Robert for unearthing this from his vast archive of floppy discs. It was on the now-defunct Auburn Waterski Team alumni webpage, newly reincarnated on facebook.
This is a story, set in 1996, about nearly running out of gas in Deliverance, Georgia, while in transit from Auburn, AL to West Palm Beach, and that slice of Heaven on Earth, Okeheelee park.
It probably went something like this in Christy's accord:
"I’m almost empty, we'll stop in Columbus. Gas is cheap in Georgia," Christy said
"uhh huhhhhhhh," Jodee acknowledged.
Christy had the first shift, and Jodee was asleep. We took off at midnight so we could have the road all to ourselves. Chad’s jeep had almost half a tank.
"Hey Chad, we can hold out for a while. Let’s not mess with backing the trailer up to the pump." I said.
"Good idea, Rykert. What do you think, trey?" Chad asked.
"zzzzzzzzzzz"
"What’s taking them so damn long? We could have filled up the car and the boat already." asked Rykert.
"Look. Jodee just walked out. Maybe he wants you to split a lottery ticket with him?" said Chad.
"Shut up Chad!" Rykert snapped.
Christy’s car took off, her engine sipping the precious fuel. "P
"Pull over, you could pay for the entire trip if we stopped in at amateur night"
"Pig! All men are pigs!" screamed Christy!
"If you start running low on cash, don't blame me. I gave you an idea"
Jodee worked the folding seat and tilted the brim on his O’Neill cap. He was asleep in minutes, less than ten.
Ahead, Chad, Trey, Rykert, and 3000 pounds of Malibu response plodded along in Chad's Jeep Cherokee.
"Chad, i could never live in South Georgia. Open spaces are nice, but this is a bit ridiculous. I haven’t seen anything resembling civilization in an hour" exclaimed Rykert
"What are you talking about? This place is great. They play tough high school football down here" screamed Trey
"Trey’s awake!"
Chad's yellow fuel light kicked on.
"Trey, your state sucks, there's nothing down here except peanut farms, and NOTHING is open past 12 outside of Columbus!" explained Rykert
"It’s about time for some gas. Do you know if there's anything around here that is open? My light has been on for the past ten minutes."
"i just saw a sign that said Richland was 20 miles ahead. Usually any town big enough to get its name on a sign 20 miles away will have an all-night gas station."
"I hope so, or else we might have to siphon out of the boat."
"Chad, we ran the gas out of the boat this afternoon when we skied. Remember, the pissing in your wetsuit, Jodee nearly skiing into a bass boat?"
"This is gonna be close, I need to slow down a bit." Flashing trailer lights shook Christy out of her highway hypnosis
"Jodee, wake up, Chad’s pulling into this town. he must need gas. "
"Man, this place looks deserted. Maybe we should stop at this hotel and ask if they have all night gas"
"Chad, this place is a ghost town. It’s like that ray Bradbury story where everything in this automated town still worked but the all the people were dead."
"Yeah, it's kind of spooky."
"There’s the police station, let's pull in there and ask where the nearest place to get gas is."
"Look, there's Jodee and Christy."
The only signs of life in richland and trey all rolled out of those two cars. Rykert walked up to the front door of the richland pd. Then he turned back.
"Jodee, the police station is closed. I can't believe it. Of all the redneck, backwoods blue law southern nowheresvilles, I have never heard of one where the police station closes at night. I feel like I’ve died and gone to eternal mayberry."
Chad interjected "we're screwed, 'cause I’m running on fumes."
"Well, we could steal some of this police station gas. This pump looks like it works."
"What if we get caught?"
"Who’s going to catch us, all the cops are in bed?"
"There’s a light on in the house behind that tree, somebody could be watching, maybe a cop lives there."
"Turn the pump on and see if it works."
"It’s got a lock on it. What kind of tools do we have?"
Jodee studied civil engineering in class, but his dad, a few failed slalom course installations, a pocket knife, and good old fashioned redneck know-how all combined into a remarkable ability to jerry-rig on a minute's notice.
"Ok, here's what we'll do. Chad, you take off and head down the road. I saw a hotel up the road while me and Christy were looking for a gas station. There’s a hose around the side of it. If we park on the side, it's dark and nobody will see us. I’ll cut off a piece and we'll siphon gas from Christy’s car if you run out."
"Jodee, that's not going to work, somebody is going to see you. We don't have enough money to get you out of jail."
"It’s either that or sleep on the side of the road, hoping you don't hear dueling banjos whistling through peanut fields "
"Let’s go Chad, maybe we'll get lucky, I mean, get lucky and find a gas station. Don’t look at me like that!"
Everyone, now wide-awake from 35 degrees of dead Georgia air regrouped to his car.
"I can't believe we've made it this far. The light has been on forever. It’ll be any minute now"
"Just keep it around 40 and don't accelerate going uphill."
"I mean, this place is just dead! I can't believe there is absolutely nothing out here."
"Chad, that's Jodee and Christy coming up from behind."
"I hope he got... holy shit! Look out the window!"
The cars were right beside each other, window down. Jodee stuck out his arm, raising 10 feet of coiled garden hose to the black sky
"CHAD, HE DID IT!"
"HELL YES!"
"I HAD TO WORK QUICK, BUT I GOT IT!"
"ONE THING'S FOR DAMN SURE JODEE, WE CAN NEVER STOP IN RICHLAND AGAIN."
"Ok, roll the windows up, I’m cold."
"Rykert, I would have given anything to see that: Jodee with his knees in the dirt, cutting as fast as
He could. "
"Yeah, and looking over his shoulder every five seconds. Of course that's not as funny as some of the
Just-in-case excuses that he was trying to invent at the time"
"Yeah, he'll be telling the cop: well, it was either that or steals gas from the police station, but i was afraid they had a neighborhood watch. Oh, what a nightmare that would have been."
About five minutes later, a gas station popped up over the hill. Chad put 20.5 gallons into his twenty-gallon tank.
Jodee and Christy evaded arrest twice on that trip. While driving through west palm, they detoured through an upscale Palm Beach county golf course. Both a little tipsy neither knew their location until they almost ran over a golf ball-washer.
Trey was only awake for about 30 minutes of the entire 14-hour trek. That time must not have included his driving shift through who-knows-where Florida. Chad and rykert were pale and nauseous from fear.
Speaking of Chad and rykert, the trip nearly claimed both their lives. After returning to auburn with nothing to do for a few days, they decided to drive straight through to Chad’s house in Huntsville.
Neither had the energy for the last leg of the drive. They swapped driving duty every fifteen minutes, then every ten, then every five, sometimes stopping to run around on the side of 1-65, at two in the morning.
For all the memories and blunders, no charges were filed.
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