Muriel Gray - Furnace

The tape hissed and then the song began.

How could he have known? Even with the benefit of the height that he enjoyed from the truck Josh couldn’t see the entire landscape ahead, couldn’t see the mark of man that was waiting for him, nestling smugly between mountains and highway. So at that religious and significant moment when the sun rose, it rose not over unsullied meadows and hills, but from behind a forest of four tall masts, one tipped by golden horns, another by the Cracker Barrel sign, the other two proclaiming Taco Bell and Burger King.

Josh blinked for a second, his mouth slightly open until an excited voice on the CB crackled over the gentle song playing on the tape and brought him back.

‘Man, oh man! Any of you northbounds see that?’

Josh glanced across at the source of the enthusiastic message; a lone R-Model Mack pulling a covered wagon on the southbound highway.

Gratefully, Josh picked up the handset. ‘Sure as hell did, big truck. Glad there’s someone else out there with a soul.’ He flicked off the tape, ready to receive the reply, and it came right back at him with its enthusiasm intact.

‘Yeah? Man, I can’t believe they’s only askin’ two dollars ninety for a chargrill, family bucket of fries, soup and a free soda. That’s a whole dollar less than the joint at exit 19. Sure gonna work for me!’

Josh Spiller stared ahead for a second or two, then gently replaced the handset, let out the remains of his breath and started to chuckle. He shook his head and carried on laughing until a tiny rogue tear rolled down one cheek and he wiped it away with the back of a greasy hand.

‘Shit. Know what, America? You are one fucked-up country.’

She’d been awake for at least two hours. Now that the dawn was bleeding through the drapes, she shifted under the covers and ran a hand over her warm belly. She had to get up. No choice. But here, in the dark that was gradually being corrupted by light, it was safe and warm to think, and everything outside that cocoon seemed impossibly cold.

Josh’s face. She closed her eyes and thought about it. Sometimes, if it had been a long time, she had trouble remembering the exact contours. But even if it was difficult to visualize she could always recall how it felt beneath her lips. She held on to that now, breathed in through her nose as she thought about the smooth soft skin over his cheekbones, the thick curl of eyelashes and the rough texture of bristle around mouth and chin.

With her eyes still shut, she swung her legs out of the bed and sat up.

The bedroom mirror greeted her with her own reflection when she raised her head and looked towards it. Despite her hunched posture, even she would admit that her breasts looked enticing. They were fuller and firmer than she’d realized, and her hands came up in an unconscious gesture to cup them gently.

Elizabeth Murray let her hands move up to her face and then spoke in a whisper to the mirror, the delicate planes of her cheeks and forehead sculpted by the grey dawn light.

‘What now?’

Josh waited impatienly outside the phone booth. There were only three private booths at this Flying J truck stop, all occupied by frowning men who looked like they were making talking an Olympic event. He sighed and leaned heavily against the wall, toying with his Driveline calling card.

The big black guy next to him was holding the phone against his ear with his shoulder, passing a rubber ball restlessly from hand to hand as he listened, his eyes glazed like he was hearing bad news.

Josh guessed what he might be hearing. The guy’s dispatcher would have put him on hold, and the profound expression of misery was most likely induced by an age of listening to the theme from Love Story reproduced electronically by a sadistic phone company. He looked at his boots. All he wanted to do was to call Elizabeth and tell her he was less than an hour from home. No filthy talk like you sometimes heard and wished you hadn’t, but he wanted privacy when they spoke, and if he didn’t get a free phone soon he’d miss her. He’d already gone past that delicious time when she would pick up the phone beside the bed and answer in a sexy, sleepy way. Right now she’d have a mouth full of Cheerios and be pulling on a jacket ready to go to the store, pleased to hear from him, but with a tone of urgency in her voice that meant he was making her late. Five more minutes and she’d be gone.

The door of the centre booth opened but infuriatingly the guy hadn’t stopped yakking.

Josh made a move towards him and the guy held up a hand without looking at him.

‘Uh huh? Well it ain’t okay with me.’

A listening pause.

‘No, it ain’t my last word. This is my last word. Okay, two words. Fuck you.’

He slammed the phone down, got up off the small plastic seat and pushed past Josh.

Josh grinned at him, and gesticulated at the phone. ‘It’s a drag always havin’ to call your grandmother, ain’t it?’

The man looked for a moment like he might throw a punch, but something in Josh’s eyes held his clenched fist by his side, and he satisfied himself with a ‘Yeah, funny guy’ muttered beneath his breath.

Josh smiled at the man’s back and entered the booth, his grin deforming into a grimace at the blush of sweat those substantial buttocks had left on the plastic. But he needed to make that call. He decided to stand, and as he punched in the code for the card he shook his head. Seemed like all truck drivers did was drive and then get mad with someone for no other reason than they didn’t like driving.

Choose any truck stop, any row of phones and mostly all you’d hear was a chorus of deeply discontented men. Some of it was just plain moaning, but enough of it was from the heart to make hearing it uncomfortable. Why drive if you hated it so much? Josh liked it fine. Just fine. And he loved Elizabeth. If the seat was clammy with his sweat after he’d talked to her, it wouldn’t be from stress.

The vacant computerized woman on the phone thanked him in a monotone for calling Driveline and informed him in a voice that suggested she was painting her nails that he had seven dollars and fifteen cents left to make his call. He punched in their number.

It rang eleven times and just as he was about to hang up Elizabeth came on, out of breath, and sounding angry.

‘Yeah?’

‘Hey. You should get into telephone sales, honey.’

She tried to change the tone, but there was still something there. Something at the back of her throat.

‘Hey yourself! Where are you?’

‘On the pike. Near enough home to smell next door’s mutt.’

‘Well get back here. I missed you.’

It was familiar small talk. But she said the last bit as though she really meant it.

‘You okay?’

‘Sure.’

‘Big day, huh?’

‘Yeah. Big.’

A melancholy tone reaffirmed that something was wrong. Now, in this tiny booth with two guys already waiting outside, wasn’t the time to find out what it was.

‘Want me to come straight by the store?’

‘How you going to park Jezebel?’

‘Normally I just pull on the brakes and shut her big ass down.’

‘And screw the Pittsburgh morning traffic?’

‘For you I’d leave her standin’ in the middle of the Liberty Tunnel at five-thirty Friday night.’

She laughed, and hearing her was like he’d swallowed something warm and sweet.

Elizabeth sounded more like herself when she spoke next. ‘Then come on by and make a traffic cop’s day.’

‘See how it goes.’

‘Love you.’

‘Love you too.’

He hung up and left the booth. Had he imagined it or had she really sounded uneasy? Understandable. Today, she and Nesta started their new career. A sackload of tasty redundancy pay blown on their crazy business.