"Okay – now you know where the clutch is, and you know the brake pedal and the gas pedal. You know how the gear shift is in the pattern of an H, right?"
"Yeah, I know that," Py said.
Joanne shrugged. "Well what else is there?" she asked, adding – "I don't know what you're so nervous about. I swear, you are the first nineteen year old I've ever met who didn't want to know how to drive a car."
Py sat behind the steering wheel, looking "pre-defeated" over the hood of Pete's old truck. "I don't have no reason to know," he said. "I don't have a car – and the way things are goin’, I ain't ever likely to."
"You'll have one some day," Joanne assured, none too sympathetic to down talk. "Besides, it'd be helpful right now if you could drive. You could run to town to get things. You could even have a social life! Wouldn't you like to take a girl out some time?"
Py looked suspicious. "Well, yeah, I guess I would."
"So what are you so afraid of?" Jo asked, exasperated. She practically had to drag him away from hard labor to give him this driving lesson, and he had seemed irrational in his obstinateness, offering excuses ranging from "it isn't a good thing for me to know how to drive, I don't have a car" to "it isn't the right day."
"What if we meet somebody comin’ up the road?" Py asked, dead serious.
Joanne wouldn't accommodate his contention that this might be a problem. "We'll steer a little to the right and go around them,"she said flatly.
"Where will we drive to?" Py asked.
"What does it matter?" Jo said. "Now, push in on the clutch and put the truck in neutral."
Py looked at her, full of misgivings, but did as directed. "Okay, so you can take your foot off the clutch now. You got the brake set?" Py nodded that it was set. "Okay, turn the key on and use your left foot to push the starter thing there…” She pointed down to a round, silver button on the floorboard, to the left of the clutch pedal. "Put your right foot on the accelerator pedal. See the choke thingy there? Pull that out as far as it will go."
Py looked at her like she was mean to put him through this. He turned the ignition key, pulled the choke, and pushed the start button. After trying and failing a couple times, the engine finally fired. "Push the choke in!" Joanne said, and Py punched it in quickly, as if something might explode if it were left out. "You might want to pull the throttle out just a little bit, so it idles nice for you. Push on the foot-feet…”
"The foot-feet?" Py asked, as the engine started to die.
"The gas!" Joanne said, a little too eagerly, and Py stepped on the accelerator, gunning the engine so that Pete, working out in the barn, wondered if they weren't going to throw a rod. "Okay, let her back just a little. There – that's good, now ease in on the throttle just a little." Py did as instructed and the engine winded down to a rattling hum. "Good," Joanne said, finally satisfied with the basic calibrations. "Now, release the parking brake, push in on the clutch, put it in first, and just slowly turn around here to the left so we can get out to the road. Go slow now,” she warned.
Py pushed in on the clutch, shifted the gear shift over and up, and then let the clutch back out. The truck began to go backwards, which shocked Py so that he jammed his right foot hard down on the brake, setting the old vehicle at odds with itself. It buffeted a few times and tried to sputter to a stall, all the while rolling back. "Push in on the clutch!" Joanne said, a little anxious, and Py depressed it in time to save the idle.
"I said put it in first!" Joanne said.
"I thought I did," Py said. "I don't know what's wrong with this thing…”
Joanne looked down at the gear shift, grabbing the knob and shaking it around a little. "Look right here," she said, pointing out a diagram of the shifting pattern imprinted in the metal shift knob. "Over and up, where you got it, is Reverse, not First!"
"It's first on Mr. Walker's truck," said factually.
"It is?" Joanne said. "Well, it's Reverse here. Here First gear is over and down, Second is over to the right and up, and Third is straight down from there."
"Oh great!" Py said. "What if I get us goin’ down the road and all the sudden forget and throw it into Reverse?"
Joanne shook her head. “Well, don't forget. Commit it to memory. Reverse is over to the left and up, and you just don't go there unless you want to go backwards. Or just remember that you never 'throw it' over to the left and up. You throw it all the other places, but never there. That way you don't even have to remember what it does -until you want to go backwards."
Py looked at her with uncertainty. "Okay,"he said. "So First is over to the left and down?" "That's right,"Joanne said, and Py took another crack at getting the truck headed forward, this time with success. He slowly let the clutch out and the truck began to creep forward.
"Turn the wheel all the way to the left," Joanne said, and Py cranked the wheel. "Now you've always got to look while you're doing that, checking to see if there's another vehicle trying to come around you on that side. Also, look ahead of you, so you don't turn right into the path of an oncoming vehicle." Py did as he was instructed, as best he could, but somehow sticking his head out the driver's side window made him aware of the motion, and that in turn made him want to depress the clutch, which he partially did on an intermittent basis. The truck moved through a series of fits and starts in a slow semi-circle. "Don't be pushing in on the clutch, now," Joanne said, and in trying to watch out the window, while also being aware of the clutch, Py found himself forgetting to turn the steering wheel, and before he knew it he was driving the old truck in a slow, tight circle in the equipment yard.
"This time around, straighten it out when we get pointed east and we'll take it out to the road," Joanne said patiently. When they reached the county road that ran by the front of the ranch, she said -"Okay, now, we're going to turn right here. Look out to the left to see if anybody's coming to the right, too. I don't see anybody, so push in on the clutch when we get a little closer to the corner and we'll just roll right on around."
Py guided the truck out onto County Road 12 and let the clutch out, re-engaging the transmission. "Give it some gas," Joanne said, "and I’ll tell you when to shift."
"To shift?" Py asked nervously.
“We’re going to have to shift into Second gear," Joanne said. "Why?"
"I ain't never been outta First," Py said.
"You'll like Second – it's faster," Joanne
said, and Py gulped as the truck picked up speed. "Okay, now this is where it
gets sort of mystical. You need to listen to the engine and feel how hard it's
working." Py glanced over at her with uncertainty. tell you when to push in on
the clutch and let up on the gas pedal." She let the engine rev just a little
bit more, then said -"Okay, push in on the clutch and let up off the gas," and
Py followed direction. "Now, keeping the clutch pressed in, take it out of First
and put it in Second. That's up into neutral then over to the right and up." Py
moved the gear shifter into Second position. "Okay, now let the clutch out and
give it a little more gas."
Py let out on the clutch and after rocking a couple times, the truck gained
speed and proceeded at a moderate clip down the road.
"So far so good, huh?" Joanne said, and Py nodded that such seemed to be the case, but he was starting to worry about that last unused gear. "It seems like we're goin’ kinda fast," Py said. Joanne looked at the speedometer, which indicated that they were barely exceeding twenty miles per hour. "Let's pick up a little more speed and we'll go to Third," she said. "I don't know why we have to do that," Py argued. This is as fast as I need to go." "Just give it some gas and tell you when to push in the clutch," Joanne directed, ignoring his objection.
Py reluctantly picked up speed as he did his level best to keep the truck headed down the center of the road, well away from the loose shoulders and the ditches on either side. He glanced occasionally into the rear view mirrors, and kept a nervous watch out over the hood for oncoming traffic, of which there was none.
The journey into Third went well, and soon Py and Joanne were traveling down the road at nearly forty miles per hour. In the distance, about a quarter mile away, they could see where the road intersected with County Road 7, and on a gentle hillside to the north of that they could see the homestead of farmer-rancher Jess Willingham. "You okay with it?" Joanne asked, and Py nodded that everything seemed fine.
Joanne seemed satisfied that Py had nothing to worry about for awhile, other than steering the truck down the roadway, so she took the opportunity to explore an ulterior motive she had for wanting Py to come on this excursion. "I wanted to ask you something, Py," Joanne said. "Do you know anything about this trip to Denver Jake just took?”
Py glanced at her as if he wished she could save this for a more appropriate time, that he had quite enough on his hands right at the moment. "He said he went to Denver on family business," Py said quickly, staying focused on the task at hand.
"That's what he told me, too," Joanne said, not quite satisfied with the answer. "Does he ever talk to you about . . . well, you know, other people or anything like that?"
"I'm sorry, but I'm havin' trouble thinking’ about what you're askin’ me and doin’ this at the same time," Py said anxiously.
"So he doesn't ever talk to you about . . .I don't know, things men talk about? Does he ever do that with you?" Jo asked.
"What do you mean?"
"Oh, you know -other people he knows …men or…women…”
"Should I be down? We're getting’ pretty close…”
"Or does he ever talk about people in his past?" Jo asked.
"What about this corner?”
Neither of them had noticed a car approaching to their left, southbound on County Road 7, that seemed to be traveling at a speed that would put it at the intersection at about the same time they were going to be there. Joanne had drifted into a brief rumination, locked for a moment on an issue that had been dominating her thoughts since Jake left last Sunday on that bus. What was he up to?
She suddenly snapped out of her daze, realizing too late that she was well outside Py's envelope of competence to handle their rapid approach to the intersection. Py was going to have to make quick adjustments if he was going to make the corner.
"Push in on the clutch!" she said, "and brake it a bit. Don't skid the tires!"
"You see that car?" Py asked, panicked to see someone competing for roadway.
"You've got the right-of-way, so he should stop and let you go right by, but slow it down…”
Py depressed the clutch pedal and eased in on the brake, reducing the speed of the truck enough that it looked as if they might be able to make the corner. "Just be ready to stop, in case he doesn't see you, and turn to the left, right on past him. You'll be okay," Joanne said. He did as instructed, but as the two vehicles arrived at the intersection the farmer driving the other car didn't yield, as Joanne had expected. Instead, he slowed, as if he was going to stop, and then rolled right on into the intersection.
"Left!" Joanne yelled, and Py craned the steering wheel hard in that direction. The driver of the other vehicle saw the pickup momentarily headed straight for him and he hit the gas and drove ahead, so that Py passed by him on his right as he turned the corner. Shocked by the maneuver, the farmer cranked his car hard to the left and slammed on his brakes, sending his vehicle into a sideways skid through the gravel of the intersection.
Py drove down into the ditch on the north side of the road then back up over the road and across into the other ditch. "You son-of-a-bitch!" he could hear the other driver yelling as he pulled the coughing, sputtering truck back up onto the roadway. "Put it in Second," Joanne said, and Py did so with some difficulty, grinding the truck into the lower gear.
Joanne looked back toward the intersection, checking to see that the other driver was okay, which he appeared to be. He sat behind his steering wheel, shouting obscenities and shaking his fist in the air. "You wanna drive now?" Py asked, to which Jo said, "No, you're doing fine. That was his fault he wasn't watching what he was doing."
Py let out a deep breath and seemed deflated. "I knew somethin' like that was gonna happen."
"You did fine," assured Joanne. "Give it some gas and put it back in third when it seems like the engine is straining where it is."
Py did as she instructed, and after a moment he made a fairly smooth transition to the highest gear. They were clipping along the gravel roads again at about thirty-five miles per hour.
"You really are doing well," Joanne assured. "Are you feeling a little more comfortable with it? You've already averted your first big chance at a wreck."
Py thought about it. "I like this part," he said, flopping his elbows to draw attention to his hands upon the steering wheel. "I like guiding it up the road."
"You're catching on real fast. No one would ever believe you hadn't been at it for years."
Jess Willingham's place was coming up on their right and as they approached his farm his old yellow retriever came running out toward the truck. Py saw it coming and tried to steer over to the left side of the road, but suddenly he and Jo heard a thump from the right front of the pickup, followed by a single sharp yelp.
“Hit the brakes!" Joanne said, and Py did so, bringing the truck to a skidding halt on the road. "Oh my God!" She looked out and saw the dog lying motionless on the shoulder of the road.
"I hit a dog!" Py, for whom animals were Godheads, cried out.
Joanne saw Jess Willingham walking toward them from his farm house. "Mr. Willingham! Your dog ran out in front of our truck and we hit him!" she yelled, and began to open the door to get out and check his condition.
"Oh, he's okay," Willingham said, to the surprise of both Jo and Py. He walked over to the where the dog lay, still as a pile of dirty laundry, and nudged it with his foot. "Bob, you okay?" he asked, and the retriever lifted his head and looked up at his master. "He's okay," Willingham said. "Everybody who drives by here nowadays seems to hit him. I think he's kinda getting’ used to it."
"That's terrible," Joanne said. Py looked with disbelief at the animal, which slowly pulled itself to its feet and then staggered over toward the pickup. It stood stupidly staring at the phenomenal battering beast that had deposited it so meanly in the weeds. "He's been chasin' cars since he was a pup," Willingham explained. "His reflexes ain't what they used to be. He's getting’ old and don't know it."
"I'm sure sorry," Jo said. "I hope he's going to be alright."
Willingham nudged the dog with his foot. "You gonna be okay, Bob?'' The dog gave him a regardant look, and let his tongue loll out of his mouth. He’s fine," Willingham said. "One of these days I’ll come out here to check on him and he won't get back up, but not today. It looks like he'll chase a few more after yours."
"That's a heck of a dog," Py said, with some awe, as he looked out at the invincible cur.
Joanne once again expressed her apologies, then she and Py continued on up the road, leaving Bob and Jess Willingham to return to their routine and await the next brush with canine mortality. "Well you are getting the baptism of the devil, I'd say. You can't have any nerves left about driving now, do you?" Joanne asked.
Py brought the truck back up to speed,
once again getting all the way into third, and he seemed to be growing more
comfortable with his command of the vehicle. He'd driven less than two miles and
already had been involved in two traffic incidents. No one or thing had
sustained serious injury yet, so Py was beginning to believe he could captain
this ship. It was becoming obvious that sometimes terrible things don't happen,
a leap of faith contemplation that would have been impossible for him prior to
this sojourn into transportability. Py was starting to relax a little behind the
wheel. For the first time in his life, he was starting to really feel that he
could drive.
"So tell me, Jake – you got another girl?”
Jake looked at Joanne like he couldn't imagine what she must be thinking. "You can be honest with me," she urged. "I can handle it."
"What makes you ask such a ridiculous question?” Jake said, shaking his head like he couldn't conceive of a notion so remote.
"Well, what'd you do in Denver for two and a half days?"Joanne asked. "And don't tell me it was family business –– you've told me yourself that all your family is in Iowa and Nebraska."
Jake grinned. "Are you just a little bit jealous? Is that what it is?"
"Do I have anything to be jealous of?" Joanne asked, to which Jake answered "No." "Well then, why can't you just tell me? Sunday night, for instance? What did you do when you got to Denver? Where did you stay?"
"On Sunday night?" Jake repeated the question as if, somehow, he hadn't quite gotten it the first time.
"Yeah – Sunday night."
Jake looked down at the 4x4 inch post at their feet, broken off flush to the ground. Joanne had all three Parker hands working to undo the damage done by the bull’s two rampaging passes through her yard. "Well, Sunday night I stayed at a place called the Crest, down in city center. It's on Colorado Boulevard," Jake said. "It's a real nice place where I often stay when I go to Denver."
"When did you check in?” Joanne said.
"Oh, I don't know –– whatever time it was when I got there,” Jake said.
"In the afternoon, then?"
"Yeah, it was in the Jake began to look at her as one might an attorney for the state.
"What about that night?" Joanne asked. "What did I do that night?” Jake repeated, but Joanne wasn't going for his dumb act. "On Sunday night, after you checked into the hotel. You had a whole evening to kill. What did you do?”
Jake smiled, somehow amused by her tenacity. "I told you that I had to meet with some people…” But before he could answer, Joanne anticipated his line and cut him off. "Yeah, yeah, yeah…you had family business. But you don't have any family in Denver, so who were these people you met with?"
"What is this?” Jake asked.
"Why are you being so shifty?" Joanne said, smiling in a way that masked her real motive, which was to find out the truth about what Jake was doing.
“I’m not being shifty,” Jake said.
"Well then - who were these people?"
Jake wasn't to be rattled. "Okay," he said, shaking his head. "There was a lawyer there a guy who handles some affairs for members of my family and he had long ago agreed to meet with me to discuss some things. He was returning from a trip to California and he stopped-off in Denver on his way back to Omaha. I had dinner with him, we talked business, and then I went back to the hotel."
"And then?" prompted Jo.
"I went to sleep," Jake said. "I was a little worn out from the bus trip and the shop talk, so I turned in early."
Joanne eyed him suspiciously. "Family business, huh? What kind of family business?"
"Well you've just got to know every little detail, don't you?” Jake said, prodding her back a little. "You must think you're some kind of a William Jennings Bryan or something. Is that right?"
"Something like that," Joanne said, standing her ground.
Jake took on a mischievous glint. "Or are you just being an insecure female?"
That brought a sharp look from her. "I'm
not insecure," Joanne said. "I just don't see why you should have any problem
with letting me know what you were doing in Denver. That is unless you've got
something to hide."
"That's insecure female," Jake said, victorious.
"It isn't either!" Joanne said, a little repulsed. "It's expecting that when two people are in a relationship they shouldn't have any trouble answering any questions the other might have about what they've been up to."
"What do you think I'm up to?" Jake asked.
"I don't know," said Jo.
"Because I haven't 'been up' to anything," Jake said. "Other than answering a bunch of fool darn questions from you."
* * * * *
Pete had been listening to the
conversation, through the kitchen window, and now looked out to make sure
everything was okay between the two of them. He hadn't said as much to Joanne,
but he had high hopes for her and Jake's relationship, and it upset him to hear
them jousting with one another. He had noticed changes in the way Joanne had
been when Jake was gone on his trip, not herself at all, fidgeting around the
house and yard, distracted and impatient with her chores. Pete hadn't seen her
behave that way since she was a kid in school. It certainly wasn't the Joanne
who had returned from the west coast, whose increased confidence and
independence had been so apparent. Now this thing with Jake had her all upset,
or at least as upset as she seemed likely to get. It may have been only a tiny
pout, but Pete was sensitive to her and he could feel her dissatisfaction.
For him there was no ignoring the fact that Jake was something powerful in his
little girl's life. Joanne had seemed oblivious to men, especially since she
came back to Longmont; oblivious to people in general, in fact, and it had Pete
a little womed. She never went to town, never attempted to reunite with old
friends from school, never met anyone new and never, ever showed an interest in
dating. Pete was unsure what to do about it or even how to feel. A part of him
liked having her all to himself, warming up nights that had seemed pretty cold
since her mother died. Joanne's moving back in with him had renewed him in some
way, and recently he had seen signs that her presence was even reinvigorating
the ranch. But Pete knew that it wasn't right -that a young woman like Jo needed
to have more than just her father in her life, that she still had youth left in
her that Pete hated to see her waste. Joanne just showed no interest whatsoever
in the local men. Pete had sometimes wondered if she hadn't had some awful
experience that had turned her against men altogether. He even wondered if it
wasn't other women who now interested her. What did he know about these things?
Her travels were far broader than his, including exotic places, exotic people.
He guessed that there were ways of thinking out there in the open world that
were probably beyond the range of imagination for him and most of his Weld
County neighbors. Who knew what Joanne might have picked up in the way of avant
garde ideas? Maybe she was modern in some way beyond his comprehension. Maybe
she had no use for lifestyles. These were the things Pete had begun to wonder,
but then Jake came along, and the Joanne he had known was back again. That's why
Pete had been so open-minded about letting Jake stay with them at the ranch.
Joanne had brought him back to life, and now he could sense that Jake was doing
something similar for her. Now he did not like the way they were talking to each
other. It sounded too close to a confrontation for an old man to want to hear.
Joanne grew tired of her own interrogation long before she got her answers, and after a while she determined that where Jake's mystery trip to Denver was concerned, the best she could do was prescind. She liked herself better that way anyway. If Jake had secrets...well, they didn't bother her if they didn't bother him -that's what she decided to feel. No harm, no foul. Maybe Jake did have a girl elsewhere and maybe there was a relationship in his life she knew nothing about. Joanne's attitude had come to be that she'd had all the callow, superficial relationships she ever wanted to have in her life, and now she was ready for something more mature and understanding. She could take a little heartache, certainly more than she once could, back when her expectations had been so huge that they could never be satisfied. Jake and her were going to be different. Whatever his shortcomings, his secrets, she liked what he did for her, and she was willing to accept him for what he was. There were only those occasional weak moments when she felt that urgent need to nail him down, to make him captive to her view of how their lives should work together. But it passed. She was a big girl now, and she intended to stay that way.
* * * * *
Py spent the remainder of the day blissfully unaware of the human drama taking place around him. He was happy that Jake was back. His presence seemed to sort of cement things around the ranch, to provide the substance that gave order to the whole thing. It was strange, since Jake was never the one who handed out the orders, or who orchestrated events – Joanne mostly took care of that. But somehow Jake's way of being, of doing things, made everything seem like it was happening as it should. Just having him around made Py feel better.
Joanne, finished with her interrogation of
Jake, came around the side of the house to find Py stringing a trail of
breakfast leftovers from the windrow to the back porch. "What are you doing?"
she asked.
Py turned around and looked at her, holding a forefinger to his lips, asking for
quiet. He pointed over toward the trees, where the big black stray cat he'd been
attempting to lure into the yard lay in the shade, giving itself a tongue-bath.
"Are you still trying to get that cat to come to you?" Joanne asked.
"He wants to come," Py said, keeping his voice hushed, "I know he does. It's been a week now since he showed up. I just think he's being careful, you know? He's just waiting to make sure everything's okay before he comes in close to where we can touch him."
"What makes you think he wants anything more than a hand-out?" Joanne said, suspicious of the stray's motives, but touched by Py's belief.
"He ain't taken nothin’ from nobody, but he's stayin’ around. I think he'd of run away by now if food was all he wanted. Besides, he's pretty heavy. He looks like he's doing just fine when it comes to grub."
"Well, I don't want to be a spoil-sport, but I bet those pigs find that bacon you put out there long before that cat takes it," Joanne said. "The chickens will probably get your bread. Besides, I don't think cats are much attracted to baked goods."
"Well, then if this don't work, something else will," Py said. "I'll just keep trying."
"Good luck," Joanne said, going in the back door, leaving Py alone on the back step.
"He'll come in sooner or later," Py said, standing fast in his mission to make a pet of the stray.
END OF CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Copyright © Rick Alan Rice (RAR), 1992-2010 Cowboy Town is the sole property of its author, Rick Alan Rice (RAR). This work may not be reproduced or re-distributed in any way without the expressed written permission of the author.