RichardDaub.com, February 2024

At the truck stop next to I-94 in Beach, North Dakota—

“Can I refill that pop for you, hon?” the waitress asked.

Carl, seated alone at a booth with a large black telephone on the table, looked up from his burger and fries to the nametag pinned to the breast of her old-fashioned pink waitress uniform—”DINAH”—then continued up to her eyes.

“Pop?”

“Your soda-pop,” she said, looking at his glass of melting ice cubes.

“Oh. Yeah. Sure.”

“You alright, hon?”

“Yeah, just a little tired from driving.”

“Where you headed?”

“Seattle.”

“Another Seattle. Lots of people headed out that way. Even people from around here are goin’ out there because they can’t stand it here. Where you from? Somewhere on the East coast, I’ll bet.”

“New York.”

“I knew it. Why’d you leave?”

“I was born in the wrong place. To the wrong family.”

Dinah smiled.

“You talk like a New Yorker, but you seem different than the others I’ve seen passin’ through.”

“I actually grew up on Long Island, just outside of the city.”

Dinah leaned in.

“Why are you lookin’ at me like that?” she asked.

“Like what?”

“You’re lookin’ at me funny. I don’t mean in a bad way, but like you’re seein’ a ghost or something. I admit, I didn’t have time to shower this morning and I’m a little wrinkled after doin’ this for six hours and countin’, but I’ve seen all sortsa types passin’ through here and they usually look at me a certain way, but not like the way you were just lookin’ at me.”

“Sorry. You just look a lot like someone I know. I used to know.”

“I knew it. Is she dead?”

“Uh, no, not that I’m aware. She was my first crush.”

“Ah, now we’re gettin’ somewhere. Was she your girlfriend?”

“No, though I wish she had been.”

“Let me guess. She broke your heart and you never really got over her after all these years.”

“She did break my heart, but I got over it. And there were plenty of others after her who broke my heart, ignored me, wanted nothing to do with me, or didn’t know what the hell they wanted from me. But you really do look a lot like her.”

“What was her name?”

“Maggie.”

“Was she pretty?”

“Of course. I thought she was the prettiest girl in the school.”

Dinah smiled.

“What’s your name, hon?”

“Carl.”

“Carl. I like that name. It’s like a racecar driver name. Is that your green Cutlass out in the lot?”

“Uh, yeah. It was my grandfather’s car.”

“And he’s dead?”

“Uh, yeah.”

“Sorry, Carl. But it’s cool that his car is still going. You don’t see many like that anymore. I’ll be right back with your pop.”

She took his glass and floated past the booths of mesh-capped truckers to the soda fountain behind the counter, where she got him a new glass and scooped some ice into it and began filling it with Coca-Cola, glancing at him a couple of times while doing so. Moments later, she was back at the table placing a fresh pop and unwrapped straw next to his plate.

“Too bad you’re just passin’ through,” she said. “I just got divorced and I’d go on a date with you.”

“Oh. Sorry. I mean about the divorce, but thanks for saying that.”

Speaking softly, she said, “If you’re willin’ to stick around for a little while, my shift ends at three, and I’ll have an hour before I have to start getting dinner ready for the kids.”

It was half-past noon.

“Well, I am a little ahead of schedule,” he said, looking at his watch. “Maybe I could stick around for a bit. Is there anything fun to do around here? Where are we again?”

“Beach, North Dakota. And, no, there’s not a single fun thing to do around here, at least until three o’clock.”

*     *     *

By 1:30 he was back on I-94 racing through the scrubby badlands of eastern Montana smiling at the nice little memory he was taking with him of the waitress at the truck stop who looked like Maggie from seventh grade, the great clouds in the Big Sky hovering before him, the Rocky Mountains waiting beyond the horizon, and, at the end of I-90, the dawn of his new life.

Yet, there was something nagging at him, that this was not yet a “memory” but an active thought buried alive, and that there was still time to go back and turn that nice little moment into the ultimate Kerouac road experience.

Jack would have gone back.

*     *     *

By 2:00 he was back in Beach, population 913, touring the town from behind the wheel, past the little stores and the grain co-op and the railroad tracks, until he found himself back at the truck stop. He parked with the tractor-trailers and tried to take a nap, but he was running hot.

At 2:55, he got out of the car and went inside. Dinah smiled when she saw him and he smiled back as he headed towards the men’s room. After he came back out, she passed by with a tray of dirty dishes and told him to wait outside, she’d be out in a few minutes.

Outside, he lit a cigarette and was still smoking when she came out. In the bright sunlight she looked less like seventh-grade Maggie and more like a twenty-something divorced single mother waiting tables for a living at a truck stop in the middle of nowhere.

“I’m glad you came back,” she said, lighting a GPC 100 cigarette, which, despite his own habit, he couldn’t imagine his sweet little Maggie doing. “Just follow me in my truck, it’s a quick drive.”

She headed across the lot to a dented, mud-splattered Ford F-150 pickup. He got into the Cutlass and followed her through town to a small house on Third Avenue overlooking the grain co-op, where, in the driveway, was parked another beat up F-150.

She pulled into the driveway and he parked on the street. She was still smoking her cigarette when she got out of the truck.

“Looks like my ex is home early,” she said. “But don’t mind him. The ink on the divorce papers is dry.”

“He lives here?”

“Yep. He has his own room in the back.”

He followed her into the small house. The front door opened into the living room, where, on the weathered plaid couch, sat a man wearing a white cowboy hat, white button-down western shirt, brown jeans, and white cowboy boots.

“Well, what do we have here, sugar?” he asked, smirking.

“Leave him alone, Buck, I mean it,” Dinah said.

“Just askin’.”

He looked at Carl.

“So, where you from, cowboy?” he asked.

“New York.”

“New York? Only pussies come from New York.”

“Buck!” Dinah exclaimed, then turned to Carl. “Don’t mind him, he’s just between jobs at the moment and a full-time loser.”

There was a knock on the front door and it opened before anyone moved to answer it. In stepped an overweight, overbleached blond-haired woman in a white leather cowgirl outfit and a long cigarette dangling from her lips.

“Ma,” Dinah said, rolling her eyes.

“Hey, sweetie,” she said, removing the cigarette from her mouth and hugging Dinah, who didn’t hug her back. She then shot a sharp look at Buck, who made no move to get up from the couch.

“Find a job yet, Bucky?” she asked him.

“No, ma’am.”

“Figures.”

She then turned to Carl.

“And what do we have here? Another quickie from the truck stop?”

“Shouldn’t you be at the bar giving boners to drunk old farts?” Dinah asked.

“Yeah, but a pipe burst in the men’s room over there and now there’s shit all over the floor and Fred had to shut down until they clean it up. He might even have to call Servpro. He probably shoulda done that before this happened.”

A crying toddler burst into the room and hugged Dinah’s leg.

“He needs a diaper change,” she said, lifting the boy. She then said to Carl, “This’ll only take a minute, then we could go to my room.”

She disappeared into another room with the kid, leaving Carl alone in the living room with Buck and his ex-mother-in-law.

“You like football, Carl?” Buck asked.

“Uh, yeah. Cowboys fan, actually.”

“Cowboys? Why, fuck them Dallas Cowboys. This is a Green Bay Packers household, son. And if you think they got a frozen tundra over there in Wisconsin, why don’t you pay us a visit come mid-January. You’ll want to kill yourself within a week. And that ain’t no joke. You really will want to commit suicide.”

“It happens a lot in these parts,” Dinah’s mother agreed, nodding, exhaling.

Carl looked at his watch.

“I just have to run out to my car,” he said. “I’ll be right back.”

He opened the door and slipped out, closing it gently behind him.

*     *     *

There was no speed limit in Montana and he made it to Billings just after sundown.

At Boomer’s Diner across the street from the Days Inn, he was waited on by “BECKY”, who looked like Nancy from eighth grade, the plain girl who liked him before she went Sandra Dee and turned hot.

*     *     *

The next day, lunching at a Pizza Hut in Missoula, he was waited on by “BARB”, who strongly resembled Cara from that steamy night during the summer before tenth grade.

*     *     *

That evening at the Denny’s next door to the Super 8 in Spokane, he was waited on by “JENN”, who strongly resembled Colleen, the girl he worked with at the All-American Burger who’d chosen a loser over him, and whose sweet sixteen party he crashed.

*     *     *

The next day, lunching at The Brick in Roslyn, he was waited on by “MAGGIE”, who strongly resembled actress Janine Turner, who played bush pilot Maggie O’Connell in the now canceled prime time CBS drama Northern Exposure, which had been filmed in town.

“Oh, wow,” Carl said, “you’re—”

“Maggie,” she interrupted, “and my real name isn’t Maggie and I don’t really look like this. I just get great tips when I dress the part.”

“Oh. You look just like her.”

“Get over it, Carl.”

“What? Wait, how do you know my name?”

“The Emerald City lies before you. The new life you’ve been longing for. The clean slate.”

“This is fucked up.”

“It’s not fucked up, Carl. This is the normal. The fucked up is now thousands of miles behind you. And you want a cheeseburger with no onions, fries, and a pop.”

“Uh, yeah.”

“And, after you finish lunching, you will get back in the Cutlass and, without looking in your rearview mirror, continue over the Cascades, to your damp, overcaffeinated paradise.”

She leaned in, hypnotizing him with her glowing blue eyes.

“Carl,” she said, “you will let go of the old.”

“I will let go of the old.”

“You will open your mind to the new.”

“I will open my mind to the new.”

“And, when she appears, you will let her in.”

“When she appears, I will let her in.”

“You will not run.”

“I will not run.” ▪