Rest Stop

By Robin Sheerer

Everything went wrong.

She raced across the parking lot, more than an hour late. Jim stood leaning against his truck, arms crossed on his chest. Scowling.

"I’m really sorry, Jim, I…"

"Great, now we'll be caught in rush hour," he griped, cutting short her explanation.

They had to creep into stop-and-go traffic and inch their way out of the city. The heat index hit 100 degrees and the air conditioner in Jim’s nine-year-old Silverado whined, threatening demise.

Once they left Chicago, Pam opened a tin of homemade chocolate chip cookies. "These sure beat those hockey pucks they sell in the cafeteria," he said, inhaling three in a row. The atmosphere in the truck eased as they gossiped and laughed about the factory where they both worked. 

It had been Pam’s idea to go camping. She thought it would be fun - and romantic. She had looked forward to it for weeks. And now, after yesterday’s news, she had something important to tell him. Something private. Before she revealed anything though, she needed to be certain he really cared about her.

They stopped for groceries and by the time they finally pulled into Palisades State Park along the Mississippi River, the sun laid low in the sky. Jim groaned when they ended up in the last site, small and treeless, squeezed between two families with rowdy kids. The large oak trees in the park looked exhausted and the humidity was so high that Pam felt like she was wrapped in a wet blanket. They were both drenched in sweat when they finished unloading the truck. Jim popped a beer and took over setting up camp.

 “Hey, I’ll help. What do you want me to do?” Pam offered. He ignored her, walked down the road to a nearby spigot, filled a five-gallon plastic container with water, lugged it back and began pitching a small blue nylon tent. Pam sulked. Was this Jim's idea of partnership? It took only a couple of minutes for her to unpack food and spread a tablecloth on the wooden picnic table. With nothing else to do, she plunked down in a canvas chair and watched him work until he finished.

"Jim, you're supposed to wait until the fuel soaks into the coals," she pointed out as he struggled to light the charcoal in the grill. Instead, he drenched them, threw in a match and nearly set himself on fire as the flames flared like a torch.

"I told you," she said, immediately regretting the words. Jim was silent except for "pass the mustard" at dinner as they wolfed down grilled hot dogs and coleslaw straight from a deli container. He opened his fourth can of beer.

"I’m sorry I was a smart aleck, Jim. Are you mad at me?"

"I’m just tired. Don’t worry about it."

After dinner, despite still being hot and muggy, he began to pile wood in the fire pit insisting, "It isn’t camping unless you have a fire."

"Why don’t you stack it like a teepee?" she suggested.

"What are you, an expert?" he snapped. She frowned. They both knew she had more camping experience than he did.

Avoiding the heat, they sat far from the fire and told ghost stories until Jim began to slur his words. Finally, they went to bed. Jim stripped down to his underwear but Pam kept her t-shirt and shorts on even though it was stifling in the tent. They lay on top of sleeping bags to stay cool. Not touching. As far away from each other as possible. Cicadas whined and lightening flashed filling the air with electricity.

Jim tousled her hair, mumbled, "Sorry I was grouchy," turned on his side and fell asleep. She felt wired and stayed awake a long time listening to night sounds: kids running around, teenagers playing rap music and adults talking late into the night. Thunder rumbled in the distance.

She tossed and turned, thoughts racing. What could she do to make things better between them? She vowed not to offer more advice. For the tenth time that day, she patted her breast in the same spot and considered waking him to tell her news but hesitated. He'd been moody today, even mean. What was bothering him? Once, in the middle of having sex, he had told her he loved her, but did he mean it? Maybe he wanted to break up.

Pam dozed off and on all night and they both woke up early. The storm had passed over without raining, leaving the air oppressive. They took showers and immediately felt sticky again. Jim looked hung-over but cooked pancakes in his camping skillet.

"Thanks for making breakfast. These look great." She took two bites, made a face, took one more, and laid the fork down.

"What’s the problem now?" he asked.

"They taste like fish. Did you wash the pan after you used it last time?"

"I hate camping with women. All you do is complain." He stormed to the bathroom, adding, "You sound more like my ex every day."

Jim drank his first beer at 9 AM. The heat climbed steadily into the nineties. Pam’s muscles ached from sleeping on the ground and during the night her allergies had kicked in. Her eyes watered and her nose dripped.

They decided to take a hike along the river but as soon as they reached the muddy waters, they were attacked by a swarm of mosquitoes. After returning to the campsite, they sat staring listlessly into the dead coals of the fire pit.

"This isn’t fun," Pam said. "Let’s go home. It isn’t working out."

Jim jumped up, tossed everything out of the tent, yanked out the stakes and began loading the truck. Pam scrambled to pack up the food.

As soon as he sat behind the wheel, Jim tuned the radio to a sports station and became engrossed in pre-game commentary on a White Sox game scheduled that afternoon. Pam sat mute, not knowing what to say. At the first rest stop, she asked him to pull in so she could go to the bathroom.

"Don’t take long, okay? Maybe I can still make the game." He parked in front of the building and turned up the volume as she grabbed her purse and ran inside. A bus filled with elderly women had just pulled in and she had to join a long line in the restroom. While she waited, she tried to sort things out.

On the one hand, he had been a jerk this weekend. Maybe some of the rumors she had heard at the factory were true. Rumors that he drank too much, had a bad temper and went through women like they were on a conveyor belt. On the other hand, they had dated for six months and he had never acted like this.

Why didn’t he plan to include her in the rest of the weekend? When she’d said, "it isn’t working," maybe he thought she meant their relationship; she only meant the camping trip. She’d talk to him on the way home. Maybe she’d even tell him her news. It might bring them closer. She wanted, no she needed, this relationship to work. On her way out, she bought two Cokes, one as a peace offering for Jim.

She hurried to the parking lot and stopped, puzzled. No truck. It was this entrance, right? Her heart beat fast. Maybe he had driven to the back of the building to wait in the shade. She walked to the other side. Two truckers sat eating ice cream cones at a picnic table, their semis idling loudly near by. No Jim.

Panicked, she returned to the front and frantically scanned the parking lot. Lots of cars. Two trucks. No Silverado. He wouldn’t leave her here. There must be some explanation. She headed towards the gas pumps where a couple of SUVS were lined up and blocked her view. They pulled off, leaving empty lanes.

Wait a minute. Was that her duffel bag next to the pump? Heart pounding, she ran towards it, sloshing Coke all over her shirt. Her hands shook as she tossed the cups in the trash and picked up her bag. Slowly, she walked back inside and sat at a table in McDonald’s.

He probably drove back to the campground for something. Or maybe he thought she deliberately took a long time. Was this his form of payback? If so, he'd be back in a few minutes. Without thinking, she reached up and touched her left breast, then called him on her cell phone. No answer. Just his recording.

"Jim, where are you? Are you okay? I’m in McDonald’s waiting for you. Call me." Twenty minutes later she tried again. Same recording. She left another message. Was it her imagination or were several people looking at her sympathetically? Her cheeks blazed.

She bought a newspaper and tried to do the crossword puzzle but couldn’t concentrate. After an hour, she ordered lunch from the same African-American woman who had waited on her earlier. "Back again," she said in what she hoped was a light voice.

Although her stomach felt hollow, she wasn't hungry and picked at her chicken sandwich and fries. Every time a guy with a baseball cap and dark brown hair walked in, she jumped up, hoping it was Jim.

There were lots of things she liked about him. He was smart, good looking in a rough sort of way and always ready to do something fun. He worked hard to stay in touch with his kids after his divorce and had the best safety record of all the team leaders in the plant.

She was thirty-three and sick of go-nowhere relationships. What was wrong with her? She didn’t want to be alone, especially now with the decisions she had to make and her future so uncertain.

She stared out the window, oblivious to the upbeat music piped into the restaurant, not daring to leave her table in case he showed up. Travelers came and went. Everyone seemed to be part of a family or with a friend, except for her. A picture flashed through her mind of her father walking out the door when she was twelve years old. Her heart hurt.

Probably it was her fault. Jim had told her she was too smart for her own good. Maybe she wasn’t attractive enough. She knew she needed to lose ten pounds.

At a lull in the restaurant the server left the counter and began wiping tables. She stopped next to Pam.

"You look worried, honey. Are you all right?"

Pam looked at her cautiously. She saw a woman with the name Jewel printed on her nametag, grey-flecked hair, soulful eyes, a round body. A woman with no hard edges. Pam covered her face with her hands and burst into tears. Jewel sat down, waited patiently and then asked, "Do you want to tell me about it?"

"It’s all my fault," Pam concluded as she ended her story.

"Well, I doubt that. He doesn’t sound like a standup guy to me. You deserve someone who'll treat you right."

Customers began lining up at the counter and Jewel left, promising to be back as soon as possible. Running through her list of friends, Pam couldn't think of anyone who was free to pick her up. She absolutely refused to call her mother knowing she would say, "I told you to never trust a man." Again.

Jewel came back and asked if she had a job. Pam told her she had started on an assembly line and worked her way up to supervisor. Now she was buying the trailer she lived in and had her own car.

"You should be proud of yourself."

"Yeah. I’m doing great, just not with men. What about you? Did you ever have trouble like this when you were my age?"

 "No, honey. I was lucky. I was married to a good man for thirty years." Jewel lowered her eyes as she added that he had died three years ago, then looked up, smiled and said that her kids were all grown now and she had recently gone back to school.

"I'm in my first year in junior college now."

"Wow. That’s something I've always wanted to do," Pam said.

"I love school. I wanna' go for a BA even though I'm fifty-six years old. I just wish I could afford to go full time but I gotta work."

Pam was quiet for a while and then confided, "I’m not as upset about Jim as I am about being alone again."

"But sometimes being with a jerk is lonelier than being alone, isn’t it?" Jewel laughed. "Uh oh, there's my boss." She promised to call a local cab service for Pam for a ride to the nearest bus station. As she left, she put a hand on Pam’s shoulder. "You didn’t get where you are today by being a wimp, girl. You’re strong."

Pam stood up, stretched and walked to the restroom. She patted her face with paper towels soaked in cold water, combed her hair and put on makeup. After returning to her table, she pulled a pen and small notebook from her purse and made several lists, including steps she needed to take as soon as she got home.

When she saw the taxi pull up, she stopped at the counter to say goodbye to Jewel. A teenager with scarlet lips and bleached hair stood behind the cash register. She reported the day shift had ended and Jewel had left.