{Travel Tales}: Highway in Hell

Frank saw himself in his rearview mirror. Tiny beads of sweat hang off his moustache and begin to drop, each droplet vapourized on the hot surface of his knee. His hot face in his hot car. He looks in the rearview mirror again, grimacing at the sight of the steaming rows of cars behind him.

This particular car was not his friend; he wished he had bought something else.

In the past, Frank had owned cars that he considered his friends, cars that never let him down. He could not say the same about this piece of crap. It had no air-conditioning and only the rear left-hand side window would open. A small crack in the passenger window allows a pinhole of air to enter the car. He is desperately warm, the heat forcing him to shift around in his own body as if trying to match the shape of his own melting skin. He feels like he is trapped in a wooden box enveloped in fire.

What type of life is this? Boiling to death on a highway to get home to a house he is bored of seeing,  escaping home from work at the pace of a snail.

A loud horn wakes Frank up with a jolt.

He has fallen asleep for about fifteen seconds and it is time to roll on, three more meters towards home. Fifteen seconds of sleep did not alleviate His tiredness.

He is so over-tired (so very over-tired) and wishes he was somewhere else. Somewhere else drinking a beer. Beer. During work today, Errol had mentioned how he could enjoy a beer “in this fucking heat,” and all Frank could think about in this hot car was that beer Errol mentioned in passing.

But Errol had said something else that Frank could not believe to be true.

Frank had replied to Errol that he would also enjoy a cool beer and added how much sweeter it would taste if that beer was enjoyed on vacation. Errol mentioned that he had never in his life been on vacation. Now Frank’s thoughts were consumed by the idea of Errol never having been on vacation.

Today, Frank lifted bags onto a pallet before the bags were whisked away never to be seen again. They are heavy bags of grain, and he lifts somewhere up of 2,000 of those bags onto a pallet every week, 51-and-a-half weeks a year.

Frank decides to let his mind drift into a fantasy.

This sometimes works when faced with strange situations; He is in Spain, which isn’t hard to imagine because of the heat. On that beach in Marbella. It is very, very hot, but nice heat; the sea keeps it all in check, and its compatriot, the wind, gently carries the sea air—rich vapors of magic that can heal anything.

This fantasy evaporates at the sound of another loud honk.

He sticks the car in shift and rolls another three meters towards home.

His thoughts, grounded in reality, return to work and Errol’s statement that he had never been on vacation in his whole life.Frank couldn’t believe this could be true, pressing Errol as hard as he could, trying to work out any situation in Errol’s life that could be interpreted as a vacation. But Errol stuck to his guns and was able to answer with a surety and confidence that effectively proved the statement true: Errol had never been on vacation.

They spent half a day discussing it, lifting bags while Frank asked Errol questions and Errol answered them. Frank wasn’t quite sure how old Errol was—he wasn’t good with ages—but he thought Errol couldn’t be more than 30 or 35.

Asking Errol why he had never been on vacation revealed more to him about Errol’s life than Frank had learned in 3 years working with the man.

They talked all day, every day, yet he never really knew him. Errol had never been on vacation because as a boy he shot and killed a boy his age over drugs and money.

“Oh, I regret it,” Errol had said. “But strangely, there is a small piece of me that doesn’t regret killing that boy.”

Frank gently pressed him on the topic—he didn’t want to provoke Errol, whom had never seemed violent or dangerous until this very day. Errol explained that he didn’t like the boy, that the boy had a meanness about him bordering on evil. Errol mourned the time he lost to prison but said that this boy deserved it. “He killed cats and dogs for fun,” Errol said, staring at his hands.

Errol didn’t say his name, and Frank never asked him.

Before he went to prison, Errol had no family. His parents had died—something having to do with drugs—and he had moved around with different relatives but mostly stayed on the street, under bridges and in train stations.

Frank tries again to fantasize about going on vacation, but this time, so that the fantasy holds better, he’ll bring Errol with him to that beach in Marbella. Frank would buy him a beer and show him what to do on vacation. He thinks they could go every year.

Frank always liked Errol. He thought he was a good listener.