoll “Truckers’ Prison”, assigning the bad-driving trucker to the netherworld prison that Clyde and Jane Ann concocted as a means to deal with the many misbehaving truck drivers they’d encountered over the miles of their touring. They were in full agreement that the old Knights-of-the-Road were creatures of the past – extinct. The modern breed of trucker, as far as they could tell, were inconsiderate to say the least, and dangerous at worst. Clyde had, over the years, as had most every other four-wheeler driver, as referred to by truckers, learned to expect the worst. He’d learned to expect that they would cut a car off, pulling in front of it at the last moment to attempt a six-county-long pass of another truck traveling a half-a-mile-per-hour slower, sometimes not slower at all once hitting the previously blocked headwind. This trucker well deserved his stint in Clyde and Jane Ann’s Truckers’ Prison, not only taking an exorbitant time to pass but then taking forever to pull back into the right lane. Finally, presuming that the trucker’s goal was to remain in the passing lane to pass another, far-distant truck or motorhome, Clyde signaled and turned into the right lane, intending to pass on the right. Determining that the truck was, indeed, bent on remaining in the passing lane, another truck ahead about a half mile in the right lane, Clyde accelerated to pass.
 
This particular truck was designed with a low window at the front bottom of the passenger door. Clyde glimpsed through the window at the driver, Santa Claus without the red suit or spectacles, his beard a dirty gray instead of shining white, a baseball cap instead of a red, fur-lined, and ribbed hat. The trucker suddenly swerved to the right, a shocked look in his eyes as his head turned to the window a half-second after his hands had turned the steering wheel. Jerking to the right, slamming on his breaks, correcting, re-hitting his brakes, Clyde avoided a major collision. The first truck that both Clyde and Santa Claus passed was able to change lanes left and miss both Clyde and Jane Ann and the wayward trucker, who eventually stopped a quarter mile on, a day late deciding not to simply keep driving. (hyperbole here)
 
Clyde’s evasive action prevented a wreck, other than two flat tires that is, but Jane Ann fared not so well, striking the side of her head of the side window, cracking her skull, and causing massive brain bleeding. She never regained consciousness, breathing her last even before being unbuckled, despite Clyde’s desperate attempts to revive her. The trucker never left his vehicle, simply sitting in his seat, concocting his story for the police of a crazy four-wheeler passing him on the right just after he made a pass himself. He was a thousand miles and states away before Clyde even began to come to himself, unsure who that self even was without Jane Ann.

Author Notes No one was hurt in the formation of this 15K-word story.
I apologize for the skimpy payoff. I had $20 of promotion, but after a huge fiasco getting it posted, Tom's fix keeping the same promotion level only lasted two reviews.


Chapter 2
Truckin, ch 2

By Wayne Fowler

Clyde, an ordinary retired man, lost his heart’s dream, his lovely, beautiful bride by the errant behavior of a semi-truck driver. Traveling a large part of the couple’s lives, Clyde and Jane Ann experienced many truckers’ driving faux paus, many actions downright dangerous and/or illegal. One such trucker move resulted in Jane Ann’s death. The trucker did not even receive a traffic citation (ticket).
 
Chapter 2
 
Life insurance in hand, along with funds from the sale of their trailer park as well as his retirement annuity, Clyde slowly began to consider his future, a future featuring himself and a certain Xarious Trucking Ltd, and all truckers, in general.

Clyde and the love of his life, his heart’s pulse, had been sharing sights and experiences. Without her at his side, Clyde cared nothing. The most beautiful scene was not worth turning his head toward without Jane Ann to feel it with him.

The first thing he did was to trade cars, trading his and Jane Ann’s crossover vehicle for a non-descript silver Ford Taurus, a car with a trunk that would hide his gear. He wanted a car that would be more difficult to remember as well as to describe to authorities. He thought the trunk would be ideal for stowing an array of batteries and electronics for his weaponry. In any event, Clyde had always preferred to drive his flag, showing his patriotism by driving American made, rather than simply waving an American flag on the front stoop, one that was no doubt made in China.

Next, he rigged a cable from a lever on the console to a spring-loaded contraption that flipped a blank piece of metal over the rear license plate. He considered a stolen plate or an old one from a junkyard, but he figured the what ifs: what if someone could track the plate to his hometown, what if he couldn’t keep the tag current, that is, a stolen plate with an expired date, what if a cop was looking for that plate, or knew somehow, that it didn’t belong to that car, what if he got stopped for anything at all while bearing an illegal plate? No, he had to keep his plate legal but obscured during his actions, hence, his spring-loaded contraption: pull the lever – the plate was hidden, release the lever and the spring-loaded plate cover retracted – simple.

Clyde’s ray gun idea was going to have to go on hold, set to the back burner. There didn’t seem to be one available at the local firearms store, big box stores, or even in the minds of geeksters.

That plan was going to take more time than he was presently prepared to allot. He was ready for action now, even if it was to be with his second choice, a gun. Clyde was no foreigner to guns. They’d been fixtures in his game-hunting family for generations. Pistol target shooting used to be a regular part of family gatherings back in his youth. And needless to say, managing his low-rent trailer park necessitated home protection.

The gun. He wanted a sure thing, something that would stop the truck, put it out of commission for at least a few hours. He didn’t want to hurt anyone, not cause an accident, just to stop the truck. By his figuring, if a truck were to lose a front tire, it would more than likely rumble to a wild, but controllable, stop. The driver might have his hands full, but who cared? Certainly not him. Biding his time, he could follow his prey until most practically safe, pull up alongside, and pop the driver’s front, or the passenger front depending on the situation. Ricochets could be a problem, but again, if he was careful to isolate the target…

Clyde finally decided on a .22 repeater rifle. The sound could somewhat be taken for a blown tire, and not too loud. Bullets were easily purchased without awkward questions. The bullets would also be virtually untraceable, available at many stores in boxes of 500 as easy as BBs. He could shoot out a hole in his passenger window that would neatly steady the rifle for one-handed firing. The Henry Survival Rifle .22 caliber was his choice: lightweight, cheap enough to dispose of if necessary, easily replaced, and capable of being broken down for transport inside a sports bag. The magazine held only eight rounds, but if he couldn’t blow a tire within two, or at most three, he needed to vamoose, in any event.

For practice, Clyde painted a sheet of plywood representative of big rig tires. He didn’t need to zoom past, since he would be matching the truck’s speed, he merely needed to learn the angle and how to position his head. This is where he devised to shoot a set of holes in the car window to hold the end of the barrel. He could both steady the rifle, and also prevent unnecessarily exposing the weapon. He calculated that his best method of operation would be to shoot twice at an angle from just behind the tire, double-tap, as Lee Childs might describe, and then edge up and do the same at the leading tread if necessary. Tap-tap. Zoom ahead a few hundred yards and reset his license plate.

Clyde spent hours, and days, devising his attack and escape mode. He would stop the truck, always on a freeway, and then immediately take the very next exit, reversing his course, allowing himself to review the success of his work. As soon as his imagination resulted in a plan, he began tearing it down, resolving to form no pattern, not always reverse course, but to occasionally plod on, forcing himself steady. Mostly, he would reverse course, and then turn either left or right, making his way to the closest parallel freeway. His plan, for the most part, was to hit no more than one per day, at least on the same road. By taking surface streets and state highways where and when he had to, but north-south freeways where he could, he planned to hop-scotch/angle his way across the country, ridding the highways of inconsiderate truckers at least for a few hours for each one that he could derail.

Clyde prepared for his maiden run, his shake-down cruise. Outfitting the Taurus with a case of water and plenty of nutritious car food, he headed west, mindful of his and Jane Ann’s last route. He daydreamed of coming upon his Xarious driver, plinking him, and going home to retire, leaving all the nation’s clean-up work to Jack Reacher and his sort. It was in Arizona, after many a qualifying applicant for his Truckers’ Prison was allowed to continue on that he first considered the circumstances ideal. The trucker hadn’t cut him off, but two cars ahead, caused a line-up of more than a dozen cars as he took his sweet, merry time passing another truck.
 
+++
 
Thirty miles further on, Clyde seized his opportunity. Without hesitation he eased the rifle barrel into the hole and cocked the rifle, resolving to cock it first next time. He edged to firing position and carefully pop-popped the truck’s tire, immediately finding himself car lengths ahead of the quickly slowing truck, the driver struggling to get it to pull over to the right shoulder. Clyde had never even heard the rifle shots. It was only as he sought a place to reverse course that he remembered that he’d failed to cover his license plate. A few minutes later, before he arrived at the first exit driving at a cruise-controlled pace of eighty-two miles per hour in the eighty-mile-per-hour zone, he passed a State Trooper who was positioned at an authorized vehicles only cut-across. The Trooper was just beginning to turn himself about, obviously responding to a call from the trucker. The Trooper would have to drive east until he could again cross back over to the westbound lane, get to the trucker, get the story, and then either race in pursuit or radio for someone else to capture the shooter. Risking that there be only the one Trooper nearby, Clyde tach-ed out the Taurus, racing it several miles to the exit.

Before the Trooper arrived at the disabled truck, Clyde was southbound on Highway 191 in search of I-20, intending to return home and await the news, prepared to face the music. The nervous shakes hadn’t taken hold for thirty or forty minutes after he discovered how far he was from I-20. There was nothing to do but ride it out, touching the steering wheel as lightly as possible and trusting the cruise control to keep him at a steady, unremarkable speed.

That was when he began to scheme how he could void cell phones or a CB radio. He also spent practice time beside his plywood target: throw the license plate lever, cock the rifle, place the rifle, fire twice, remove the rifle, and flip back the license plate lever – over and over and over. Before finishing, he added lowering of the passenger window an inch to hide the rifle barrel hole. He also learned how to break the rifle down, removing the barrel from the stock with one hand to hide it on the floorboard. From the truck drivers’ perch, they could easily see a rifle lying on a passenger seat. He figured that it would be easy enough to re-assemble, that he would never be in such a hurry as to need it for defense, and would never take on another target so soon afterward. Second thinking, he decided that he would never use the gun to defend himself in any scenario. Patience – he mentally practiced patience.

Clyde had intended to return home and watch the news, to lay low and see whether any report was made. He also made certain that he had the phone number of an attorney in the event authorities knocked on his door to arrest him. He set a minimum hiatus of ten days.

That was until he’d witnessed an egregious act of unsafe conduct on the part of a national chain driver. As the trucker passed an onramp, he swerved into the left lane, forcing a car driver to hit his brakes. The apparent reason for the trucker’s move was to allow a car entering the freeway room to merge, space that it didn’t even need since it had sufficiently accelerated. Clyde figured that the trucker had not noticed the car’s approach and was startled.

Clyde’s next victim was self-identified.

Several minutes further: cock the rifle, set the plate cover, position the barrel… And then Clyde’s jittery stomach became increasingly greater physical shakes. He couldn’t understand it, He’d already demonstrated that he could do it. Why now? After obvious success? Clyde eased back, coasting back behind the truck, resolving to return home.
 

Author Notes I apologize for the length. Sometimes you just can't quit.
For those willing to suffer along with Clyde, rest assured that this is more than a simple revenge story.
Photo courtesy of cleo85 (Don't drink and drive) from FanArtReview


Chapter 3
Truckin, ch 3

By Wayne Fowler

In the last part Clyde decided that not only did Jane Ann need avenged, but the country, other innocent people, needed protected from criminally dangerous truck drivers. Clyde resolved to sideline trucks for a couple hours by shooting out tires.
 
The rifle method worked. For a time Clyde stopped thinking electronically. And he was satisfied that he could work through his nerves. By the time he’d reached home from his first hunting truckers venture – one success and one aborted fiasco, having seen a dozen more potential targets, criminals behind the wheels of monster trucks, he’d resolved to immediately return to action.

He increased safety concerns by always eating at drive-thru fast-food places when not eating his nutrition bars, and by avoiding all diners and cafes, especially those at truck stops. Also, by always staying at non-chain, low-rent, no-tell motels that accepted cash, along with sleeping in rest areas he could avoid having to use a credit card and leaving behind a paper trail. Clyde knew all his past movie-watching would come in handy. The problem with rest areas, though, was that truckers used the same facilities as automobile drivers, which meant he could rest, only, and not risk using the restroom facilities.

On his next few excursions, safaris, as he called them, he never stopped a truck within a half-day of his home, not desiring to lead investigators to his house. Likewise, considering patterns on an investigator’s map showing a large hole circumnavigating his residence, he would plink one now and then as he passed by, not stopping. Scattering them like buckshot across the country was his plan – no timing routine and no map routine. He would, though, allow pins in an investigator’s map around his home on passes through, passes not associated with long stayovers at home. The jittery nerves never repeated.

By the time he matched the famed Billy the Kid, though Clyde did not notch his gun, he began to realize a pattern to his kills. U.S. mail trucks, furniture haulers, and certain national store chain trucks never got his attention, and never committed the crime that put them on his radar. Others self-identified with regularity, especially Xarious Trucking. He resolved to remain pattern-free, even if it meant taking a pass on a worthy subject, letting one escape justice. Clyde’s thinking was along the lines of Jesse James and the Pinkertons. Target a line too often, and someone, the firm or the cops, might set a trap, veritably opening the side walls of a tractor-trailer with a hidden Gatling gun to blast him to smithereens. He would be an equal-opportunity vigilante and still do his best to avoid any pattern.

But all the planning in the world couldn’t beat bad luck. He was eastbound on I-10, almost to New Mexico. As soon as he’d popped and stopped a passing-lane violator, one that he’d had to shoot out the passenger side tire, firing through his open window from the slow lane, Clyde discovered a vintage Firebird on his tail. The classic sports car of the late sixties, or early seventies, had been coming along at a pretty good clip and intending to pass the truck on the right all along, the same as it appeared Clyde was. Clyde found him on his bumper just as he’d withdrawn the rifle. He might not have seen the deed, but he sure enough saw the result – a blown right front truck tire and a Ford Taurus merrily cruising along.

With a sudden burst of speed, the Firebird drew beside him, despite Clyde’s acceleration to 100mph. The Firebird driver, a senior himself, probably an ex-cop, Clyde thought, pointed to the side of the road. Hitting his brakes hard, Clyde watched as the Firebird, without anti-lock brakes, spun to a stop, half on the shoulder, and half not, facing the desert. Clyde sped by. The rear-wheel drive Firebird fishtailed, spinning tires lunged the Firebird back from the shoulder, onto the roadway, and then back to the shoulder, the right tires in gravel. Tromping on the gas, the carburetor muscle car hiccupped, choked, and sputtered, requiring the driver to nurse it to performance speed. By then, Clyde was off I-10 and hidden by an abandoned business building, watching for the Firebird to fly past. It never did, apparently opting to stay on 10, unwilling to let off his hard-won 6000 rpm. Eventually meeting with Troopers, he was able to offer no better description than had the trucker.
 
+++
 
Realizing a flaw in his routine, the next time he made it home Clyde spent two weeks becoming a shift worker, adapting himself to the nightlife. He’d never before worked the midnight shift, sleeping in the daytime to wake when others were settling in for the night, beginning his hunt after dark. He quickly learned that there would be far fewer targets. With fewer trucks on the road, there were naturally fewer trucks to pass one another.
He considered disabling the license plate lamp, but thought better of it, not wanting to be pulled over and a curious or super-observant cop figure him out. And with his headlights, a trucker might be able to read his plate anyway. Far better to keep to his routine. One distinct benefit to night-fighting, though, was the ability to forego disguising himself, worrying about glasses and hats, long sleeves, short sleeves, jacket color and such.
 
+++
 
Know your enemy. Clyde realized that except for the obvious – tires, he was pretty much ignorant of the workings of a semi-truck. Everything he thought he knew, was conjecture and guesses based on movies and perhaps falsely transferring automobile science to trucks. He also wanted to know exactly how truckers thought, and how they were trained.

Waiting for a local truck driving school to begin its next class, Clyde watched as many YouTube videos about trucking as he could find. There were a few by truckers, themselves, offering counsel and advice to fellow drivers. He found comfort in their straightforwardness, telling truckers not to take a hundred miles to pass others, to be the better man, and to pull in behind one that wouldn’t yield. “Look,” one guy said in a video, “You’re driving a new truck that’s governed at sixty-seven. You’re in a seventy and four-wheelers are doin’ seventy-five or eighty. You don’t try to pass another truck that for whatever reason is only goin’ sixty-six. No! You get beside him, wake him up, and he speeds to sixty-eight. You will never pass. You’ll just make people mad, mad enough to pass on the right, pass on the shoulder, who knows. You will be the hazard.”

Most YouTube videos, though, were truckers who dash-cammed brake checkers, those like his past self who had, after finally passing a truck, cut them off and immediately applied brakes, slowing the trucker down. Without fail, the complaining trucker neglected to mention what transpired before the brake-checking. Only once did a trucker acknowledge – “maybe he thought I took too long to pass.”

Getting a jump-start on the class, Clyde downloaded the state CDL Handbook, finding a treasure trove of information, all the way from truck handling and truck operation mechanics to state laws and regs. Air brakes had spring brakes, automatically engaging whenever air was lost. Trucks took as much as a third of a mile to stop at eighty miles per hour. The safe following distance was ten feet for every second of travel time – double that on wet roads. It took longer to stop an empty truck than a heavy, full one. Bobtail trucks take longer to stop than combination rigs. Tanker trucks handle differently than regular tractor-trailer outfits. Locked-up brakes present potentially dangerous skidding and jack-knifing. Rollover is a constant threat depending on curves, winds, and of course, erratic driving practices. Clyde gained a new appreciation for public safety, glad that he’d already determined to isolate targets by following bad drivers until they were safely away from other vehicles.

Clyde also appreciated that competent, professional drivers, those with full knowledge of the law and their rigs, careful and considerate of the public’s safety, as well as their rights to the road, deserved his respect every bit as much as any other professional. He was controlling an 80,000-pound machine with all its moving parts at seventy or eighty miles an hour, surrounded by drivers of every degree of competence and awareness, often sleep-deprived through no fault of his own, separated from family for extended lengths of time, driving in every adverse climatic condition, and usually under time pressures. Furthermore, he was responsible for a myriad of state driving laws, state after state, as well as laws relating to the condition and performance of his vehicle, often a vehicle to which he had no control, being owned and maintained by his employer.

It was almost enough to make Clyde give rise to question – until he remembered what Santa Claus had done to his beautiful bride, his heart’s beat, his reason for living.

Waiting for trucker school to start, the break from action far longer than he wanted, Clyde watched YouTube trucker fails, wrecks involving trucks and heavy equipment. The videos effectively balanced his appreciation for competence and excellence among truckers, exposing a world of careless and incompetent idiots, exposing the public to who-knows-what-all danger.

Once in class, Clyde wasn’t particularly interested in the how-to’s of driving. There were, of course, a few interesting tidbits relating to safety, but having no intention of taking the CDL test, let alone passing it, he was free to selectively focus. To him the initial orientation speech was worth the price of admission: “You are not Knights-of-the-Road. Like Roger Miller said, you are Kings of the Road! It’s yours. It’s your workplace. You don’t go into a restaurant kitchen and tell the chef what to do, four-wheelers don’t get in your workplace and tell you what to do! Unless they wanna wipe their butts with corn cobs, if they wanna eat tonight, if they want their GameBoy or new telephone delivered, they’ll get outta the way an’ let you deliver your loads. Their Constitutional pursuit of happiness depends on you!  Surface roads are made for cars. They should get out of our shop!”

    Clyde was steamed, self-control nearly impossible.
 

Author Notes No truckers were injured in the writing of this story. And yes, I am fully aware that there are more good (great) truckers out there than there are bad ones.

Clyde: A retiree who's wife, Jane Ann, died as a direct result of a truck driver's action
Jane Ann: Clyde's deceased wife, dead by the action of a trucker (Santa Claus)
Santa Claus: the name Clyde gave the Xavious Trucking driver responsible for Jane Ann's death
Thurmon: a middle-aged truck driver
Sara: Thurmon's wife
Nate: Thurmon's 12 y.o. son
Susan: Thurmon's 7 y.o. daughter
Corine: Clyde's grown daughter
Rick: Clyde's son


Chapter 4
Truckin, Ch 4

By Wayne Fowler

In the last part Clyde enrolled in truck drivers’ school to better understand his enemy.
 
Chapter 4
 
Cutting cars off with quick lane changes and camping out in the passing lane were not the only infractions that Clyde noted as punishable offenses. Entering a freeway at a veritable crawl when it was within a driver’s control to accelerate to highway speed scored high. Certainly, a driver has no control over those ahead of him, but when a driver chooses to stop and sleep on a freeway on-ramp, limiting his approach distance to near nothing, he could not possibly reach a safe merging speed. Many times, Clyde witnessed truckers virtually demanding through traffic to take unsafe evasive actions – Truckers’ Prison. Dealing with these offenders was not terribly easy – unless you had all the time in the world. And also, if he didn’t insist on actually witnessing the crime, but simply assume the potential. That being the case, all Clyde need do once spotting trucks parked on on-ramps, or on the approach to freeways at the very end of rest stops, was to circle back. It might take hours to return to the scene, but who was counting? The easiest way, though, was to simply pull off at the next exit, wait for the offender to pass by, and then re-enter the freeway.

The first time Clyde attempted a truck stopped virtually on the freeway at the very end of the approach lane from a rest stop, his shot missed entirely, firing six of his eight rounds. He had to accelerate to freeway speed in order to safely merge, giving on-coming traffic most of his attention. Finding his right-side rearview mirror in the way of forward shooting, he had to wait until he was nearly broadside. Not knowing whether, or not he’d scored Clyde opted to wave it off and not circle back once again just to find out. He would need practice, which he got the very next day, but with no confidence in the results. This venture was cut short, and he returned home from a single state away.

Rather than making another rifle barrel hole enabling him to shoot forward, ahead of the side mirror, he decided to machine-gun fire, emptying the magazine in what he called Billy the Kid fashion down toward the bottom of the tires. His main concern then was to avoid the gas tank. Billy the Kid was known for emptying his gun in a fight, just throwing lead instead of aiming. Once reaching a semblance of merging speed and beside the offending truck, Clyde would do a no-look spray of bullets and hope for the best. If he scored, fine, if not, well, sometimes a trucker just got lucky. Not knowing whether or not he’d disabled the truck was disconcerting, leaving him dissatisfied, but he had learned to accept life’s shortfalls.

One extremely upsetting factor that sorely frustrated Clyde was the too-often inability to satisfactorily isolate an offending trucker. Traffic was simply too heavy, never letting up. Clyde surely hated to give up on a deserving victim.
 
Then it finally happened – calamity. All went routinely except that after setting his license plate correctly, Clyde saw in his rearview mirror that the driver had failed to control his vehicle. The truck jackknifed and then rolled onto its side, sliding to a stop totally blocking all lanes. Traffic would be stopped for hours, for miles. Clyde felt awful.

He considered using the next median cross-through, the path reserved for emergency vehicles only to survey the damage, as well as to immediately change his pattern. He nixed the idea as being too dangerous. He might be seen performing the illegal maneuver, or worse, recognized by the trucker. The next exit, six miles on seemed interminably distant. Using back roads, Clyde criss-crossed his way back in the direction he’d come, hoping to get to a motel in time for the evening news.

    Clyde resolved to change tactics. Shooting the front tire was simply too dangerous, unsafe for following traffic. Taking aim at the tractor’s rear dual, drive tires, he would from that point on just snap off as many shots as he could, hoping to get both duals.
 
+++
 
“Hello, Dad! Wow, I finally got you!”

Clyde had moments before plugged his phone into the dash to charge it. “Hi, Corine! What’s up?” His daughter rarely called. He got right to the point in case there was a problem.

“Nothing much. There’s a three-day weekend this weekend and I thought Ellie and I would come see you.”

“Well, you know how much I’d like that, but, well, I’m not home.”

“Oh, where are you?”

Clyde had to think fast. The last time his daughter and granddaughter came to visit, he had connected with Ellie’s phone to locate each other. Clyde could track their progress. Would Ellie be nearby? Would she look to see where he was? He’d almost been ready to plead that he was revisiting a beach condo that he and Jane Ann had enjoyed so much. But that was before remembering about the phone tracking. He was on I-80, not terribly far from their Iowa house, and no real good reason not to go visit. He couldn’t tell her that he was anywhere near home because then he could go home for their visit. Out of time for a logical, honest answer, he simply stated that he’d been returning to places he and Jane Ann had once toured.

“You sure that’s healthy, Dad?” she asked.

“Oh, it doesn’t hurt any more’n stayin’ home. Look, why don’t I come up in the next, oh … few weeks, or month, or so. Call your brother and figure out when would be good. And I’ll call you about it in a few days, Okay?”

They agreed, said their I love you’s, and ended the call.

Clyde had not kept count of his truck kills, but the authorities’ estimate was approaching two hundred. He wondered whether his kids had any suspicions, and what they would think.
 
+++
 
“Truckers’ Prison,” Clyde said to himself out loud, the same inflection as if Jane Ann had been at his side. A diesel rig a quarter mile up had been alongside another truck, attempting to pass for over a mile. He’d begun his pass just at the base of a long incline. The incline alone would have slowed him, and then add the headwind. Clyde knew what they taught in driver’s school: "It’s your road!”

    Clyde increased his speed just enough to tag behind the offender, but not enough to draw the attention of cops. Atlas Trucking, one of the worst. Clyde held back, slowing to match the truck’s seventy-four miles an hour, waiting for traffic to allow his deed. “Humph, passing a truck, but not even going the posted seventy-five speed limit. Clyde pfffed again his disdain. He noted that the driver of the Toyota fairly close behind the truck that was being passed was driven by a woman talking on a cell phone. He thought nothing of it, except to shake his head at the ever-increasing frequency of drivers talking on cell phones. What he didn’t know was that she was speaking with the driver of the passing truck, advising him of the following Taurus, herself remaining behind the passed truck.

    A half an hour later, Clyde calmly made his move, casually easing up beside the charged, found guilty, and soon-to-be-executed criminal, not noticing that the woman in the Toyota, still on the phone and a dash-mounted camera, had moved into the passing lane from behind a truck that was several hundred yards behind. Fortunately for him, he’d covered his plate before the woman came within range. The second before squeezing the trigger, though in hindsight, he might as well have followed through, just before triggering the .22 for the double tap, he glanced in his rear-view mirror. Though the darkened glass prevented anyone seeing his extended right arm, it did not conflict with his sight of the Toyota rapidly gaining on him. By then she would have seen his plate covering and accurately identified his Taurus.
 
Dropping the rifle, he hit passing gear, slicing across the front of the truck, barely missing him on his way to the shoulder of the highway where, with a fish-tailing correcting move, he braked hard, the truck and the Toyota whizzing past. Waiting for the following trucker to pass, the trucker’s horn blaring as he did, Clyde backed as quickly as he dared for nearly a mile where he saw a median cross-over. Dashing across the lanes and spinning tires in the cross-over dirt, Clyde raced to the nearest exit, expecting the woman to be on her phone to the state Troopers that very moment. Grateful for the Taurus’ 5.0 engine, he began several miles of Bonnie and Clyde's escape driving, hoping his inevitable shaking would await his stop.

    He hoped to get off the freeway ahead of a westbound Trooper, and figured that eastbound Troopers would use his cross-over to reach the stopped truck and Toyota, who had parked at the scene of the non-crime. Troopers would want to see her video, which would no doubt be on that evening’s news. It was time to retire the Taurus.

    Driving surface roads only, Clyde found a state park within the hour. He figured he had enough food for nearly a week, when it should be safe enough to drive home under the cover of darkness. His plan was to paint the Taurus and then to park it in the backyard, leaving it for emergency use only.

    The shaking and vigorous heart palpitations began before he’d even retrieved his tent from the trunk. His major disappointment was that he did not have motel television to keep up with the news.

    It was only after heading out in the morning that Clyde realized he’d left a paper trail. He’d listed his vehicle and license plate number, fearing that a State Park official would question falsified tag numbers. A fake name was no problem, but tags…? He considered stealing plates from another state, believing that the tag numbers would never be entered into a database.

    Clyde gave no thought to the increasingly criminal nature he was adopting.
 

Author Notes No truckers were injured in the writing of this story. And yes, I am fully aware that there are more good (great) truckers out there than there are bad ones.

Clyde: A retiree who's wife, Jane Ann, died as a direct result of a truck driver's action
Jane Ann: Clyde's deceased wife, dead by the action of a trucker (Santa Claus)
Santa Claus: the name Clyde gave the Xavious Trucking driver responsible for Jane Ann's death
Thurmon: a middle-aged truck driver
Sara: Thurmon's wife
Nate: Thurmon's 12 y.o. son
Susan: Thurmon's 7 y.o. daughter
Corine: Clyde's grown daughter
Rick: Clyde's son
Photo courtesy of cleo85 (Don't drink and drive) from FanArtReview


Chapter 5
Truckin, Ch 5

By Wayne Fowler

In the last part Clyde continued his campaign against bad truckers. He had a surprise call from his daughter, temporarily bringing him back to Earth. He then tried the night shift for a spell.
 
Ramp sleepers. Once Clyde let his mind focus on them again, they became far more extreme irritants than previously considered. Truckers knew which rest stops were full. They had routes, most of them. They had phones and radios – rest stop forty miles ahead – that gave them half an hour to learn whether there was a slot. But even lacking that option, drive through, no empties, go on. Driver cut it too close and his time clock says to break, go on to the next exit, and pull over – not on the on-ramp, but on the off-ramp, where after his rest, he can cross over, and use the full on-ramp to build up speed for a safe merge. Simple. Oh, but he doesn’t like it when other trucks exiting that ramp use their super loud jake brakes to slow a heavy vehicle down, thus disrupting his slumber. “Too bad! Welcome to America,” Clyde mused. He briefly thought about mounting a super-speaker on his hood and playing a ramped-up recording of jake brakes as he slowly crept through truck stop after truck stop. A nice idea, but not very practical.

Clyde pulled off at every exit, immediately re-entering the freeway in search of on-ramp sleepers.

Night work insufficiently rewarding, he returned home to readjust to daytime life. As soon as he turned into his driveway, the rising sun gleamed off his side yard painted plywood target. .22 caliber bullet holes peppered all about targets that were clearly not bull’s eyes, but more like very large tires, Clyde’s heart leaped into his throat. Anyone could see or surmise that he’d been practicing shooting at tires. Anyone aware of the recent plight of over-the-road truckers could add two and two. He cut the plywood into manageable pieces and burned them before even unloading his car, his blood pressure again pounding when he remembered that there might well be a burn ban in place. Blaming the night shift and his fatigue for not thinking things through, he resolved to be more deliberate in the future.

Which led to an intensified search for a replacement for the gun, a different method of truck disabling. And it was time to rid himself of the Taurus, switch to a different make and color.  

Which took him to Dr. Geek, renewing his quest for a ray gun. "Afterall," Clyde thought, "if sun spots with its gamma rays could fuse solid state electronics, then why couldn't someone make a miniature version of a gamma-ray gun?"

+++

    Thurman Gibson felt himself fortunate to be on the side of the highway upright and not laying on his diesel rig’s side. Horsing the slightly overweight 53-foot trailer onto the shoulder was the struggle of his life. Just as he was about to eject the CD and call his wife on his cell phone, the left front tire suddenly blew, a trucker’s worst nightmare, aside from falling asleep and ramming a stopped vehicle at full speed.

    Losing the left tire always resulted in the truck’s veering into traffic. Hard braking, a driver’s natural instinct would most certainly jackknife the rig, or throw it on its side. Full weight on the steering wheel, check the surroundings, apply air brakes, set the flashers, pray to ease the beast to the shoulder, and hope for the best. After what seemed ages, Thurmon first called his company’s number for roadside service, then his supervisor, and finally his wife.

    “Hard ta say for sure, Mr. Gibson, but I’m gonna say you been shot,” the road service technician said.

    “Shot?”

    “Yup. Twice is my guess. See? Look here at the rim. The bullet didn’t go through, but right there on the lip. See that indent? Nothin’ on the road could cause that. Shiny an’ all. That’s a bullet. Tire’s all shredded, but I’m bettin’ a second shot got the tire, blew it up.”

    Thurmon called 911 for a Trooper.

    “No idea, Officer,” Thurmon replied to the question. "Just normal. I remember it was light traffic. One, maybe two four-wheelers. Can’t say, really. Didn’t hear anything but the rig and Willie Nelson. Mighta been a car passing me, but I had my hands full. Know what I mean?”

    “I do,” the Trooper said. “I’ll have the state look at the wheel and pieces of tire we can gather and send a report to your company. Oughta help with insurance.”

    “Yeah, if I was private this’d cost me a couple thousand bucks, lost time and all.”

    As the Trooper left, he advised Thurmon that the State Police, who had authority over commercial vehicles would be along, probably directly.

    It was nearly four hours before Thurmon could resume his route, his timetable completely skewered. He was paid only a fourth of his hourly rate for downtime. And the downtime did not count as official rest time. Eleven hours was the limit. Downtime could be counted in the thirty-minute required break after eight hours of driving, but Thurmon had already taken that. Legally, he was already past the eleven-hour limit before he retrieved the safety triangles he’d placed behind his rig. He would have to stop for the mandatory ten-hour break no further than the next legal truck stop or rest area.

    The stop turned out to be a rest area in which all available parking spots were occupied, some by motorhomes pulling automobiles. Thurmon pulled to the shoulder on the onramp leading back onto the freeway, several hundred yards from the facilities. He was counting on a hot meal and a shower at his regular stop, the station where his company had a contract and he would have to pull into for fuel anyway – more downtime at this point. "At least the Company paid for the damages," he thought.
 
+++
 
    It was hours after he’d finally fallen asleep that Thurmon woke with a start. He’d dreamed of the lady flipping him off. She must have been tall because it was the longest middle finger on a lady he’d ever seen. And so unladylike. She was the passenger in a black Honda pickup truck. He remembered the occasion distinctly. It was half an hour, maybe a little more, before losing the left front tire. He remembered that it was approaching in the passing lane, but thought he had time to move over in front of it in order to clear the shouldered J.B. Hunt trucker on the side of the road.

    “Show some respect!” he remembered the trainer shout. “Passed by an eighteen-wheeler when you’re on the shoulder is like being passed by a Boeing 747. It can blow an empty rig over. A little professional courtesy, girls. Always! Always give your brothers room, move over to the left. It won’t hurt those four-wheelers. They can ease up a second or two. They’ll appreciate it when you move over for them, too.”

    Seeing the practice just about universal, every new driver adopted the routine, in part, to avoid taking flak from fellow drivers at the next stop.

    Thurmon didn’t recall any other issue with any other driver that day. He resolved to call the investigating officer the next day.

    Clyde, driver of the Ford Taurus several car lengths behind the woman that Thurmon remembered, would not be mentioned.
 
+++
 
    Thurmon, for the first time in his driving career, began to take notice of his fellow driver’s practices. It wasn’t that he’d not been aware of driving mistakes and infractions, but that he’d never before consciously observed the effect on four-wheelers, or even on other truckers.

    The first thing he saw was what truck drivers failed to do. After passing a tandem – a tractor pulling two trailers – he noticed that the driver never flashed his lights indicating that it was safe to pull back over to the right. Paying attention, he noted that none of the truckers exercised that courtesy throughout the day. In connection with that, he saw that on average, most truckers remained in the passing lane two or three times as long as necessary.

    “Would you look at that.” Thurmon was on the phone with his wife.

    “What’s that, hon?”

    “An impatient four-wheeler passed a truck on the right. The trucker just passed a Roadway rig and the car passed him on the right even after the trucker put on his blinker.”

    “Did the trucker take too long getting back?” Thurmon’s wife Sara asked.

    “Nah. Textbook. Might be a newbie. Did it just right.”

    “Well, I wish he’d get a ticket for unsafe driving. It would serve him right to get run off the road. The trucker could say he never saw him in his blind spot.”

    “He wouldn’t be lying,” Thurmon agreed. “The car would be in the ditch, maybe rolling over and over before the trucker ever saw him. But it would cost him half a day. Maybe even his job.”

    “I hate people that make your job unsafe,” Sara offered. “And I hate companies that fire drivers when it isn’t their fault. Makes it hard for them to get hired on to the good companies.”

    Thurmon grunted his agreement.

    “Just make sure you don’t get another ticket, Thurm. One more…”

    “Yeah, I know. I’m careful. You know, hon, I’ve been watchin’ lately. I don’t know if it’s the kids they’re running through the classes these days, or if there are a lot more foreign drivers…”

    “What? What do you mean foreign?”

    “You can drive big rigs across the Mexican border and take your load to its destination. Can’t pick up another load, but they gotta get back. So there’s a lot of foreign drivers coming and going.”

    “Do they have to follow our laws?” Sara asked.

    “Sure, but who knows what they’re taught. And what’s the penalty? A fine that their company pays. That’s it.”

    “How can that be right?”

    Sara didn’t hear the shrug of Thurmon’s shoulders.

    “Just be extra careful around them,” Sara said to Thurmon’s silent chuckle. As if he could know the details of other drivers.

    “Wish I had a rear camera. You know, like some motorhomes have? I’m being passed by a tanker whose going maybe one-mile-an-hour better. Gonna take him miles to pass me. Wish I could see the line of cars behind him.”

    “Why don’t you, you know, slow a bit, get it over with?”

    “I could but it would cost a few bucks in fuel.”

    “A few bucks we don’t have since I had to quit my job.”

    Sara’s retail job stopped allowing her to end her shift in time to care for their kids after school. All other retail positions were the same, or worse, requiring new hires to work into the evening.

    “Yeah, I could,” Thurmon said with respect to easing up and letting the tanker pass. “But the last time I did that I had to pass him on the very next grade,” he said, referring to an uphill climb.
 

Author Notes No truckers were injured in the writing of this story. And yes, I am fully aware that there are more good (great) truckers out there than there are bad ones.
Clyde: A retiree whose wife, Jane Ann, died as a direct result of a truck driver's action
Jane Ann: Clyde's deceased wife, dead by the action of a trucker (Santa Claus)
Santa Claus: the name Clyde gave the Xavious Trucking driver responsible for Jane Ann's death
Thurmon: a middle-aged truck driver
Sara: Thurmon's wife
Nate: Thurmon's 12 y.o. son
Susan: Thurmon's 7 y.o. daughter
Corine: Clyde's grown daughter
Rick: Clyde's grown son

Photo courtesy of cleo85 (Don't drink and drive) from FanArtReview


Chapter 6
Truckin, Ch 6

By Wayne Fowler

In the last part we met a trucker named Thurmon who’d been sidelined by a front tire shot from Clyde. Thurmon is a conscientious driver who’s mistake one day cost him a tire and wheel by Clyde’s gun. We got a glimpse of trucking from a driver’s POV. Here, we pick back up with Clyde.
 
Chapter 6
 
    Blue lights, gaining hard. Clyde had seen Troopers on a chase before. Always before, though, he’d been cruising at his normal six to eight miles an hour over the limit, whatever the traffic would bear and not make him draw unwanted attention. He didn’t want to match speeds exactly because that would limit his experience, his opportunities to see as many trucks in action as possible. But at the same time, he didn’t want to race ahead, even if below the speeds that Troopers might be looking for. He didn’t want to zoom up to trucks that were going to change lanes and cause them to cut him off when doing so would be unfairly influenced by his own speed. No, he wanted bad truckers to bury themselves, not be unreasonably trapped in a predicament.

    Clyde was already in the right lane, but he braked to get out of cruise control just to allow the cop to see his compliance. Ordinarily, to get out of cruise control, he’d press the cancel button, saving brake wear. But this time he wanted the Trooper to see his brake lights. It’d been about twenty minutes since he’d stopped a trucker, about twenty-five, or thirty miles. “The cop could be after him, he feared.”  The rifle already broken down, he casually tucked the rifle parts as close to the right seat as possible, wishing he could turn the broken-down parts ninety degrees and hide them. Close examination would reveal some sort of silliness over his license plate, but he hoped that once the cop read the tag from inside his patrol car, he would ignore it, concentrating on his task at hand. Clyde prepared to be pulled over – “Yeah, Officer, on my way to visit family.”

    Zoom. Undulating in a tone-changing Doppler effect as he whizzed past, Clyde began to breathe, not realizing he’d been holding his breath. He took the next exit, ambling his way to the next freeway north, I-80. He allowed reprieves to every violator he saw that entire day, hating to let one of them off the hook, no matter how egregious his violation.
 
+++
 
    Clyde was becoming increasingly lonely. He missed Jane Ann. Convinced that she would go along with his scheme, he was equally certain that she would not condone the degree he’d taken it. Two or three, maybe, but then her conscience would dig in. There was no way that she would have tolerated carrying a vendetta as far as he had, no matter who had been hurt. But she wasn’t here. She was dead, thanks to Xarious Trucking. Being alone was catching up with him, though. Maybe he should buy himself a Mr. Wilson, a volleyball ala Tom Hanks in Cast Away, he laughed to himself. No, an accomplice would be nothing but trouble, far too risky. There would never be anyone he could trust not to talk. Or want to go into restaurants, or want to take other unnecessary risks, like talking to people, or shooting into doors or windows as exclamation points. No, he was the only person he could trust.

    He didn’t care for the Malibu he traded for once he’d knocked out and then replaced the passenger window of his Taurus to eliminate questions. The Malibu didn’t have the power that he thought he might one day need. And he never could get used to where the windshield wiper control was, always accidentally tripping it, feeling the fool, wondering if he’d drawn attention to himself. Noticing that the most common vehicle out there, especially in the west, was the white Ford F-150 pickup truck, he wondered whether that would draw attention, or not. And what it might do to his trajectory, the angle from the passenger window to truck tires. And then his visibility. Sitting higher, would truckers get better views of him? But he could add hard hats to his disguise ensemble. He would stick with the Malibu and think about it. He also had to think about what configuration might best facilitate a ray gun, should he ever get one figured out. A jammer is maybe what it would be called.
 
+++
 
    I’m the great pretender – ooo-oo-oo-oo-ooo
    Pretending that I’m doing well
    My need is such, I pretend too much
    I’m lonely but no one can tell

    It was the The Platters song from 1959. Clyde wiped his eyes and cheeks with his hands, looking to see if it was safe to pull over. He and Jane Ann, though married later in life, had 50s, 60s, and 70s music in common. They were both full-on boomers, born only a few years after the end of World War II.

    Clyde had Sirius radio tuned to the sixties channel to ward off drowsiness. He and Jane Ann often tuned to the fifties, sixties, and occasionally the seventies channels, reliving the golden years of fabulous music. He would occasionally slip in classic country: George Jones, Merle Haggard, and the like. And sometimes real oldies like Jimmie Rogers, Ernest Tubb, and Hank Williams when he felt bold. Once in a blue moon, we would sprinkle in gospel quartet-style music, the stuff of Dottie Rambo and Bill Gaither.

    He was concentrating on whether he was a pretender, pretending to be a vigilante, avenging Jane Ann and protecting the innocent driving world, or merely on a terroristic vendetta journey, no better than marauding scalp hunters. Then came Brian Hyland’s Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini and Clyde snapped out of his funk. He’d never seen Jane Ann in a bikini, but had a good imagination.  
 
+++
 
    The paint sufficiently dry, and his supply of .22 shells replenished from a box of 500 that he’d made before his first safari, he was ready to get right back on the horse, so to speak. He wouldn’t need the bullets with his ray gun operational, but like the good Boy Scout that he’d been … He plugged his phone into a charger, preparing it for his trip. It rang immediately.

    “Hey, pop!”

    “Well, hello, Son. Haven’t heard from you in a while.”

    “’Cause your phone’s never on. You should call me if you leave it off.”

    “Oh, I know. It’s just that without Jane Ann …”

    “Yeah, but we still love you.”

    “Thank you, Son.”

    “We were hoping you’d get up to see us before now. Whatcha been doing? Not sitting home moping around, I hope. Watching movies all day.”

    “Oh, no. I’ve been doing some reading, I guess. Spent a lot of time on an electric project out in the garage.”

    “Yeah, what’re you making?”

    “A mess, mostly. I can wire black-to-black, but you know, electrical stuff not exactly my forte.”

    “Hey, you hear about the Turnpike Terrorist? I think about you and your war on truckers every time I see it on the news. They have a name for it now – brake-checking. That’s not you is it?” His chuckle told Clyde that he was at least half joking, not really suspicious.

    “Yeah, well, yeah, I heard about that. Mom and I were satisfied to put ‘em in Truckers’ Prison.”

    They talked for a couple minutes about the grandkids, said their goodbyes and best wishes, and hung up. Clyde wondered whether his son, Rick, or his daughter, Corine, would turn him in if they truly suspected him, recalling that the Una-bomber had been outed by his brother.

    His pick-up fueled, his provisions restocked, Clyde headed to Florida, determined to go event-free. Before stopping for the night, he’d been sorry on three different occasions that he’d pledged, having to satisfy himself with merely assigning bad drivers to his and Jane Ann’s Truckers’ Prison.

    The next day held no such promise, wasting a trucker who’d committed his crime in Alabama but was in Florida sitting on the side of the road with no functioning cell phone, radio, or truck, the engine brain-smoking.

    This brought Clyde to a dilemma, there was no realistic east-west freeway to the south, but he really would like to hammer at least one more in Florida.

    One more and he’d get to Highway 98, the beach highway, then over to I-75 and do a little northbound hunting. One thing for sure, he didn’t dare cross Pensacola Bay on the I-10 bridge, or for that matter, the Mobile Bay bridge on I-10 heading back west: sure-fire traps, both of them. Side roads, I-75, get one more, and then get outta Dodge, as they say.
 

Author Notes No truckers were injured in the writing of this story. And yes, I am fully aware that there are more good (great) truckers out there than there are bad ones.
The Doppler effect is the change in the frequency of a wave in relation to an observer who is moving relative to the source of the wave. (def. taken straight from Wikipedia)
A 'boomer' is a person (in the U.S. at least) born between 1946 and 1964, named so due to the 'boom' in the birth rate following World War II.
Brake-checking is the term applied to vehicles abruptly pulling in front of another vehicle, usually a big truck, and slamming on the brakes, giving the vehicle cut off an opportunity to 'check' his brakes to determine whether they work or not. The practice has become quite popular.
The 'Una Bomber' is the name given to Ted Kaczynski who mailed letter bombs to American dignitaries in the latter part of the 20th century.
To 'get outta Dodge' is an expression meaning to leave the area quickly. It came from the TV show 'Gunsmoke'.
Clyde: A retiree whose wife, Jane Ann, died as a direct result of a truck driver's action
Jane Ann: Clyde's deceased wife, dead by the action of a trucker (Santa Claus)
Santa Claus: the name Clyde gave the Xavious Trucking driver responsible for Jane Ann's death
Thurmon: a middle-aged truck driver
Sara: Thurmon's wife
Nate: Thurmon's 12 y.o. son
Susan: Thurmon's 7 y.o. daughter
Corine: Clyde's grown daughter
Rick: Clyde's grown son

Photo courtesy of cleo85 (Don't drink and drive) from FanArtReview


Chapter 7
Truckin, Ch 7

By Wayne Fowler

In the last part Clyde was moved by radio music as well as by a phone call from his son, Rick.
 
Chapter 7
 
One day, sitting in a diner where Clyde doubted any trucker could park, he watched the traffic on the business section of the highway, noting how many truckers used their engine brakes instead of regular brakes. Clyde recalled with a grin how Jane Ann had wanted him to petition the County Judge to get a No Jake Brakes sign on the road near their home. He determined to add that to his punishable offense list.

    Hunting was getting harder. There were offenders, but getting them alone was nearly impossible on I-95 up the eastern seaboard. And when he did, it seemed every dark sedan was an escort, ready to bust him. He knew that most of his fear was paranoia, but was reasonably certain that not all were. The horse was bucking him off, despite his Florida success.

    He thought about reverting to his days before the war, back when he dealt with annoying truckers less aggressively. For years, Clyde’s toolbox was limited to paybacks less lethal, simply pulling in front of offending truckers and slowing them down, as slow as thirty-forty miles an hour. When they’d try to pass, he would change lanes in front of them. Once, he infuriated a driver so badly that the trucker followed him off the freeway. Clyde intended to slip in behind the trucker to see whether his behavior had changed. The trucker was prepared to fight, more than likely with a gun. Clyde sped off. Leaving the trucker to seethe.

    What truckers on YouTube call brake-checking, Clyde termed just slowing him down, making him shift gears, when possible. Pull in front, hit the brakes, use the gas when necessary to avoid a collision, and let the guy know he’d aggravated him.

    To revert to those tactics now, when he couldn’t effectively isolate an offender, would be far too dangerous, allowing truckers to record his license plate and a description.
 
+++
 
    “One-ten, maybe,” the Geeky guy said. “Two-twenty would prob’ly take out the neighborhood, at least a couple others, anyway. You don’t wanna do that, you the only one in the building not affected, you know?”

    Clyde’s story was that he wanted to jam up, or short-circuit an apartment neighbor’s obtrusive electronics. “The kid wouldn’t listen to reason, the manager was scared of the guy, etcetera. He didn’t want to move, being there over twenty years and the new guy only there a few months. If he went to the law, the guy would probably poison his dog, blah, blah, blah.” Clyde’s hyperbole was in overdrive. He felt he could convince the Pope to murder the people in the non-existent next-door apartment.

    “You ever hear of the Havana Syndrome?”

    “I don’t want to make him sick,” Clyde replied.

    “No, I mean, it’s like that, but well, more like a neutron bomb. You know, the one that the Russians have that will knock out every solid state in the city – nothin’ works, not even your toaster. Oh, the Russian bomb kills people and leaves all the infrastructure – so they move right in with all your stuff, you know?”

    Clyde’s frown spoke for him.

    “Well, not that extreme, but you want somethin’ in between, a simple jamming device.”

    “Is there such a thing?” Clyde asked.

    “Not over the counter,” he said with a winking brow that was intended to convey any sort of conspiracy theory. “There was a guy who invented a sound wave interrupter. He wanted to nullify the sound waves of jet engines by shooting negating sound waves back at the engine, like opposing waves on an oscilloscope.”

    Clyde held silent.

    “Didn’t work ‘cause it inhibited performance, affected the electronics somehow.”
  
     The man gave Clyde the eye, wondering if he was the one he'd heard about in the news, the Turnpike Terrorist. Silently winking to himself, he decided to erase the day's surveillance tape, having already sided with anyone willing to take on obnoxious truckers.

    Clyde spent the next month on the internet, erasing searches once printing out what might be useful, burning paper copies once put to memory. After he was finished, he wished he’d done all the computer work at a library. In his garage, he became mechanically and electronically handy, and a favorite customer of Harbor Freight, and then Lowes, and Radio Shack, the last Radio Shack in the state, the associate said.

    The completed project, housed in a steel box to contain the resulting product and protect his own electronics, weighed nearly two hundred pounds and required disassembly before mounting into a vehicle. Clyde did not doubt that someone with more competence could devise a miniaturized version, a more sophisticated and efficient machine – but it worked. And no one knew about it except himself.

    His new hard hat properly scuffed, and his two-year-old F-150 fitted with a secure and lockable bed cover, Clyde went to work rigging the license plate cover device, requiring a contortion of pulleys and cable work. After several failed efforts, he finally shaped a more or less parabolic cone to fit the oval tailgate Ford logo, shooting through the plastic as if it wasn’t even there.

    The intermittent flow of microwaved bursts of ions, facilitated by a clever arrangement of a simple personal fan and metal ductwork, the effective range he estimated to be about fifty feet, give or take. Sufficient to fry electronics in the engine compartment, the cab, and sorry to say, also the refrigerator cooling the contents of a refrigerated trailer. Oh well.

    But it could not operate on a twelve-volt automobile system. It needed household one-ten. Thus, the need for a pickup truck. With an array of deep motorhome, or marine six-volt, deep batteries connected to the truck’s charging alternator, with a transducer, a transformer, and inverter, before and after the device in series, respectively, the outfit gained an additional four hundred pounds. Again, the pickup truck with the high power, heavy-duty package.

    With the back glass tinted to blackout strength, the license plate cover operating smoothly, he tested the device on a junker with a CB radio purchased from a scrap yard and a cheap burner cell phone. The first test was from fifty feet. Shooting directly out the tailgate, he would have to pass his prey, easing in front of it in a manner not to alarm, or cause a trucker to immediately change lanes to avoid a collision. He wanted to direct the blast at a diagonal, allowing him to remain in a passing lane, but without further engineering … maybe through the tail light lens. Next time home he would experiment, but for now he was becoming more anxious by the day. He felt that truckers were getting away with murder as he sat and tinkered.

From fifty feet, he stopped the cell phone and the radio, but not the engine. Experimenting, he laid on the trigger for longer and longer durations before attempting from a closer distance. He fried the transformer. The longer burst also brought the battery array to dangerously high temperatures. A fire or explosion would be bad. Not being a real electronics expert, though more educated by the day, it took hours to isolate the problem. He bought two replacements, just in case. Finally, he determined that five seconds at forty feet should get the job done. Though with the variety of configurations, gauges of steel, and other plating materials between his blaster and the electronics of the various models and manufacturers of trucks, he wasn’t sure. He put a rifle barrel hole in the side window and packed the .22 just in case.

The last thing he did was to outfit his truck with a CB radio, wondering why he hadn’t thought to do it earlier. Hearing truckers’ chatter on channel nineteen could be helpful.

His first opportunity, forced somewhat – too bad for the barely rude trucker – was on I-70 in Kansas. Clyde didn’t want a mishap too close to home, or on a route he most frequented. Cutting back quickly after passing the trucker, a tad sooner than etiquette and protocol allowed, Clyde hit the trigger immediately, having covered the license plate as passing. After a four-second blast with nothing happening – no obvious response from the truck, he triggered the device a second time, his nerves atwitter. Hearing a loud backfire, Clyde throttled down, and made his escape, restoring his plate once too distant to read. The trucker was too busy handling his rig in any event, his power steering out, as well as the trailer air brakes. Success! Clyde was jubilant, determined to go with a full five-second burst the first time on the next one. Discipline to hold the full one one thousand, two one thousand… was not easy. It being already late afternoon, he decided to call it a day. To settle himself in a 1960s vintage motel he found in a sleepy Kansas farm community. A local dive offered a pizza burger through their drive-up window. That with a Coke, a rare treat, Clyde settled back on the uncomfortable plastic chair that the motel offered to watch cable news and enjoy the memories of news-watching on a fairly regular basis with Jane Ann.
 
+++
 
    Before his next safari, he rented a Ford Edge similar to the one he and Jane Ann once owned and took a trip to see his kids and grandkids, thinking it might be his last visit with them.
 

Author Notes No truckers were injured in the writing of this story. And yes, I am fully aware that there are more good (great) truckers out there than there are bad ones.
Brake-checking is the term applied to vehicles abruptly pulling in front of another vehicle, usually a big truck, and slamming on the brakes, giving the vehicle cut off an opportunity to 'check' his brakes to determine whether they work or not. The practice has become quite popular.
One-ten and two-twenty refers to volts of current delivered to plug-in outlets. Ordinary electricity is 110. Things like water heaters and stoves/ovens require 220.
Havana Syndrome is the term applied to suspected attacks on Americans in the U.S. embassy in Havanna, bombarding the building with malevolent rays.
Jake braking is when truckers use engine compression to slow their rigs. Outlawing them is due to their extreme noisiness, like a Harley Davidson motorcycle, or a vehicle without a muffler.
Transducers and stuff are necessary to convert battery energy to household current.

Clyde: A retiree whose wife, Jane Ann, died as a direct result of a truck driver's action
Jane Ann: Clyde's deceased wife, dead by the action of a trucker (Santa Claus)
Santa Claus: the name Clyde gave the Xavious Trucking driver responsible for Jane Ann's death
Thurmon: a middle-aged truck driver
Sara: Thurmon's wife
Nate: Thurmon's 12 y.o. son
Susan: Thurmon's 7 y.o. daughter
Corine: Clyde's grown daughter
Rick: Clyde's grown son


Chapter 8
truckin, Ch.8

By Wayne Fowler

In the last part Clyde rigged up an electronic jamming device in an F150 pickup truck. He continued sidelining truckers.
 
Chapter 8
 
    First Thurmon noticed a drop in his speed. Checking his mirrors, something every good trucker does every several seconds, he saw flashing headlights and then smoke. Signaling his move, Thurmon gradually moved onto the shoulder of the road as far as he felt safe. After engaging his four-way flashers, he exited the truck to do a quick-around survey. It didn’t take long to discover that the brakes on a rear dual had locked, destroying two tires.

    After placing his safety triangles twenty-five and fifty yards behind his rig, he again called his company road service as well as his supervisor, again grateful that he wasn’t a private contractor and on his own. He called Sara while he waited. “No, no hon. It wasn’t the truck killer. Yes, I’m sure. It was the brakes. No, he couldn’t do that. It was the stupid trucker who hauled this trailer last. He should have known to red-tag the trailer. Or somebody at dispatch who should have followed the maintenance schedule and had this trailer checked. That’s usually the problem."

Thurmon continued, “I know, hon. This is two trips in a row. But it’s been tires – or brakes – both times. It’s not like I ran out of fuel, or did anything. I don’t think they’ll hold it against me. I got my ten-year accident-free pin, remember? That should mean something to them. Don’t get upset. It’ll be all right.

“Yes, hon. I’m watching for him. A gun or rifle sticking out a window should be pretty easy to see, but nobody has yet, far as I know. He’ll get caught.

“Okay, darlin’," Thurmon said. "Next time I’m home I’ll go around and see what I can do driving locally, the cement company or something. It’s only about half pay, but then you could get a job and we’d be about the same."
 
"But day care and transporting the kids..." Sara injected.

“Yeah, except for that, takin’ care of the kids," Thirmon agreed.

“I love you, too Sara. I’m squeezing’ you right now. I love you.”

“Oh, Thurm! I forgot to ask you about all the wrecks. Have you heard any news?”

“Yeah, but what do you mean?”

“Well, I saw a report, I don’t know Frontline, or 20-20, I don’t know, about, and it’s all over the country. Cars are letting trucks hit them. There was a lot of cell phone footage. It’s like car drivers are protesting, not yielding, or getting out of the way of trucks that need more room, merging especially. They think car drivers are being incentivized by the Turnpike guy.”

“Maybe, hon, maybe. I’ll be extra cautious, okay?”

“Okay, please do. Please, for us. I love you.”

“I love you!”

Thurmon ended the call and checked his mirrors, knowing that his observations during the call were less than perfect.

The truth was that local drivers received about two-thirds the pay of OTR, over-the-road, drivers, but only those working for the larger corporations. Those gigs were few and far between, often secured by references from those already employed.

A mobile mechanic was able to fix the brakes, “At least temporarily,” he said.
 
+++
 
    At maybe two miles per hour faster than the truck ahead, Thurmon crept up on a furniture hauler. Every trucker knew that furniture and mail were light loads. They would never approach maximum weight limits. Mail trucks rarely traveled more than a day’s drive distance. Furniture trucks, though, often crossed the country. This furniture truck was moving along at a steady seventy-eight miles per hour in the posted eighty-mile-an-hour limit zone. It was a bit faster than Thurmon normally drove, but after catching him on a downhill grade, Thurmon found the sweet drafting spot, a distance of about seventy or eighty feet behind where he could benefit from the furniture truck slicing the wind for him, but still get sufficient air to his radiator, keeping his engine cool. At that distance, he could easily save ten percent or more on fuel burned.

Traffic was medium, over-easy, as he liked to say. After about an hour of drafting, Thurmon began to imagine his truck stop a couple hours ahead – a hot meal, a hot shower, and level, fairly quiet sleeping. He remembered many times arriving at various truck stops only to find all parking spots occupied. He checked his mirrors, put on his blinker, and edged to the passing lane. Wham! The full force of the westerly wind slammed him head-on. He immediately lost his acceleration. He felt himself the fool as he timidly returned to the right lane while a stream of cars passed him. Thurmon imagined all the four-wheelers laughing at him. He also imagined the furniture trucker getting the last parking spot, the last of the chicken fried steak meals, and the last of the hot water. He prayed to God that none of his family would call him just then. He did not want to bite anyone’s head off.
 
+++
 
    At truck stops Thurmon heard the chatter about sending money for a bounty on the truck killer. Some talked about patrolling truck stops and rest stops as trucker protection. Thurmon didn’t say anything, but couldn’t find any way to imagine what those men expected to find – some fiend carrying a gun and shooting tires in the parking lot? Or stabbing and slashing tires? Or a crazed Jack Nicholson like in the movie The Shining, or Michael Douglas in Falling Down where a man goes off on a terror rage. Or maybe a version of the Unabomber, Ted Kaczynski, a man on a vendetta.

    Thurmon leaned toward the latter. (One radio news report sometime after the hundredth likely targeted truck that the FBI was getting involved, beginning with searching databases for fatality accidents.) The trouble was that there were thousands of them, especially if investigators went back a few years.
 
+++
 
    Fortunate for Clyde, the incident involving Jane Ann was never listed as a vehicle accident.
 
+++
 
    “Dad, what will they do with the truck killer?” Nate held onto the baseball they’d been playing catch with as he waited for Thurmon’s response. “Will they execute him?”

    Thurmon smiled, waving his glove indicating that Nate should throw the ball. “Nah. He hasn’t hurt anyone. Just messed with them.”

    “He’s a terrorist, I heard.”

    Thurmon nodded. “Yeah, I could see some thinking that. But what would you do if you knew that a delivery driver, say UPS, ran over and killed Susan?” Thinking fast, Thurmon amended his question. “Or your mom?”

    Nate’s next throw was far off target, making Thurmon run for it. He figured he’d made his son think. “The thing is… he hasn’t actually hurt anyone. He’s mad, but maybe not crazy. It’s way more than somebody mad at being cut off, but… I don’t know, Nate. I’m just worried about copycats, people who don’t have themselves in as good a control as the truck killer.”

    “What would you do with him if you could catch him?”

    After a moment Thurmon replied, “I’d want to talk to him, find out what happened, and how we could make it right.”
 
+++
 
Sara knew not to call Thurmon unless it was an emergency. The kids, though, had yet to completely grasp what constituted an emergency. And being home only one week after three on the road, normally anyway, made Thurmon miss them enough to not complain, or object. Each family member had a different ring. Thurmon had learned that he needed to take Sara’s or Nate’s calls. (Nathan being a very responsible twelve-year-old, no matter how dicey the traffic.) Susan’s call could go to voice mail if traffic was too hectic. He always returned calls as quickly as he could.

“What’s up, Nate?” Thurmon answered.

    “Oh, nothin’.”

    His son’s tone made Thurmon wish he was there with him. “Your sister pestering you again?” Thurmon asked as he checked his mirrors, knowing how distracting talking with his kids could be.

    “Nah. It’s Coach Nelson. He’s such a jerk.”

    Thurmon wanted to bust Nelson in the mouth. Blinking back tears of frustration, he asked what was going on.

    “He has his favorites, but since I’m an outfielder I get to play some, most games, I guess. It’s just that whenever a kid’s dad is there Coach always puts him in for the whole game instead of, you know, subbin’.”

    Thurmon often wished he could be home: special occasions like birthdays, anniversaries, school pageants… and Little League games. And then there was the issue of the lawn growing to jungle stage before he could get home and take care of it. Sara and Nate did their best, but sometimes the half acre was more than they could handle. And in the winter there was snow and ice. Thurmon hated knowing that Sara’s habit was to only scrape the minimum, letting the defroster take off the ice necessary for safe driving. He should be there to properly parent his kids, and husband his wife. That night’s rest on a freeway off-ramp did not meet his body’s needs. He paid the price the next day.
 

Author Notes No truckers were injured in the writing of this story. And yes, I am fully aware that there are more good (great) truckers out there than there are bad ones.

Clyde: A retiree whose wife, Jane Ann, died as a direct result of a truck driver's action
Jane Ann: Clyde's deceased wife, dead by the action of a trucker (Santa Claus)
Santa Claus: the name Clyde gave the Xavious Trucking driver responsible for Jane Ann's death
Thurmon: a middle-aged truck driver
Sara: Thurmon's wife
Nate: Thurmon's 12 y.o. son
Susan: Thurmon's 7 y.o. daughter
Corine: Clyde's grown daughter
Rick: Clyde's grown son


Chapter 9
Truckin, Ch 9

By Wayne Fowler

In the last part we learn more of truckers’ lives and struggles.
 
Chapter 9
 
    “Breaker one nine.” Thurmon didn’t often use his CB radio, but he kept it turned on low enough not to disturb Willie Nelson or the chirping of his phone. Earbuds helped, and also helped squelch B radio chatter. Breaker one nine was somehow programmed into his psyche, a phrase generally reserved for a notice from a fellow trucker of pertinent, if not invaluable information: a wreck, police, lane closures, things that directly related to driving.

    Channel nineteen was exclusively a trucker’s channel. Breaker one nine was code that all conversations should stop, allowing the floor to the breaking into speaker.

    “Breaker one nine. Forty marker 126 eastbound.” Every trucker knew that the speaker was referring to U.S. I-40, mile marker 126 in the eastbound lanes. There was never any confusion as to which state, even if near state lines since all measuring began on the west entry, counting up from the west and down from the east.

    “Smokies surrounding a silver four-wheeler. Might be our shooter.” The speaker’s saying shooter mimicked most who continued to refer to the Turnpike Terrorist as using a gun.

    It had been months since Clyde’s first verified tire kill. After dozens such incidents, the word began to spread until most nationwide trucking firms broadcast bulletins to their drivers. And like Jesse James, nearly every side-lined truck was attributed to the truck killer, as Clyde began to be referred to. The fact that hundreds and thousands of miles separated incidents did not affect attributions to Clyde’s reputation, though no one had yet correctly identified him.

    Clyde’s electronic wizardry had yet to be identified.
 
+++
 
    But the attention did nothing to change driving behaviors. It seemed to both Thurmon, and Clyde, though Clyde was unaware of trucking company notices to their drivers, that if there was any change in practices, it was for the worse, not the better.
 
+++
 
    Thurmon was in the right-most lane that his trucker GPS, Global Positioning System, recommended for navigation through the construction-fraught Oklahoma City. Trucker’s GPS was a Godsend. Every trucker bought one version, or another. Most trucking companies, as did Thurmon’s, required drivers to purchase their own. Thurmon’s was the middle-of-the-road, average version. It had lane indicating, and overpass heights, but did not allow him to enter his truck height, nor did it have real-time traffic updates. Thurmon was grateful not to miss turns, misses that could cost hours and money.

It was the middle of the weekday afternoon, and traffic was traveling at seventy miles per hour, nearly bumper-to-bumper. To his left, he watched a pickup truck, obviously a private lawncare individual since it carried several pieces of equipment, but lacked business signage. What drew Thurmon’s attention was the fact that the tailgate was down. Crazy. Who would not secure the tailgate? Thurmon surmised that it came open at one of the many potholes in the road, what with the construction and all. But with any degree of awareness, the driver should have seen his problem.

    Sure enough, as the pickup hit a bump, a leaf blower bounced out of the bed, landing on the road just ahead of the following vehicle. Evidently aware of the potential hazard, that driver quickly swerved to avoid the wreck-causing obstacle, but just as quickly swerved back, avoiding any collision. The close-following car behind that one jammed on its brakes, but quickly accelerated just in time not to be rear-ended. Between the first and second cars, the leaf blower made it to the inside shoulder, coming to a stop at a concrete barrier. Catastrophe averted, Thurmon took a breath, not realizing that he’d been holding it.

    “Not all four-wheelers are operated by bone-headed, cell-phone-glued, mouth-breathers,” he told himself.
    

+++
 
    “Dad, Susan took my baseball. My Sabertooth ball.”

    Thurmon knew that it was a big deal. He’d been able to take Nate to a professional baseball game, the state’s Sabertooth team against their biggest rivals. Nate was lucky enough to snag a homerun ball. Thurmon stopped at a local sporting goods store on the way home to get an acceptable trophy display case, an acrylic box. In a couple years he would take Susan.

    “Where’s your mom?” Thurmon asked.

    “Walmart. I’m babysitting.”

    Thurmon knew that it was perfectly fine for twelve-year-old Nate to watch seven-year-old Susan for the time it would take Sara to shop. “Put Susan on.”

    “SUSAN!”

    Thurmon could hear his daughter’s bellow, “I’M IN THE BATHROOM!” Thurmon caught himself, instinctively grabbing his airbrakes, slowing his load, then his foot brakes and engine brakes, commonly known as jake brakes, for the tractor. He’d failed to notice that the string of vehicles in front of him had begun to slow down. The pickup truck pulling a car hauler directly in front of him did not use its brakes, but simply let off the gas, slowing dramatically. Slowing in such a manner, the brake lights never activated. Followers were not given any warning of what was happening. Thurmon hoped that nothing inside his trailer shifted and broke with his sudden, emergency braking. “How hard would it have been for the pickup driver to just touch his brake pedal?” Thurmon complained to himself.

    “Tell your mother to call me,” Thurmon said too tersely, immediately sorry for his tone. But it was too late. He knew that he’d hurt his son’s feelings with his tone. He wished that he could take it back, that he’d asked Nate to take the phone to Susan. He wished he was home.
 
+++
 
    “Breaker one nine. A silver four-wheeler approaching a red tractor trailer 40 somewhere around marker 300 westbound.” Thurmon was hearing dozens of such reports a day. He was beginning to ignore them. Many reports were in such conflict that they were becoming a nuisance.
 
+++
 
    The truth was that by this date, Clyde had already hunted successfully with a different color car, but had already progressed to his F150 using his electronics-jamming ray gun.
 
+++
 
    “One last item,” the television news reporter said. “A new twist to the Turnpike Terrorist. It would seem that the tire-shooter has gone hi-tech. After weeks without shot-out tires, the Terror of the Turnpikes can now, evidently, disable not only vehicles but communication devices, as well. Motorists are cautioned to be aware, and to call this special FBI phone number available twenty-four hours a day with any information leading to stopping this terror.”

    Clyde was furious. He was not a terrorist. And the way it was presented, he was a danger to all travelers. “Trucks! Big-rig trucks. They were his only targets. Why didn’t they say that? Why didn’t they say he only hit the inconsiderate, traffic law violators?” he said to the TV.

    The ad that followed caught Clyde’s attention.

    “We only hire considerate drivers, but we reward them for their dedication to rules of the road and the ideals of basic courtesy. Join our family of safe, and friendly drivers here at J. D. Trucking, America’s delivery family. And we don’t hesitate to let go those identified as unfriendly, inconsiderate, or unkind.”

    “Hah,” Clyde said aloud to the tiny flat-screen TV. “Family, family and America! How blatant can you get? Appeal to family values and patriotism. Hah!”

    Cleaning up after his early supper of microwave popcorn and a lukewarm juice drink while reflecting on the ad, Clyde realized that he had only stopped one or two J. D. trucks in his entire time. Clyde paused. “But wait. That last part, delivered in a near whisper. That was a direct message to him, the Terror of the Turnpike, a name no doubt invented by a New York City reporter. J. D. was asking him to lay off their trucks. Report a bad driver, and he would be taken seriously. He’d done that in the past, years in the past. How’s my driving? Call 555-123-4567. He did. “Thank you, Sir. I’ll call the driver right away.” Who knows whether or not they did? One thing for sure, Clyde would not be making any calls that might identify himself. Surely the FBI would be doing searches and making visits. And it wouldn’t do to be away from home for periods that they could tie to incidents. Clyde had a cell phone, but only for the extreme emergency. Should he, for any reason, cause a wreck, he would immediately call for help. But mostly, he used it for the maps feature, keeping the battery out of the phone except when he wanted to power up for a moment. Usually, though, he was able to navigate quite well with a map book. Back when he and Jane Ann traveled, they truly appreciated the lady in the phone offering right or left-lane advisements. She was a life-saver. But now, if he mistakenly found himself headed the wrong way on the wrong road, who was to care? Maybe it would be for the best, the highway choosing his randomness for him.

“Hmmm, J. D. Trucking… he might find his way to cut them slack.
 

Author Notes Clyde: A retiree whose wife, Jane Ann, died as a direct result of a truck driver's action
Jane Ann: Clyde's deceased wife, dead by the action of a trucker (Santa Claus)
Santa Claus: the name Clyde gave the Xavious Trucking driver responsible for Jane Ann's death
Thurmon: a middle-aged truck driver
Sara: Thurmon's wife
Nate: Thurmon's 12 y.o. son
Susan: Thurmon's 7 y.o. daughter
Corine: Clyde's grown daughter
Rick: Clyde's grown son
Rick: Clyde's grown son

CB radio: Citizen's Band. Channel 19 is generally accepted as exclusively a truckers' channel.
Four-wheeler: a term truckers use to refer to autos and pickup trucks.
Smokie: policeman
Tractor: a term used for the cab/truck part of the semi-truck


Chapter 10
Truckin, Ch 10

By Wayne Fowler

In the last part we learn more of the issues that family truckers experience while on the road. The authorities finally caught on to Clyde’s jammer.
 
Chapter 10
 
    Clyde’s jamming system seemed to be functioning fine. For Peterbilts, though, he learned, he needed to get just a little closer and give it six seconds. After the first success, he found where he could safely stop and check out the gear. All seemed well, except for the truck bed temperature – too hot. The next trip home he would try to ventilate the bed, maybe install one of those fancy, schmancey indoor, box A/C units. Just plug’n play.

    Since he was exposed more to the new device, letting truckers get a better description of his outfit than they had with his car, he utilized official crossovers more than in the past. He also took more evasive moves, using country roads that might not be considered escape routes. Mindful that a white F-150 parked between trees out in the country might be suspicious-looking to a local, when Clyde felt he needed to stop and park for a while, he tried to do his hiding in plain sight: at a park, local, or state, at a Walmart, or on a side street next to a pickup truck dealership.

    Checking the national news, he often saw reports of his exploits. Some incidents being attributed that he’d been nowhere near, truckers suffering breakdowns wanted a few minutes of fame. He found comical the few truckers who agreed to interviews, expressing stupor, and total ignorance as to why they might have been selected, set apart from all the other truckers. Their lying was transparent. Once, the camera broke away from the trucker, focusing on a scraggily bearded, overweight, shaggy-looking character about fifty years old. The guy started babbling as if asked a question, “I seen him, I did. He was shootin’ out that off-ramp on two wheels, slingin’ gravel. I thought it was one a’ those gas trucks. You know, the frackin’ people, wearin’ that white hard hat. I knew I couldn’t catch him, flyin’ up 213.”

    It was on Highway 213. That was Clyde, but he wasn’t flying, always careful to drive over-easy, as he called it. Reflecting, Clyde figured that the guy saw the incident as he drove south on 213, his white pick-up close in front of the diesel rig, and then shooting away as the trucker rolled to a stop. Taking the exit that was just car lengths ahead, the guy had a bird’s-eye-view.

    “So, I came down the off-ramp, and well, here I am.”

    The reporter from Cheyenne attempted a question.

    “I was a trucker,” the Good Samaritan added quickly. “Hurt my back.”

    The editor cut him at that point. Clyde wondered why he’d let him continue at all until he saw the camera pan to a load of small bales of hay on the bed of his beat-up Sierra.

    Clyde turned off the TV to think. He was relieved when he remembered that he hadn’t flipped the plate cover off until up 213, the exit being so close to the action.

    He would lose the white hard hat. And go back to a Taurus, and have a back-up vehicle for while at home, anyway. And he would paint his F-150. A trip to Harbor Freight, a can of Forest Green as well as a can of Clear Coat, the green specific to Ford, from off the shelf at an auto supply store in a different state. With ultra-fine grit emery paper and blue tape for masking, he was ready to change stripes. By the time he was finished, he didn’t know how in the world Earl Scheib could have ever painted a car for $29.99.  Letting the truck sit in his garage for a week, or so, he outfitted his reddish-maroonish Taurus, a hole in the side window, and set off to do some retro throw-back hunting, give the reporters and the FBI something else to consider, namely, that there may now be two Turnpike Terrorists.

    In no particular hurry after getting a late start, Clyde pulled into the first rest stop he came to. It going on evening, he wanted to check out the game, survey his prey. He had no intention of using the facilities. He never would. Too great a risk of a trucker taking a wild, but lucky, guess. Neither would he ever use a rest stop to sleep for the same reason. He has, though, on occasion, stopped briefly to study a map, though his preference was to take an exit, cross over, and stop on the on-ramp across the road. This time, he idled through the rest area simply to get a feel for the atmosphere. It was well worth the risk. Huddled in three separate groups, he saw truckers engaged in some sort of parley. By body language, he also surmised that they were packing heat, armed. Hmmm. He wondered if any might shoot a hole through his own pick-up’s windshield. Maybe one who owned his own rig. It was certainly something to consider.

    He also noted civilian cars, muscle cars he used to call them, alongside some of the trucks. Escorts, maybe? Armed guards? Today’s Pinkertons? Maybe. He would have to be alert, conscious that they might lurk a distance behind, ready to call his trucker to cut him off and entrap a car or truck that resembled a suspected vehicle. Clyde decided to let evil-doers go for a while and watch for a truck and guardian team. Not seeing one that evening, he circled back, timing his pass by the rest stop in hopes of spotting one of the teams he’d seen the evening before.

He did. Matching their speed, trying to keep at least one car between them, it was almost a hundred miles before a white F-150 approached from behind running the fast lane at least ten miles per hour over the limit. Sure enough, the truck cut him off, making the pick-up hit his brakes. As many male drivers do, the pick-up, once finally past the diesel, made a quick cut back and gave him a brake check, hitting his brakes and forcing the big rig to hit his own. “It was not at all like I would have done,”” Clyde thought.” I would have let traffic clear, driving normally, waiting until I could have my way with him unmolested, even if it took hours.” Clyde would be in no hurry.

 The guardian rocketed ahead, cutting off a car himself. Once he reached astride the truck, the position of his right hand as seen through the back glass, plainly held a pistol aimed at the pick-up driver. Then it was off to the races. Clyde took an exit long before catching up to them, not interested in becoming bound up in any sort of mayhem. He fought disturbing thoughts about a potential incident of a pick-up driver being caught up in his vigilante game.
 
+++
 
    That night Clyde spent in a state park for the first time using a small, one-man tent and the few camping supplies he’d purchased several months back when he’d first begun his campaign. Not bothering with cookware, Clyde was content with nutrition bars, fruit, and crackers. Since Jane Ann’s death, his appetite, and interest in tasty foods nearly disappeared. Nothing excited him. Even the last ice cream he’d eaten was with Jane Ann. “It would be like cheating on you,” he once quipped. “I’d never go to a Sonic without you!” Since losing her, he’d lost over twenty pounds, but felt fit, glad to be rid of the caffeine addiction, as well as the need to eat four or five times a day.
 
    Trying to settle down, a group of men, probably fishermen of the park's river, became rowdier and rowdier, their friendly raucous behavior preventing sleep. It was obvious that one of them was the superior fisherman, or at least far luckier that day. To Clyde, the man's pride was off-putting. Instantly, Clyde transferred the man's psyche to his own. To what degree was his success affecting his nature? Was he proudly zapping his targets, or did he maintain his original impersonal mind-set? He didn't have an answer, only that he did not want to be the trophy blow-hard of the neighboring campsite.

    Without conscious knowledge, Clyde picked up his pace the next several days, working longer hours by earlier starts and later evenings. Almost by rote, he methodically sidelined trucks one after the other, day after day, scoring sometimes more than a few per day. Keeping to his methodology – randomly hopping to a different freeway after each hit – he began to add the north/south freeways to his routine, wondering why he hadn’t used those highways from the start.

    Glad he’d taken the CDL course, Clyde was more careful of tanker trucks. He hadn’t known the degree to which sloshing partial loads affected handling. It would be unconscionable to cause a rollover and subsequent calamity. He resolved to lay off tankers … or at least to exercise extreme caution if a tanker driver insisted on being sidelined.

    Tanker trucks caused Clyde to take note of load placards. He’d generally avoided tanker trucks during his rifle days for fear of one jackknifing and then being rammed by another big rig. His ray gun brought them back into play. Recalling the classroom study, Clyde paid closer attention to placards that described hazardous, or volatile loads: explosive, flammable, corrosive, toxic, infectious … even radio-active. Each designation had placard detail requirements. For example: a diamond-shaped red and white “dangerous” placard must be accompanied by another citing the specific dangerous material. Also, placards had specific placement regulations. Rules indicated whether placards were legitimate, or that the operator was deserving of punishment. For example, a truck bearing an “explosives” placard but parked near a bridge … no, no, no. Either he’s lying, or stupid. Either way …

    The lying concept caught Clyde’s attention. The awareness made him take note of certain placards that didn’t fit. They didn’t seem right: too new, misplaced, misaligned, on the back but not on the side.

    Clyde began to include some of them in his targeting whether they’d committed crimes or not.
 

Author Notes Don't drink and drive photo courtesy of FanArtReview by cleo85

Clyde: A retiree whose wife, Jane Ann, died as a direct result of a truck driver's action
Jane Ann: Clyde's deceased wife, dead by the action of a trucker (Santa Claus)
Santa Claus: the name Clyde gave the Xavious Trucking driver responsible for Jane Ann's death
Thurmon: a middle-aged truck driver
Sara: Thurmon's wife
Nate: Thurmon's 12 y.o. son
Susan: Thurmon's 7 y.o. daughter
Corine: Clyde's grown daughter
Rick: Clyde's grown son

A Good Samaritan is a person who altruistically comes to the aid of a person in need. The term is taken from Jesus’ parable found in Luke 10:25-37
Walmart is a grocery/department store.
Earl Scheib franchised auto painting shops.
A Peterbilt is the name of a brand of truck, like Mack, or Kenworth.
Sonic is a fast-food drive-in. Their soft-serve ice cream is the best!
Harbor Freight is a tool store
CDL: Commercial Driver's License


Chapter 11
Truckin, Ch 11

By Wayne Fowler

In the last part Clyde tested and proved out his ray gun. He noticed that some trucks were escorted by guardian vehicles. He picked up his pace of avenging Jane Ann, albeit with greater care.
 
Chapter 11
 
Clyde was on I-95, northbound, arguably the busiest freeway in the nation. One factor in truckers’ favor was that with such dense traffic, cutting people off, or unnecessarily lording it in the passing lane was infrequent. But when a trucker managed to commit such an offense, it was most often impossible for Clyde to isolate the offender to put him out of commission.

A trucker several cars ahead suddenly veered left into the passing lane. Unfortunately, that lane was occupied by two cars at the time. The leading car panic braked, causing the one behind him to jerk into the left breakdown lane, barely avoiding a collision. The trucker jerked back into his own lane, more than likely awakened from sleep, or at least drowsy-driving, awakened by the raised, lane markers. Unbelievably to Clyde, the trucker put on his left blinker, eventually passing another truck by cutting off a third car, making that driver hit his brakes.

Clyde focused on the offending trucker.

Within a few miles, Clyde was able to slip in front of the obviously independent trucker, a trucker who owned his own tractor and picked up loads as he could at depots. Without actually brake-checking him, Clyde slowed to sixty, then fifty, and then forty-five. Traffic was heavy enough that the trucker had no opportunity to squeeze into the passing lane. Eventually Clyde sped back up, leaving the trucker to waste fuel regaining speed.

After taking the next exit and waiting for his target to drive by, Clyde repeated his slowing the trucker down action. This time, Clyde lowered his window and shook his fist at the trucker. Clyde was prepared to repeat his routine as long as necessary. But this time, the trucker followed Clyde onto the off-ramp, murder and mayhem in his expression. Once he came to a full stop, Clyde jetted across the intersection, figuring that at this point the trucker probably exited his cab with a Glock nine.

Driving at the speed limit, Clyde reached the next exit seven miles further on without sighting Big Chartreuse, the truck of his project. Clyde only had to wait a couple minutes before he appeared, nearly as a blur, barreling by from beneath the underpass. He trailed from as far behind as he could and still keep the truck in sight. A hundred and forty-six miles and another state beyond, he followed the truck into a TransAmerica truck stop. It was a truck stop where truckers could get showers and valet service for their trucks.

    As quickly as he could, Clyde donned a baseball cap and a jacket that served as a disguise. He hoped that, along with the absence of sunglasses would be enough.

    Clyde lingered in the store area until his trucker friend was served his hamburger and fries lunch.

    "Hey," Clyde said, sitting down two bar stools away. Clyde had seen that his friend ignored a group of truckers seated at a long table on the other side of the room. The trucker didn't respond.

    "Tough one, huh?" Still the trucker did not respond.

    "Yeah, me too. Some fool cut me off, nearly jack-knifed me. I thought I was gonna be writin' a check for the farm."

    His head initiated a glance, stopped by his stiffened neck.

    "Anyway… safety first," Clyde said with a joke in his voice as he repeated the universal management mantra.

    Clyde left him still stewing in his juices.

    "The chartreuse Mack," the trucker told the cashier as he gave her his tag number. "I need to pay for the fuel."

    "Oh, it's paid for, hon. $382.41. He said to tell you he was the white Ford 150. He said you'd know. You know, the one who sat by you."

    Clyde was pretty sure he saw a tear well up as the man choked back a non-response. Hidden by the Little Debbie pastry rack, Clyde saw him swipe at both eyes as he cinched down his camo ballcap.
 
+++
 
    Sooner or later, as much time as Clyde spent on the highway, it was bound to happen: a crash between a truck and four-wheelers just in front of him. Clyde couldn’t see the actual initial impact, but what happened was obvious enough: a road-raging auto pulled in front of a trucker and brake-checked him. Only this time, the auto driver either miscalculated the trucker’s ability, or misjudged the trucker’s inclination to avoid ramming him, spinning him sideways and then catapulting the car into other traffic. The several-car pile-up was calamitous. Clyde only suffered a blown tire, unable to avoid debris.

    With people scrambling and dashing from one car to another, Clyde saw no value he could add to aiding folks actually involved. He busied himself changing his ruined tire as quickly as he could.

    “I’m Trooper McClean,” the police officer said, approaching just as Clyde was attempting to secure the blown tire behind his ray gun array. Clyde quickly pulled the tire back off the tailgate, closing it as casually as he could.

    “Dale,” Clyde said, using his middle name as he touched the bill of his cap in a faux salute.

    “Were you involved in the crash? You can get your tire covered by their insurance.”

    “Nah. I have hazard insurance on the tire. I’ll save the hassle. Thanks, though.” Clyde hoped the officer was busy enough to accept his word and move on.

    “Did you see what happened? Give me a statement?”

    “Not really. Happened kinda quick, know what I mean?”

    The Trooper nodded. Having all the statements he needed, he told Clyde that he was welcome to change his mind, just to call the state headquarters, give them the date, location, and his license number and he could make a claim.

    “We’ll have a lane opened up in a bit. Just work your way to the left and we’ll get you in. Have a good day.”

    Clyde’s restrained sigh of relief became an anxious choke of fear as the trooper noted Clyde’s license number in a pocket-sized notebook.

Clyde wedged the tire and wheel onto the passenger seat, preventing nosy eyes from peering into the bed of his pick-up. He spent the rest of the day considering that his license plate would be associated with a truck crash.
 

Author Notes Clyde: A retiree whose wife, Jane Ann, died as a direct result of a truck driver's action
Jane Ann: Clyde's deceased wife, dead by the action of a trucker (Santa Claus)
Santa Claus: the name Clyde gave the Xavious Trucking driver responsible for Jane Ann's death
Thurmon: a middle-aged truck driver
Sara: Thurmon's wife
Nate: Thurmon's 12 y.o. son
Susan: Thurmon's 7 y.o. daughter
Corine: Clyde's grown daughter
Rick: Clyde's grown son

photo courtesy FanArtReview 'Don't drink and drive' by cleo85


Chapter 12
Truckin, Ch 12

By Wayne Fowler

In the last part Clyde bought a tank of fuel for a trucker he’d tormented. And Clyde escaped police scrutiny after witnessing a crash.

Chapter 12
 
    One night, stopping at a convenient motel, Clyde tuned into PBS Newshour, his and Jane Ann’s favorite news program. Judy Woodruff’s special segment was the Turnpike Terrorist. Her initial comment had to do with the increased frequency, promising a more in-depth discussion later in the show with a roundtable discussion between the president of the Teamsters Union, Jason Summers, and the CEO of J. D. Trucking, Inc., Thomas McNeely.

    “Mr. McNeely, let me start with you,” Judy began. “I know you heard the interview I had with Assistant Director, Allan Tylerson, that we broadcast yesterday. He said that by their count there have been well over a hundred attacks on trucks since the recent trouble began, by some counts two or three hundred. He claimed that they began in November last year and that they’re looking at all truck-involved accidents up to a year before that date. What, may I ask, is your theory of why this is happening, and why now?”

Clyde was glad, now, that his incident wasn’t deemed an accident. The FBI would not run across it.

    “Well, Judy … and thank you for having me on your program. First let me say that I can only speak for my company, and our fleet of over 29,000 drivers and associates. But I’ll try to be generic enough to represent other carriers. By our reckoning, truck drivers are confronted with, on average, 344 vehicular engagements per shift. That is, they have to make a driver’s decision. And I’m not talking about how many times they are passed on the highway, I mean how many times they must decide whether to brake, change lanes, make unplanned shifts, what have you. If they don’t do something, things could go terribly wrong.” He hadn’t answered her question, but Judy moved on regardless.

    “Mr. Summers, one point three million members …”

    “That’s right, Judy. And let me tell you. On this subject I feel privileged to speak on the behalf of the other drivers, the independent drivers that are out there, day in, day out, night in, night out, battling the weather, the traffic, their employers …” Summers nodded toward McNeely. “You know, Judy, truckers are required to drive eleven hours a day, and then stop wherever they are for a rest of only eight hours, total.”

    “Yes, but isn’t it true that many of them, and many that don’t belong to the union, do so because they don’t want to be held to only eleven hours, that they want to keep driving?”

    “That’s not true, Judy. They …”

    “Look, they’re not all men,” McNeely interjected, cutting Summers off. “We have women drivers, and teams, couples that can keep their rigs moving twenty-four hours.”

    “Let’s turn back to the issue, shall we," Judy asked.

    “Knights of the Road, Knights of the Road,” Summers offered.

    “But you heard Mr. Tylerson say, in his comments yesterday, that trucks account for over half of all fatalities when the statistics are specific to freeway accidents, and 66% of the dollar value of damages.”

    “Well, that’s not really fair, Judy,” McNeely said. “Between a big rig and a car …”

    “But isn’t that just the point?”

    “550 feet,” Summers said. “It takes 550 feet to stop a fully loaded truck going fifty-five miles an hour. An empty truck going the speed of traffic could take over a quarter mile. And that’s if the truck is in top repair, which we all know, they are not. And if a trucker complains about his rig in disrepair, well, he finds himself parked, without a load, maybe dead-heading back, driving for free.”

    McNeely began to speak but was cut off by Judy. “Mr. Summers, you mentioned a moment ago something about Knights of the Road. Would you like to elaborate on that?”

    “Sure, Judy. You know, years ago, truckers used to stop for disabled cars. You know, help them out. Kids used to pump their arms to get truckers to sound their air horns.”

    “Yes, I remember that,” Judy chimed in, a huge smile on her face. “We would lay on the shelf, the ledge under the back window and… well…”

“Yeah, I did too. But now that driver has a computer tracking his every move. And sometimes cameras, and counters. Did you know Judy, that some outfits count how many times a driver applies his brakes? And he’s governed to 67 miles per hour? And did you know that most of the carriers only pay for miles, not waiting time, or loading time, or time tied up in construction zones?”

Judy didn’t have a response, or follow-up question for the rapid-fire tirade. “Mr. McNeely?”

“Let me just respond to the speed, the governed speed. We’re dealing with Mack, the manufacturer of most of our fleet. And we’ll be talking to the others, Peterbilt, Kenworth, and the others. They’ve agreed to immediately increase the governed speed to seventy, the speed limit on many of our interstate highways. They’ve also agreed to step it up to seventy-five after 10,000 miles. That alone, Judy, should go a long way toward the time it takes to pass a motorhome, or say, a car pulling a U-Haul trailer.”

Clyde, sitting on the edge of the bed noticed that McNeely deliberately avoided saying anything about passing other trucks.

“And one other thing I need to add. At J. D. Trucking, we red-line any truck that a driver declares unsafe. If it involves the drive train or safety. That truck is off the line until it’s fixed. Look, our customers don’t like it when their product is on the side of the road. And we don’t make any money fixing terrorized motors and tires.”

“Finally, starting with you, Mr. Summers, what about caravans, like that famous singer, who was it …”

“C. W. McCall,” Summers offered with a smile.

“Yes, what about them, caravans?”

“Nightmares. That’s all I can say.”

McNeely added, “We’ve done focus groups, believe it or not. Motorists don’t like ‘em.”

“Hate ‘em,” Summers injected.

“Motorists get blocked from their exits. They get bottlenecked with slower motorhomes, and the like, in the passing lanes …”

Summers took his turn. “And when several of them all want the same truck stop for refueling and whatnot… well, it just doesn’t work.”

The two vigorously nodded agreement.

“Well, Gentlemen, we’re gonna have to leave it there. I know there’s much more to be said on the subject, but unfortunately, we’re out of time. Thank you both for being here. And we all hope that the current trouble that brings us here will come to an end.

“But before we go, we have come upon a report, very unscientific, mind you, that about fifty percent of the general public is holding the Turnpike Terrorist as some sort of Jesse James figure, a sort of folk hero. The other fifty percent believe he is a menace to society and should be prosecuted and held responsible for his actions.

“And there you have it: the Turnpike Terrorist – a Robin Hood, or just a hood.”

The guests offered their thank yous and Judy ended the segment.
 

Author Notes PBS: Public Broadcasting Service.
Judy Woodruff: PBS Newshour anchor from 2013-2022
Clyde: A retiree whose wife, Jane Ann, died as a direct result of a truck driver's action
Jane Ann: Clyde's deceased wife, dead by the action of a trucker (Santa Claus)
Santa Claus: the name Clyde gave the Xavious Trucking driver responsible for Jane Ann's death
Thurmon: a middle-aged truck driver
Sara: Thurmon's wife
Nate: Thurmon's 12 y.o. son
Susan: Thurmon's 7 y.o. daughter
Corine: Clyde's grown daughter
Rick: Clyde's grown son

Photo courtesy FanArtReview, Don't drink and drive Cleo85


Chapter 13
Truckin, Ch 13

By Wayne Fowler

In the last part Clyde watched a television segment of the PBS News Hour in which he was featured as Judy Woodruff interviewed trucking company CEOs. Only one chapter remaining.
 
Chapter 13
 
Clyde was unpersuaded, wishing he’d seen Judy’s interview with the FBI. He did acknowledge that perhaps J. D. Trucking drivers might be offered slack, at least the benefit of the doubt. As with every interview he remembered watching with Jane Ann, he wished they’d gone into more depth, especially concerning drivers’ bad driving. And he certainly didn’t care for McNeely’s terrorized comment, though he struggled to come up with a better term.  But what good would it do for a 70mph governed truck pulling out to pass another governed truck and then hit a headwind, effectively slowing it to match the speed of the one he attempted to pass?

Shaking his head, he wondered whether he should return home. Waylaying trucks had become rote, almost so routine that there was little excitement, little adrenaline production. Clyde worried that his lax performance also meant lax diligence, attention to detail. Was he being as cautious of the surroundings as he ought? He replayed the scene of his latest event. The driver’s window was down. Why? Was his A/C out? Or did the driver have in mind to shoot Clyde’s truck? Maybe he thought Clyde had to hover, or linger, in order to kill the rig’s brain. Maybe he didn’t time it right, otherwise Clyde would already be either stopped, himself, or sporting an unexplained billet hole.

Had Clyde seen the FBI interview that PBS aired he would have learned that they had narrowed the search his state: no front license plate and matching date and location patterns. Also, they had accurately identified him as Caucasian, about five, foot nine, a hundred and fifty pounds (light there, but …), a beard and mustache that came, and went, and probably free of arm tattoos. He was chagrinned to note that his efforts of applying temporary tattoos were less than effective. Clyde would also have seen the FBI map that indicated his infrequency of New England states, and total neglect of Florida. He wondered how mad the governor of Florida might have been for the FBI to draw that to his attention. Clyde would have also discovered that they had accurately calculated that he lived in one of four midwestern states. He would have responded to the New England failure based on the difficulty of isolating bad drivers.

He was perturbed in a confused way. He painstakingly ventured into Florida specifically to score hits in that state. Why were they not credited? But then he caught himself, why did that disturb him? Why did it matter that he wasn't accredited with all his kills? Clyde recognized that pride might have entered the fray. And that it was misplaced: he should be happier that he was not suspected, or at least not reported.

Clyde would also have been surprised to learn that he’d never, in all this time, taken out a truck on a Saturday, causing the authorities to conjure that he was Jewish, but ignoring the issue of whether a devout Jew would kill trucks, Sabbath, or no Sabbath. "Surely he had , but the'd gone unreported," he thought.

He would have been pleased to hear that Xarious Trucking had been taking the brunt of the hits. And further pleased to know that the NewsHour had requested Xarious to participate in the show, but that they had declined.
 
+++

When Thurmon reported for work following his week off, he was handed a company handout focusing on who was being referred to as the Turnpike Terrorist. The best information available was that hundreds of trucks had been taken out of commission for various lengths of time, costing the trucking companies thousands of dollars. Still, though, there were no reports of injury.

    At the bottom of the notice was a bullet point list of driving practices that the company was concerned about. All of them aimed toward common courtesy, many of which were codified into the law.

    The list included:
•    Not passing unless the move could be completed within a mile
•    Prompt return to the right lane
•    Signaling and changing lanes only with certainty that other vehicles would not be required to brake
•    Changing lanes for merging traffic only when absolutely necessary to avoid collision
•    Entering freeways at unacceptably low speeds after stopping on onramps. That bullet point included a recommendation to use off-ramps for rest stops when necessary.
 
The handout also included industry-wide statistics of collision injury, damages, and lawsuit indemnification awards. Total payments reached the hundreds of millions of dollars.

Thurmon thought that the trouble with the off-ramp point was that after discovering a parking lot was full, it was too late to return to the off-ramp.

The Company promised two things: bonuses at year-end for an accident-free year. What was new was that it included blown tires attributed to the Turnpike Terrorist. Additionally, they promised to work with the states and the federal Government to immediately increase parking spaces in rest stops, as well as to build some at weigh stations. They would also work to build new rest stops for trucks, only.

Thurmon was encouraged.
 
+++
 
    “Hey, Brake.”    

    “Thurmon.”

    Thurmon was about to climb into his rig, having already performed the outside safety check when a driver nicknamed Brake thumped the tires of a rig parked beside Thurmon’s. “Hey Brake? I never heard how you got your name.” Thurmon turned to Brake, getting his full attention.

    Brake threw up his hands, gesturing wildly. Then he pointed to the office building. “Clowns in maintenance thought I wrote up too many trailers for defective brakes.”

    “Most of ‘em are,” Thurmon said, repeating a theme throughout the craft.

    “Yeah, well… So you watchin’ for green cars?”

    “Nah. I think the guy traded vehicles a buncha times. Or painted it. Most’re sayin’ he’s in a white pickup.”

    “I heard a copycat got slammed. Some guy stuck a gun out the window and the trucker put him into a guard rail.”

    “Was it…?

    Brake shook his head, interrupting Thurmon. “Was a pellet gun. Wouldn’t have broken skin. But the dude was charged with terroristic threatening. Prob’ly get a year in the pen.”

    Thurmon nodded understanding and agreement with Brake’s obvious delight. “Well, happy trails,” Thurmon said, repeating Roy Rogers and Dale Evans theme as he waved before climbing into his rig.
 
+++
 
    “He’s changed vehicles again.” Thurmon was in conversation with Sara, his wife.

    “How do you know?” Sara asked.

    “Uh… I don’t know. I just feel it. That’s what I’d do. I’d get into a white F150 pickup. Big enough to see what’s around, and about the most common truck out there.”

    “I don’t think I like how you’re thinking,” Sara teased, “You sure you don’t have a secret life? But I think you’re right. Then the news said that there’s a mysterious rash of electrical problems with trucks. And it costs hundreds of dollars to fix.”

    “Well, he needs to get away from a gun. That will get him life in prison.”

    “Attempted murder,” Sara responded. “They would charge him with trying to kill truckers because he could. It could happen.”

    “Or bystanders,” Thurmon added.

    “I know you’re bein’ careful… Aren’t you?”

    “Of course, darlin’. I think that drivers who exercise courtesy are safe. There’s a million of us out here…”

    “And only a few bad drivers spoil it for everyone.”

    “Only I’m afraid there’s more than a few bad drivers. The thing is, though, we might have a thousand encounters everyday. And if we do the right thing, make the right move 99 percent of the time, that still leave ten very angry car drivers who might catch road rage.”

    “Wouldn’t that be a hundred, or never mind. You know I hate math.”

    “Imagine a surgeon. If in a hour-long surgery he had a hundred different things to do and he had a 99 percent right move rate… Well, he’d kill his patient every single time with the one wrong move, one out the hundred.”

    “You’re scarin’ me, hon. Nobody’s a hundred percent all the time. Even you could make somebody mad at least once a day. What if it was him?”

    “Sorry, Sare. I shouldn’t a said all that.”

    “The Golden Rule, right?” Sara said.

    “Do unto others,” Thurmon replied.

    “Oh, I didn’t tell you. I took the kids to Sunday School last week instead of lettin’ the church bus come get ‘em.”

    “Yeah?” Thurmon’s voice had an uplifting tilt.

    “Yeah. And they both decided to include you, your safety in saying grace before meals.

    Thurmon blinked back tears, nearly choking on his words. Finally, he managed, “Tell them I love them. And I’ll see you all next week.”

    “Six days,” Sara corrected. “I love you.”

    “I love you!”

    After completing the call, Thurmon counted three white F150s in close proximity. He called Sara back. “Sara, hon…”
    “Yeah,” Sara replied, trepidation in her tone.

    “Ask the kids to pray for the Turnpike Terrorist too, okay?”

    Choking, Sara barely got her agreement through her constricting airway.
 
 
 

Author Notes Clyde: A retiree whose wife, Jane Ann, died as a direct result of a truck driver's action
Jane Ann: Clyde's deceased wife, dead by the action of a trucker (Santa Claus)
Santa Claus: the name Clyde gave the Xavious Trucking driver responsible for Jane Ann's death
Thurmon: a middle-aged truck driver
Sara: Thurmon's wife
Nate: Thurmon's 12 y.o. son
Susan: Thurmon's 7 y.o. daughter
Corine: Clyde's grown daughter
Rick: Clyde's grown son

'Happy Trails' was written by Dale Evans
Photo courtesy FanArtReview Don't drink and drive by Cleo85
One chapter remaining
Addition of the song is meant to reflect Thurmon and Sara's love

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