Baked Scribe Flashback : Hitch

Albert pulled the straps of the backpack tighter around himself, and lowered the hood of his jacket against the driving snow. Wind howled all around as he tried to focus on keeping his feet on the road, to ignore the fatigue that was starting to settle in. Pain flared as he flexed his mouth, trying to stretch out the skin in his cheeks that was starting to feel numb from the cold. From behind, the noise of a car engine intruded into the gale force wind and he turned in time to see the Cadillac slowing to a stop. The window rolled down and even from a few feet away, he could feel the warmth from the heater, pushed out through the window.

“Need a ride?”

Albert looked into the car and his initial reaction was to laugh. The guy had to be joking, or maybe he got off on dangling the possibility of a ride. The inside of the car looked like he had driven it straight from the dealership. If not, this was clearly the neatest person he had ever met.

“You sure about that?” Albert asked. “I’m covered in snow and mud, it’s going to get all over your interior.”

“Leather seats clean off,” the man replied. “Don’t worry about the rest. What’ll be, will be.”

Albert shrugged and dropped the backpack off his shoulder, opening the door and sliding onto the seat, placing his bag between his legs on the floor as he reached back to close the door. “Thanks. I appreciate it.”

The man didn’t say anything until the car had gotten up to full highway speed. Then, he finally introduced himself.

“Name’s Jefferson.”

“Albert. Thanks again for the ride.”

Jefferson nodded, but said nothing more. Albert turned his attention back to the road and tried to overlook the awkwardness that was growing out of the pervasive silence. He glanced back at Jefferson, but the man was occupied by the road, oblivious to all else. Albert turned back to look out his window, but as he turned away, he could have sworn he saw Jefferson turn to stare at him. He looked back to meet Jefferson’s gaze, but he had already returned his attention to the road.

“Where you headed?” Jefferson finally spoke.

“Just traveling. Making my way west.” The sound of the wiper blades took over again as Jefferson was evidently already losing interest. Albert looked around the car, trying to spot anything that might spark conversation, wishing that Jefferson would offer up a little more himself. “You want to try some music?” he asked, with his hand already halfway to the radio console.

“No.”

Back to silence. Albert tapped on his knee and stared at the glove compartment, feeling an odd compulsion to open it and explore the contents, noting for the first time the smell of disinfectant in the air. Maybe the car had just been detailed. It only made him that much more uncomfortable for all the crap he had tracked in from outside.

He was starting to sweat from the blower hitting him square in the face, but was afraid to do anything in light of the reaction to his radio suggestion. The car hurtled down the road, inside a bubble of snow, visibility down to a few car lengths. If there were road signs alerting them to what was coming up, he had not spotted any. Already, he was scanning the horizon, trying to come up with any excuse to get to this guy to stop, just to get out of the car. The bracing cold of the wind and snow was far preferable to this vacuum, where basic social skills apparently had ceased to exist.

“What do you do?” He took another futile attempt at conversation.

A smile seemed to tease the edges of Jefferson’s mouth. “Do?”

Albert rolled his eyes, took in a deep breath and tried again. “What do you do? What’s your trade?”

Jefferson offered no answer to this either, but he was definitely grinning now, an audience of one to a punchline that no one else had heard. Albert listened to the front passenger tire slapping against the pavement, something in the bearings loose and rattling. It was something to focus on at least. Something other than this lingering sense of wrongness.

“How far is it to the next town?” He asked.

No answer from Jefferson.

“I’m not even sure how far south of the city I am.”

Jefferson offered no suggestions.

“How far are you driving?”

This time, Jefferson looked at him and the lopsided grin turned into a full smile, reminding Albert of sharks. The cruel glint in the man’s eyes made Albert cringe back against his door as Jefferson actually answered the question.

“All the way until the end.”

Albert wasn’t even sure how to take that. Had it been a threat? What did it even mean? The end of what? He had to change the subject, keep him talking about something, anything to interrupt whatever train of thought was ending in that freakish Cheshire grin. He swiveled his head around again, looking for inspiration.

“You know, I don’t think I’m ever been in a car this clean before, other than when they’re new.”

Jefferson nodded and flexed his fingers around the steering wheel, causing the plastic to groan from the strain. Albert licked his lips, tried to swallow through a dry throat, and contemplated how badly he would be hurt if he just opened the door and jumped. Maybe the snow bank would break his fall. He had a vision of Jefferson’s arm reaching, stretching out like rubber to grab Albert by the neck and pull him back into the car.

“You know,” he said, “you could probably let me off at the next town. I don’t want to put you out too much. This time of night you probably want to get back to—”

“It took a long time to clean.” Jefferson interrupted.

“Sorry? I don’t—”

“You commented on how clean the car is. I’m saying it took a long time to clean properly.”

“Right…So, if you—”

“It takes special skill and resources to clean up that kind of mess.”

“The…I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”

Albert watched as Jefferson first slowed, and then pulled off the road into a thick grove of trees. He turned off the engine and hit the automatic locks before Albert could open his door.

“I do wish I could keep it this clean,” Jefferson said, “but it seems that I just can’t help myself.”

“What are you talking about?” Albert felt around on his door for the lock release, slowly realizing that the switch to control the lock was gone, a rough hole dug out of the door, where it should have been.

Albert watched as Jefferson turned to look at him, and for the first time saw what he had unconsciously been dreading since getting into the car. He saw his end, written in those eyes.

Jefferson spoke again.

“I just hate it when the DNA soaks into the upholstery like that.”