DID YOU STAY UP ALL NIGHT TO WATCH THE ROYAL WEDDING? I didn’t, but it was close. My wife, the lovely and seriously Royal Wedding-a-phile, Dawn, planned it all out. Up at 4 AM, a pot of tea, and comfortable chair. That and the TV and she was set. I was set too. At about 11 PM I was in my Lou Ferrigno Onesies and checking out for the duration. I was asleep before the first Fascinator showed up.
It’s not that I don’t care about the lovely couple and the wedding.
SOMETIMES YOU SEE OR HEAR SOMETHING THAT JUST TICKLES YOUR RIBS and makes you laugh out loud. I’m not talking about hearing a comedian on TV, but something that comes out of somebody’s clever imagination. Something that you weren’t expecting that reaches out and hits the proverbial nail right on the head. I had one of those yesterday morning. A friend posted a comment on Facebook that hit me as so unusual, so out of literal context, but so right in its imagery that it stopped me in my tracks.
The general context was a discussion about a person’s irrational (read cuckoo) thinking about things when my friend posted this picture.
Fiction Saturday – Continued
Chapter Twenty-Three
“Actually, Davis, using your car is a good idea. We can avoid public transportation and no pesky rental agreements floating around.”
“See, I told you I’d come in handy.” Davis looked out of the passenger side window at the passing California landscape. “I wish you’d let me drive for a while, though.”
“Later tonight maybe. I’m a better driver than you are and it helps me to relax.” Relax was something that Laura had not been able to do for a second, ever since she saw her own face staring out from page four of the San Francisco Chronicle. “Besides, I think better while driving. Maybe I can figure a way out of this mess for us.”
“Well, I’m a very good driver—no accidents ever, and you could use a break.” Davis knew there was no changing her mind once it was made up, even though Laura looked like she hadn’t slept in days and her jaw was clenched tight.
Appreciating his effort to care for her, Laura smiled and gazed at him as he huddled up against the car door. He looked lost, she thought.
“Well, dearest,” she said, “at sixteen I was picking up extra pocket money as a wheel man. Just for kicks really. My father never knew. It was stupid and dangerous, but I was good at it.”
“Don’t tell me any more right now.” He was a stranger in a strange land if ever there was one. “I haven’t digested everything you’ve laid on me so far.”
“Okay, I understand.”
“I do have one question though,” he said. “Why did we stop at a travel agent before we left? A ticket for one from Miami to Detroit?”
“A little deception. Detroit is a border town, a ten-minute walk out of the country across the river. I bought it in my own name, of course. It won’t fool anybody for long, especially Dominic. But the Feds will have to check it out. It’ll tie up a couple of their guys for a few hours and give us a little extra edge. It’ll help our odds, maybe.” She shook her head and shrugged her shoulders. “Maybe not. I don’t know.”
“What are our odds?” He was immediately sorry that he had asked.
“We’re two snowballs and we’re driving south.”
“Oh.”
Down the Hall on Your Left 