Long Haul

By Michael Bronte

Gus Barrington has been a long-haul trucker for almost thirty years. On a dark, rainy night in July, he’s in his Freightliner semi hauling a load of lettuce along I-10 outside of Jennings, Louisiana. Through the mist coming off the tires of the eighteen-wheeler in front of him, his headlights catch something along the side of the interstate. It's the body of a fifteen-year-old girl, and she’s been beaten badly. Gus doesn’t know it, but his life is about to change forever.

The girl’s name is Abby, and she tells Gus that her mom and four members of the family they’ve been living with have just been killed. Abby is alone in the world, and Gus decides to take her under his wing until he can find a permanent solution to her living situation. In doing so, he discovers that Abby is the only witness to the murders, and the killers are trying to take her out to prevent her from identifying them.

Follow the action across thousands of miles of highways and truck stops as Gus tries to extricate Abby from a deadly situation.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Michael Bronte
• Release date: May 7, 2024
• ISBN: 9798324899165

Michael Bronte

Michael Bronte is a graduate of Union College in Schenectady, New York, and George Washington University in Washington, D.C., and lives with his wife of 38 years in New Jersey. "All of the heroes in my novels are everyday people," says Bronte. "Any of them could by your next door neighbor. None of us really know what we're capable of until the time comes for us to reach beyond the boundaries of our everyday lives. Remarkable feats of courage are performed everyday, by everyday people. It's amazing."​ As a young teenager I remember reading paperback mysteries under a huge oak tree outside my parents’ neighborhood grocery store in Dalton, Massachusetts, a small town located in the heart of the Berkshires. I can recall pulling a book from the rack and getting locked in to those novels as the fragrant summer breeze of Berkshire County tried to turn the page before I was done reading it. I don’t know why, but I was greatly affected by a book titled The Fan Club, by Irving Wallace. When I was done reading it, I can still recall thinking that someday I’d be able to write a book like that on my own; I knew I could do it.Well, the idea stayed dormant for over thirty years while I did what I thought I should have been doing for a living (looking back, it all seems so trivial sometimes) until I rekindled my infatuation with writing novels. Now, many years after that, and many mistakes and many failures later, there are several Michael Bronte novels available for those of you who like mystery, suspense, action-oriented stories with true-to-life characters.

Book preview

Long Haul

by

Michael Bronte

Copyright ©: Michael Bronte 2024

All Rights Reserved

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Table of Contents

Preface

Chapter 1  Amber Alert

Chapter 2  The Pickup Truck

Chapter 3 The ICU

Chapter 4  Heading For Flagstaff

Chapter 5  Spotted In Amarillo

Chapter 6  Good Cop, Bad Cop

Chapter 7 Back To Jennings

Chapter 8  Whac-A-Mole

Chapter 9  Aunt Jenny

Chapter 10  Surprise, Surprise

Chapter 11  Margolis

Chapter 12  McAlester

Chapter 13  Bubba’s

Chapter 14  The Double-wide

Chapter 15  Sunday To Remember

Chapter 16  Crunch Time

Epilogue

Preface

I’ve not heard from her in seven years, going on eight as I look at the calendar. It’s

my fault. I move around a lot, as you’ll soon find out. It’s the nature of what I do for a living. I guess she’s twenty-three now, or maybe twenty-four, not that it matters much. She’s old enough to get married. Heck, I was significantly younger than that when my wife and I tied the knot, and we already had a kid on the way. Things were much simpler then, however. Not like it is today. It’s much harder for young people who are starting out than it used to be. Back in the day, once you got a job it was yours for life if you toed the line and did what you were supposed to do. That’s how it was with me. I got my CDL license two months after my twenty-first birthday and I’ve been behind the wheel of one type of big rig or another ever since. I can pretty much operate anything on wheels, with passengers or without, and I have the necessary endorsements for hazmat tankers, livestock carriers, double trailers, and even school buses. Over the years I’ve driven all of them, with most of my time being spent in the cab of a long-haul eighteen-wheeler.

In reading her letter, to say I’m surprised would be an understatement. I would never have dreamt in a hundred years that she’d ask me to walk her down the aisle. I’ll be honored to do it, of course. She was as close to me as anyone has ever been, and that includes my wife and my real daughter, who’ve been gone now going on twenty-two years. I wonder how she found me. The fact that we’ve not spoken to each other in such a long time is my fault. I live out of my truck mostly, and it’s hard to catch up to me, even by mail, which goes to a post office box that I only get to about once a month when I roll back into town. That date stamp on the letter I’d just read is from three weeks ago. As for phone calls, I’m not good at those. My number has changed several times in the intervening years. I’m sure she doesn’t have my current one. She knew how I lived my life when the whole ordeal we’d been through ended those eight years ago. For me, being a loner has its advantages, but it also has its disadvantages. I should have made more of an effort to stay in touch.

I hope the man she’s marrying a good man. He’d better be. She deserves it after what she’s experienced. I guess I’ll have to get myself a suit to walk her down the aisle. God knows I wouldn’t have much use for one otherwise. I could probably use a haircut as well. It’ll be good to see her in one way and difficult in another, but I’m going to write her back and tell her that I’ll be there. I hope she doesn’t start crying, but I suspect she will. Her name is Abby. Let me tell you our story.

Chapter 1

Amber Alert

I was hauling a load of lettuce on I-10 just outside Jennings, Louisiana, on my way to the Kroger distribution center near Atlanta. I’d been on the road for six hours since my last rest period, which I’m required to take after every eleven-hour stretch of driving time. That’s according to the FMCSA, or the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration. Driving time is pretty regulated these days, and it’s not a good idea to try and get around the rules. Even if I wanted to buck the system, the Electronic Logging Device, or ELD, that’s connected to my truck’s engine will keep track of my time and designate it as on-duty, off-duty, or on-duty not driving. Having an ELD is federal law, and violation of the FMCSA guidelines could result not only in being taken off the road for a period of time, but could also cost a pretty penny in fines, so much so that gaining a couple of extra hours of driving time is just not worth the risk. It’s for everyone’s safety, after all, and after thirty-one years behind the wheel, I’d seen all the damage I cared to see, not to mention the loss of life that an overly fatigued driver could cause.

The AC was cranked, and my Freightliner Cascadia was humming along while my favorite CD by Little Big Town played on the sound system. The weather had been blasting hot all the way from West Texas, and at 11 p.m. the temperature was still hovering around ninety except that now the Louisiana humidity made it feel like I was sitting in warm bath water. I did a lot of my driving at night not only because it lessened the chance of getting stuck in traffic around the large metropolitan areas, but also because I planned my hauls so that I’d arrive at my destination during normal work hours and not have to sleep in my cab overnight in order to be unloaded the next morning. I’d traveled I-10 many times, and I knew there was a truck stop just off the interstate near Jennings that served some really good homemade ice cream. After a six-hour stretch, with my shirt sticking to my back, I figured it was a suitable time for my required half-hour break during which I’d hit the head, pick up some water for my cooler, and enjoy a couple of scoops of butter pecan made with big, salty Louisiana pecans. I’d been to that truck stop often enough that some of the waitresses had come to recognize me. I took a seat at the counter, took off my John Deere hat, and waited for Juanita to come over. I hadn’t seen her in a couple of months and was surprised to see that her belly was so swollen that it looked like she was going to have her baby any minute. She came over with another young woman and smiled widely.

Hello, Gus. How have you been? I haven’t seen you in a while.

I guess not, I said, nodding at her belly. When are you due to deliver?

Any day now.

She looked tired, but radiant, the way pregnant women do. It looks like you should be off your feet.

I know, she said, still smiling widely. But I wanted to wait as long as possible before I stopped working. We need the money, you know? She indicated the second woman who was standing behind her. This is Manuela. She’ll be taking my place while I’m on maternity leave. She turned to Manuela. Manuela, this is Gus… She turned back to me and paused. I don’t even know your last name.

Gus Barrington, I said, reaching over the counter and shaking Manuela’s hand. She blushed, and I said, How about some butter pecan ice cream, two scoops. I smiled.

The ice cream was good, and I left a nice tip on the counter. I bought a gallon of water and some ice for my Coleman cooler—it’s important to stay well hydrated when you’re on the road—and went back to my truck where I calculated the rest of my haul. I had another five hours of driving time before I’d have to stop again and get some sleep. That would put me on the other side of Mobile, and from there it would be a straight shot up I-65 and I-85 to Atlanta. If all went well, I would drop my load around midmorning and pick up my return haul, which was a load of paper towels from a Georgia-Pacific warehouse that was being shipped to another supermarket distribution center in Phoenix. So far, the trip had been easy-peasy, and I was right on schedule.

I topped off my fuel tank and rolled out of the truck stop back onto I-10. The interstate was a ribbon of black in my headlights as I tooled along at a steady sixty-five miles per hour. There was a whole lot of nothing in that part of Louisiana with more trucks on the road than cars at that time of night. The CB was relatively quiet—yes, truckers still use CB radios even though the technology is outdated; for some of them it’s an inevitable part of their lives—and I turned the volume down low to avoid the annoying crackle that sometimes comes in bad weather. I could feel the trailer swaying from side to side as the wind whipped across the highway, and I knew that a thunderstorm was on the way. Indeed, it was only minutes later that the first plop of a raindrop exploded onto my windshield. It didn’t take long: plop…plop plop…plop plop plop plop. It was a deluge in no time. It came hard and fast, so much so that the wipers couldn’t keep up with the downpour. I had to slow down to keep the lines on the asphalt visible through my windshield. I detected the flash of headlights in my side mirror and saw another eighteen-wheeler coming up fast as it moved into the passing lane behind me.

Dumbass, I said aloud as it blasted past me, and I was suddenly drowning in the mist coming off its tires. At full speed, my wipers were barely able to keep up with the amount of water pelting the windshield. Between the mist and the storm itself, it was like looking through wavy Jell-O. The rain sounded like a freight train as it beat down on my cab, and I detected hailstones ricocheting off my hood and sounding like machine gun fire. Huge, scary lightning bolts flashed from one side of the sky to the other, and the crack of subsequent thunder was so loud that it sounded like it came from right next to me. I let off the accelerator as the other rig’s turn signal came on indicating that it was coming back into my lane. I was about fifty yards behind it at that point; there was plenty of room for it to come over. Another massive lightning bolt flashed, turning night into day for a split second. That’s when I spotted something off in the distance, barely off the asphalt and caught in the high beams of the other truck. I thought my mind was playing tricks on me for a second. Suddenly, the other truck stopped coming into my lane and swerved back to the left, its trailer fishtailing from the sudden change of direction. Obviously, the other driver had seen it too, but he kept going. Instinctively, I hit the brakes as I realized that my mind wasn’t playing tricks on me after all.

I flicked my high beams and realized that what I’d seen was no mirage, but a body. I was certain of it now. I couldn’t tell if it was a man or a woman, alive or dead, and I pulled my rig off the travel lane onto the shoulder as I passed it. My heart was thumping. Reaching into the storage drawer of my center console, I pulled out my flashlight, jumped from the cab, and ran back to where I thought I’d seen the body. There wasn’t a truck or car in sight, and the night was dark as coal. The smell of rain was strong in my nostrils, and the only other sound was the chirping of a million crickets. When I got there, it only took a second for me to see that it was a young woman, a girl actually, dark hair, maybe Hispanic. Her hair was matted, and her skin was cold to the touch, which wasn’t surprising since the rain was pelting down on both of us. I rolled her onto her back and shined the flashlight on her face, shocked to see that her lip was split and there was a massive contusion on her left cheekbone. There was no doubt that the girl had been beaten badly. I tried to check for a pulse to see if she was still alive, and her eyes sprang open.

Coughing violently, she said, Help me, mister. Please. They’re tryin’ to kill me. Her voice was weak, and it sounded like her larynx had been dragged over a cheese grater.

I checked her arms and legs for broken bones. She was young and light-skinned, her cheeks the color of cream. What’s your name, sweetheart?

My name is Abby, she croaked. Please, mister. Can you help me?

How old are you?

Fifteen. Please, they’re looking for me. They want to kill me. She could barely get the words out.

What the hell was she doing here? How did a fifteen-year-old girl get beaten up like this and end up on the side of a highway in the middle of nowhere? I didn’t take the time to answer my own questions. I picked her up gingerly, thinking she couldn’t have weighed more than seventy pounds. Carrying her back to my truck, trying not to drop her as I climbed up into the cab, I carefully placed her in the passenger seat and strapped the seat belt around her to keep her from falling over onto the floor of the cab. I pulled a jug of water out of the cooler and tried to get her to drink some, but she was out cold. Not good, I thought, and I undid the seat belt and lifted her into the sleeper berth where I laid her on the bunk mattress there. I knew I had to get this girl to a hospital.

Pulling out my cell phone, I Googled hospital Jennings Louisiana, and up came a listing for the Ochsner American Legion Hospital. It was back in the direction I’d just come from, about eight miles from where we were on the highway. I pushed the directions button on the map app, and the direction lady told me to go to the next exit on I-10 East, which was further away than the hospital, turn around, and go back to Jennings on I-10 West. I figured it would take the better part of an hour to get to the hospital, but I had no choice. It wasn’t like I could just do a U-turn with an eighteen-wheel rig with a fifty-three-foot trailer attached. Looking back at the girl, I prayed she was going to make it.

Feeling anxious to say the least, I got back behind the wheel and strapped myself in. A dozen trucks and as many cars had passed while I was tending to the girl. None of them stopped, but that was understandable in that I hadn’t put out any flares or reflective emergency triangles. Where were the state police when you needed them? Looking into my mirrors, I released the brakes and was about to pull out into the travel lane when I noticed a pair of headlights coming up the highway behind me, not in the shoulder lane where I was sitting, but in the travel lane, moving along slowly. I could tell it wasn’t another eighteen-wheeler, but it wasn’t a car either. The headlights were too high off the ground for that. I figured it to be a pickup truck.

Alarm bells went off in my head. There would be no reason for anyone to be traveling that slow on an interstate at that time of night, not unless there was something wrong with their vehicle—or they were looking for something. The itch on the back of my neck told me it was the latter. I thought about pulling out the Colt .45 I carried legally for protection but thought better of it. Instead, hastily, I put the truck in gear and hit the accelerator, feeling the big rig heave forward into the night. The headlights behind me continued to close on me, and it wasn’t long before they were right behind me. I was right. It was a pickup, maybe an F-150; I couldn’t tell exactly, but I wasn’t about to find out. I accelerated quickly, checking the sideview mirrors the whole time. About ten minutes later I heard the direction lady tell me to take the next exit to get back onto I-10 West. The pickup had had plenty of opportunity to pass me, but it didn’t. Instead, it followed me off the exit, which was labeled as Jasmine Road. The alarm bells in my head were ringing louder now, and instinctively I imagined that it had something to do with the girl.

There were some streetlights illuminating the exit ramp, and for a second I thought the pickup was going to go around me. I guided my rig as far to the right as possible, and as the pickup weaved in and out of my sideview mirror, I managed to see that it was an older model, light tan in color, with the front fender on the driver’s side being a darker color, maybe black, maybe brown, but it obviously wasn’t the original.

I spotted some yellow arches as I got off the exit and realized I was close to a McDonald’s, maybe a quarter mile down the road. I headed straight for it. Hopefully, it was open late and there’d be people there. I was thinking about what I was going to do when I got there when I noticed that the pickup truck had vanished. I found a spot where I could turn my rig around, and a sense of relief washed over me as I sat there for a minute looking into my mirrors. I didn’t see the pickup anywhere, but just to be safe I took the Colt .45 out of its compartment and loaded it.

* * *

I got as close to the emergency room as I could—hospitals aren’t known for having good tractor-trailer access—and ran in to get some help. An older-looking male nurse and what I think was an orderly, both the of them black, came out with a stretcher. The nurse took one look at the girl and said in his thick Louisiana Cajun accent and said, Where’d y’all find this girl? She looks like she been tore up bad.

I found her by the side of the road out on I-10. I couldn’t just leave her there.

You’re a good man, suh. Let’s get her inside and get an IV into her right away.

He and the orderly did just that, and I couldn’t help but think how much worse she looked under the fluorescent lights of the emergency room. The ER itself was hot and stuffy, and everything in it looked worn out. There were half a dozen roller beds lined up in a row separated by stained curtains, the only sounds being the constant beep of a machine and some ungodly moaning coming from somewhere in the bowels of the facility. Either of them was enough to make me crazy and I’d only been there a few minutes. The smell was something between disinfectant and piss, and I didn’t want to think about what was sticking to my shoes.

The nurse pulled a stethoscope from around his neck and moved it around to various places on her chest. With a concerned look on his face, he rolled her onto her side and listened again. Do you know if this girl has been raped? he asked seriously.

I’d not even thought about that. I have no idea, I replied.

Are you her next of kin?

I told you, I found her lying by the side of the road. I’ve never seen this girl before in my life. I said nothing about the fact that she’d told me her name was Abby.

He looked at me suspiciously for a second as if to indicate that he’d heard it all before. Quickly, he put the stethoscope back around his neck. We’ll run a rape kit on her, but first we have to get her into the ER. This girl is bleeding internally. Moving rapidly now, he pulled a blanket up over her and said something to the orderly who whisked her away to parts unknown.

Are you sure? I asked.

Normally, I would have an ER doctor look at her, but we only got one tonight and we can’t wait for him to get around to her. I know what I’m doing.

Is she gonna be okay? I asked, feeding off the sudden urgency in his demeanor.

Hard to tell. It looks like she might have some broken ribs. To be safe, we have to make sure she doesn’t have a punctured lung. I do believe you may have saved her life, mista’…

Barrington. Gus Barrington. You can call me Gus.

He stuck out his hand and said, My name is Horace. You’ve done a good thing here."

I nodded and said, Now what happens?

We’ll take an X-ray. If the lung is punctured, we’ll have to suction out any blood that’s accumulated and reinflate it.

A wave of anxiety moved through me. Does that mean she’ll have to undergo surgery?

Possibly. We’ll know more after the doctor sees the X-ray. Someone did a number on this girl.

I didn’t know what to do. I had to consider the fact that I had a hundred thousand dollars’ worth of lettuce I was responsible for if I didn’t make my delivery on schedule. There’s only a limited amount of time that a load of produce can be in transit once it leaves the field. That said, I didn’t want to just leave the poor girl. How long is she going to be here? I asked.

I’d say a couple of days at minimum, significantly longer if there’s organ damage, Horace replied as he stripped off his gloves.

I recognized a small Semper Fi tattoo on the inside of his forearm and knew immediately that he’d served in the Marines. I’d been a jarhead myself; that’s where I’d first learned to drive heavy-duty rigs. Where’d you serve? I asked pointing to the tattoo.

He looked me in the eye and knew why I’d asked the question. I was a medic in Iraq. Did a lot of patrolling on the front lines tending to boys who got their legs blown off by IEDs, but a man can only take so much of that. After that, I spent some time working in a military hospital in Baghdad. That’s how I got this gig and am now able to work in such luxurious surroundings.

Desert Storm, I said, sliding up the sleeve of my t-shirt and showing him my own USMC ink. We now knew everything we needed to know about each other. Look, I got a perishable load I have to deliver that I can’t afford to pay for if it goes bad, but I can be back here in a couple of days. You’re sure she’ll be here, right?

We’ll take care of her, Horace replied. We’ll have done the rape kit my then. Be sure to ask for me if you want to know the results, though. We’re not supposed to reveal that information to just anyone.

I thanked Horace for his help and got back in the Freightliner. The first thing I did was fix my ROS, or Record of Duty logbook, to reflect how I’d spent the last couple of hours. Atlanta was eleven hours away, and I determined right then that I was going to drive straight through with a couple of breaks in between to make sure I stayed alert. After that, I’d pick up my load from Georgia-Pacific and get some sleep before coming back to Jennings. A load of paper towels wasn’t perishable, and I could take my time with it. It wouldn’t be the end of the world if it was a few hours late getting to Phoenix, and it would give me a chance to check on Abby to see how things turned out.

It was 2 a.m. by the time I got back on the road, and all I could think about was that poor girl—and who might have beaten her like that. I remembered now what she’d said as she was lying helpless by the side of the road. Help me, mister… They’re tryin’ to kill me. I wondered who they were and why anyone would want to kill a fifteen-year-old girl. I got ripping mad just thinking about it, but the thought passed as I pictured the pickup truck that had come up behind me after I’d carried Abby into my truck. I had no logical reason to believe that the pickup had anything to do with her, but that’s what I’d thought at the time, and it was still what I thought now. I’ve always found it hard to go against my instincts.

The first thing I did once I got on the road was to unload my Colt .45 and put it back in the compartment where I kept it, which was right under the cup holders next to my right leg. Truckers are allowed to carry firearms, but the law says they are supposed to be kept out of the reach of the driver and any passengers, and the ammunition is supposed to be stored separately. Right. That was the stupidest regulation I’d ever heard of—and there were plenty of stupid regulations—and abiding by it meant that having a weapon under those conditions provided no protection at all. What was a trucker supposed to do if someone tried to break into his truck? Say, would you please wait a moment while I retrieve my weapon and then go into another compartment and get my ammunition so I could load the weapon and finally get around to shooting your ass off? I’m sure that reg was written by someone who went to Yale. I did go halfway with it, though, in that I kept my gun unloaded most of the time just as a safety precaution. An unloaded weapon can’t go off by accident and cause unintentional harm to anyone. I did, however, keep a couple of fully loaded clips in the same compartment where I stored the gun so that if I ever had to make a quick decision to use it, I could shove in a clip and be ready in two seconds.

The drive to Atlanta went off as planned and so did the pickup at Georgia-Pacific. Once I got outside the metropolitan area, I stopped at the Love’s Travel Stop in Hogansville, Georgia, about an hour outside of Atlanta where I grabbed about six hours of Zs in my sleeper compartment, had some breakfast, and paid eight bucks for a shower which I hadn’t taken in three days. Clean shaven, refreshed, belly full, I put on some clean clothes and got back on the road where I hopped on the CB radio and brought up the maps app on my phone to check for traffic conditions on I-85. All indications were that it was wide open all the way back to I-10 West. It would take nine hours to get back to Jennings which would put me back there around midnight. I took my time, figuring Abby wasn’t going anywhere. That, and I calculated that Horace would be on duty in the ER at that time of night. My thoughts revolved around Abby, and while I didn’t know a thing about her or the circumstances that led to her predicament, I couldn’t help but feel that outside of her injuries, she was in deep trouble. At fifteen, she was five years younger than my daughter would have been at the time, and I couldn’t help but think how I would feel if Kathleen had been in the same situation.

I thought about my daughter almost every time I saw a ten or twelve-year-old girl, which was about her age when I’d lost her. It happened eleven years earlier when she and my wife both died in a car accident on a snowy night when a drunk driver fell asleep at the wheel and hit them head-on while they were on their way home from a birthday party for one of Kathleen’s friends. Kathleen, or Kat as we used to call her, was ten, and my wife Becky was thirty-five. The guilt of not being around when it happened still eats at me when I think about it. I was driving mostly short hauls at the time, one or two nighters, which was tolerable. It was the cross-country hauls that were too much for Becky to accept, and she made me promise that I’d find another line of work rather than be away from the family for multiple days and sometimes multiple weeks at a time. I had a wife, and a daughter, and a house to take care of, she had said. She couldn’t, wouldn’t, do it by herself. I did what she wanted, but it didn’t matter. I was four hundred miles away when I’d learned about the accident. I didn’t see them until the day after it happened. The thought of seeing their lifeless bodies still haunts me.

I still own that house that we lived in, which is in the Arizona high country outside of Flagstaff. Being in the house without them was unbearable, which is why I started taking on long hauls shortly after their funerals. The only other family members in the area were from Becky’s side, and I found it easier to deal with my grief alone rather than listen to sympathetic, well-meaning comments that only served to drive me further into my funk. I’ve always found peace behind the wheel of a big rig, and to this day I find it therapeutic for anything involving body, mind, and spirit. I think truckers can be a solitary bunch, content to associate with others as the need arises, but not unhappy when there are stretches of time between encounters. I admit that I’m like that at times, not antisocial, but thankful for the freedom to think what I think, believe what I believe, and do my own thing without the need for the approval of others.

As it is, I roll into Flagstaff four or five days a month to collect my mail, pay my bills, and make sure everything is in working order at the house. Sometimes, if I have more than a couple of days between hauls, I’ll have a few beers and do some two-steppin’ at Black Bart’s cowboy bar with a lady friend I’ve been seeing on-and-off for a couple of years now. Neither one of us wants our relationship to be any more than it is at the moment, and that’s fine with both of us, I think. I’ve gotta say though, that I wouldn’t have minded if it turned into a sexual thing, but that could make things complicated, and complicated was not what I wanted at the moment, if ever again. We’ll see.

I found out from calling out on the CB that there was a travel plaza in Jennings itself that I didn’t even know was there. It wasn’t a large facility, but it had spots for a couple of dozen big rigs to park, and that’s all I needed. I locked the truck and armed the alarm system so that the truck wouldn’t start if someone broke into it. Then, I went inside and asked if it was all right if I left it there for a couple of hours. Having gotten a shrug and, It’s your rig, from the tattooed guy behind the counter, I called for a taxi and was told one would be there in ten minutes. It showed up half an hour later, but I took it in stride, thankful that it showed up at all. I figured there weren’t many people who aspired to driving a cab on the graveyard shift in Jennings, Louisiana. I gave the guy a ten for a five-dollar fare. He looked like he needed it. I walked into the ER and spotted Horace right away.

Remember me? I said when we locked eyes. He looked like he was busy.

There are some chairs in the waiting area in front of the check-in desk, he said without greeting me. Wait there. I’ll come out as soon as I can.

That could have meant ten minutes or ten hours, but I did as he instructed and watched the comings and goings of the underbelly of Jennings, Louisiana at quarter to two in the morning. Drunks, guys with black eyes and bloody lips, families with sick kids, and all kinds of unfortunate people—no trust fund recipients in this bunch—stumbled in and out of the emergency room looking no happier on the way out than they did on the way in. Horace came out fifty minutes later, looking stressed. I noticed a significant splotch on the leg of his scrubs. I assumed it was blood.

Do you know how she’s doing? I asked, almost afraid to shake his hand.

Privacy rules stipulate that I can only give out certain information about patients, he blurted. You’ll need to talk to the doctor who’s treating her to obtain specific medical information about her injuries, especially since you’re not her guardian or next of kin.

I felt myself tense up. Okay, I said, trying to stay calm. When can I do that? I assume the doctor isn’t here at this hour.

Horace made a face. You can call the information desk in the morning and get the doctor’s schedule.

I took off my John Deere hat and wiped some sweat from my forehead. I’m a pretty good-sized guy and can be quite intimidating when I put on my I’m annoyed face. C’mon, Horace. What’s with the stonewall? She’s fifteen, and she’s hurt, and I take it no one has been around to help her out or you would have already told me so.

Horace looked around as if he was afraid that someone was listening. The Privacy Rule stipulates that I can only reveal her condition in general terms and—

I held up my hand, stopping him. Look, we don’t know each other, but when we first met, I sized you up as someone who cared about people. All I’m trying to do is find out about the girl’s condition, not adopt her. What are you trying so hard not to tell me? I paused dramatically. Is she dead? I could see him blush right through his dark skin, jaw muscles working.

She’s not dead, he fired back at me.

Well, what then?

Horace gave me a long, appraising look, seemingly wrestling with my questions. There’s something you need to know.

I didn’t like the sound of that. Is it about the girl?

No. It’s about you, I think.

You think? What the hell does that mean?

Horace looked around again and motioned us to the vestibule between the entrance doors to the ER and out of earshot of everyone nearby. He looked me straight in the eye and said, There’s an Amber Alert out on the girl.

I knew about Amber Alerts, of course. AMBER