Driving Home
David Hoogterp
Copyright 2011 David Hoogterp
“Oh, God, if you let me get home to my wife tonight, I will never do this again. How could I be so stupid?” Brad did this sort of thing once or twice in his younger days, driving when he should not have, and he survived, but now he was genuinely afraid. He was certain that his life should have passed before his eyes but all he could see was the dim red lights on the vehicle in front of him going in and out, near and far.
The white lines on the highway median drifted into the pool of the headlight beams and slid along beside the little hatchback car. Just beyond them shone the red of tail lights and the occasional glint of a chrome bumper against something dark and boxy, a van or a truck of some sort, the only other vehicle on the road at this hour of night, or this hour of the morning - Brad wasn't sure of the best way to think of it in his present state, fuzzy-headed. He couldn't clear the fuzz out of his brain, and it increasingly obscured his vision as well.
He felt the thump-thump-thump as his tires passed over the reflective dots into the opposite lane then back again as he corrected his steering. Every time he did it he heard water slosh in the bin that held the empty keg in the back of the car. He tapped the brake to avoid creeping up on the van in front of him which seemed to have developed the habit of speeding up and slowing down at shorter and shorter intervals. He should try to get around it but was afraid to pass – in his present state.
Thump-thump-thump. Another correction. Another tap on the brake.
“Dude, you know I can't go. I'm sorry, but Cici will never let me go to a bachelor party at a strip club. Once you are actually married you'll understand.” Brad leaned back in his chair, left hand picking up a pencil from the desk and twirling it, something to distract him so he did not have to look his friend in the eye.
Sam stood with one elbow on each side of the cubicle entrance, his stance penning Brad in physically as effectively as his words penned Brad figuratively. “I can't believe you are doing this to me. My last night of freedom and you don't even want to be there.”
Sam was a old friend Brad knew from his college days, when they had waited tables at the same restaurant an by strange coincidence they were hired at the same company after graduation, in different departments, but both on the bottom rung of the corporate ladder.
“I do want to be there.”
“Good. Seven o'clock. It'll be awesome. There's gonna be chicks like you've never seen. I mean these chicks are wild. I got liquor lined up and Joe from sales is bringing a keg...”
“I didn't...” Brad started to respond but paused and changed what he was going to say. “A keg? How's he gonna bring a keg in.”
“Oh, it's a BYOB place, fully nude, my friend. They can't serve booze in a place like that. It's not legal, so they let you bring your own. Joe's gotta a pickup truck.” He gave a salacious grin. “We booked the party room upstairs so we just take it up there and it's safe from moochers.”
“Dude, I can't.”
“You gotta.” Sam turned and began to retreat down the corridor. “Seven o'clock,” he called over his shoulder.
“I have to go, Cici. It's Sam's big night and it means a lot to him that I am there,” Brad said, face impassive.
Cecilia's stern expression showed nothing but disapproval. “Where is it, this bachelor party?”
“At a bar.”
Cici's scowl deepened. “A strip club?”
“A bar. Just a few guys from work having a few drinks. I'll be home by ten.”
Cici was the center of Brad's life, smart and beautiful with shoulder length brown hair and a sparkling smile. He loved her more than anything but they had been married almost a year now and were hardly apart. Brad didn't miss hanging out with the guys but now that the opportunity presented itself he had to admit he wanted to be there.
After a bit more discussion she eventually and reluctantly agreed, but the rest of the evening she followed him from room to room like a sad puppy, pleading without words for...what? For him not to go? It wasn't that big a deal. Cici would understand even if it took a little while. Just a bunch of guys going out for a little fun. And Sam was getting married, that was worth celebrating wasn't it? He did not know why but he couldn't help but feel bad as he backed the little car. He almost thought he could make out his wife peeping through the curtains as he backed the little car down the driveway.
He would have to do something about this car one day. A hatchback was not a fitting car for a professional man. He slipped out the bottle of cologne he had secreted in his jacket pocket and gave himself a spritz.
Two o'clock in the morning had come and gone, but the music still rumbled loudly, the lights still flashed in time, and a beautiful blonde with muscular legs spun around a brass pole on a tiny stage. The DJ had announced her as Candy – “isn't she dandy” – and Brad caught the scent of talc each time she whirled by.
He looked down and found what he believed to be a jack and coke in his right hand so he lifted it to his mouth. Over the rim of the glass he saw another girl approaching, a petite copper skinned lovely without a stitch of clothing.
“You want a lap dance?” she asked.
“No thanks, um...” What was her name? Something alcoholic. Hennessy, that was it. “...Hennessy
“Okay, babe.” She smiled at him anyway and moved to the next table.
And that was the problem, now that he was here he just wanted to be at home with Cici. The guys were having a blast, standing at the stages, dollar bills extended, and grinning from ear to ear, or trying to maneuver the dancers into the shadows around the perimeter of the room for a little more privacy and some inane chat at the going rate of twenty dollars every fifteen minutes, or however often they answered yes to the question that echoed over and over throughout the room, “would you like a lap dance, hon? Would you like a dance?”
Brad didn't want a dance and suddenly didn't feel very sociable so he appointed himself as guardian of the booze and sat at the table to keep passing strangers from helping themselves. And since there was nothing better to do he drank, and drank some more. Whiskey, Rum, and Vodka sat upon the table, and sodas and juice to mix with, not to mention the much vaunted keg, now empty and floating on several gallons of beer foam and melted ice in its plastic trash bin.
Thump-thump-thump. He was straddling two lanes again. Another correction. Another tap on the brake to keep the van ahead from getting to close.
He repeated a mockery of the old rhyme he remembered from school, not part of the official curriculum to be sure, “Liquor then beer...you cannot steer. Beer then liquor you wreck even quicker.” It probably was not as clever as it sounded, but a slack grin spread across Brad's face none the less. He would have to remember that.
Thump-thump-thump. Correction. Van tail lights again. A tap on the brake.
Outside his little pool of light the shadowy forms of trees and pastures slipped by in the darkness. Brad made this drive every day on the way to work but it never had the penned in claustrophobic feeling it had tonight. He clicked on the radio in hopes of livening himself up.
The dark van's tail lights grew larger in his vision - a tap on the brake - and brighter – another tap on the brake – and brighter.
Oh, Hell! The guy was stopping, right in the middle of the highway!
Unprepared for what was happening, and slow in his response, Brad stomped the brake peddle with all his might.
Tires screeched. The slosh of water. A hollow thud as the beer keg in it's plastic bin fell forward at the sudden change in momentum. The car slid forward and forward as red lights grew larger and filled Brad's vision. A great wave washed over him. Cold silence. The van was blue.
Sam was a wild man
, enjoying the attention he got as the groom-to-be. Joe had last been spotted hours ago with a pale skinned beauty in a corner alcove. He was still there as far as Brad knew. Brad wondered if Joe would wake up tomorrow with a head full of cotton and an empty bank account.
The DJ's voice boomed through loud speakers as the music died down. A few dancers tried to keep to a rhythm that was no longer there.
“Last call for alcohol, everybody. The club is still open,” he said, “We don't stop partying till the sun comes up, but all alcohol must be removed from the premises.”
A few tables over a waitress elaborated on the same theme to another customer. The club could not serve drinks but was bound by liquor laws anyway, a prospect that seems to upset Joe from sales, who appeared out of his cave, taking animatedly to Sam and pointing back to his corner where a pale stripper bopped about drunkenly, despite the absence of her customer, more or less in time with the music.
Brad gestured to Sam who came over to the table, “It time for me to go,” he said.
Sam looked at him a long time, his eyes measuring the amount of alcohol he had ingested. “You sure you're okay to drive?”
“I'll be fine.”
Sam paused a moment longer as if debating whether to allow it then shook a finger at him. “Okay but wait here just a minute.” He darted back across the room to Joe. They exchanged a few words then Joe nodded and both came back to the table.
“Take the keg,” Joe said.
“What?”
He glanced over his shoulder to the girl in the corner. “I'm not ready to go yet but we have to get it out of the club.”
“Just put in your truck.”
Joe scoffed. “Yeah, we'll just set in the back of the truck in front of a few hundred reckless drunks and hope no one takes it,” he said incredulous. “We'll put it in your car. It's a hatchback. It'll fit”
After a moment's negotiation Brad agreed to take the empty keg in his car. If he put the seat down they could just fit it in the back, so the three of them seized the plastic barrel, essentially a thirty gallon trash can, in which it sat and began to wrestle it down the stairs and out in the parking lot. It was heavy, containing several gallons of water from the melted ice, and by the time they got outside Brad's arms and back ached so he let the other two load it into his car. Tilted over at the angle at which it finally came to a rest, it did not look stable but Joe and Sam had already returned to the club so Brad just let it be. He climbed behind the wheel and began the long drive home.
Much to his dismay he soon found that keeping in his lane required all his concentration, and he was having trouble reading the street signs. He would soon be on the highway however where there were fewer obstacles.
For an instant the entire world stopped, with Brad gripping the steering wheel of his tiny car with both hands, elbows locked as if to brace for impact. Under the dash his foot pressed the brake pedal as if fused there. The radio had gone silent and the lights on the center console of the dashboard no longer shone, most likely shorted out. And Brad was wet, wet like jumping into the pool with his clothes on, and the seats were wet, and the dashboard was wet.
The brake lights on the blue van, which had never completely stopped, dimmed again as it began to accelerate and turned onto a side street, then disappeared.
He could not see in the darkness but Brad heard splashes as he moved his feet about on the floorboard. He could feel his heart pounding, and his breath came in gasps. He was wet and miserable and he smelled like stale beer, the drippings and spillage of an entire nights partying. The odor was so pungent as to be overwhelming but his head no longer felt so muddled and he was no longer falling asleep. He was acutely ware, in fact, of just how cold and miserable - and alert - he was. He did not know how damaged his car was but that was a problem for later. The engine still ran and the headlights still shone so Brad stepped gently on the gas peddle, and went home to his wife.