Road Test by David Wickenhauser (most read book in the world .txt) 📕

When they came through the front entrance, Hugh handed each of them their room key, and told Roly he’d talk to him briefly in the morning, that he needed to make an early start because he had three morning deliveries.

“Charlie, be ready to leave first thing,” he told her. She needed to ride with Hugh and Jenny down to Corning, where they would meet up with James.

Chapter Thirty-Three

Hugh and Jenny said goodbye to Roly and Charlie in the hotel lobby and walked arm in arm back to Hugh’s truck. Hugh hadn’t wanted to prolong being alone with Jenny even long enough to see his brother and Charlie to their rooms. He was emotionally and physically drained, and only wanted to hold Jenny in his arms.

At the truck, sitting on Hugh’s bed, and holding hands, Jenny spoke first.

“Hugh, you look like a wreck. What happened?”

“Charlie happened. This has been the longest week of my life.”

“Hugh, it’s been three days, two nights.”

“You’re kidding. It sure feels longer.”

“Was she that bad?”

“No, actually. After the first few hours, which were tense, she came around to being a mostly normal person.”

“Then, what was it?”

“It wasn’t any one thing. Just a whole lot of little things. Maybe the one big thing is she claims to be an atheist. It is so difficult for me to understand anybody who denies God. I really don’t know how to relate to somebody with such a self-destructive spirit. Know what I mean?”

“Yeah, Hugh, I do.”

“It makes me realize how right we are for each other.”

“I was so angry when you called, and I heard Charlie’s voice on the phone. I was angry and jealous,” Jenny said.

“No need to be, believe me.”

“Well, I guess you passed the test.”

“What test?”

“The fiancé alone in a truck with a beautiful woman for three days road test,” Jenny said.

Hugh and Jenny sat in comfortable silence.

After a few moments, Jenny said, “I had a long talk with your mom. She knows you better than anyone alive. She said she was absolutely, one-hundred percent, positively dead certain no power on earth could tempt you or tear you away from me.”

“Good old Mom,” Hugh said.

“Yup. I couldn’t have picked a better mother-in-law.”

“I’m dog tired, and we have an early, long day tomorrow. Let’s make a trip to the facility, and then go to bed.”

Jenny looked up at the top bunk where her sleeping bag still held Charlie’s scent.

“No, honey.” Hugh said, and patted his lower bunk.

Back from the restrooms and changed into their pajamas, Hugh got into his bunk first, the side against the back wall, then opened the covers for Jenny to come in. It was nowhere near the space they’d had in their resort villa king-size bed. More like a large twin size. But, as it turned out, all that extra space would have been wasted anyway.

Jenny immediately covered Hugh’s left side with her own warm body, and snuggled in like it was the most natural thing in the world.

Hugh could feel himself releasing all the built-up tension of the past several days, and relaxing like he hadn’t done in a long time.

Jenny murmured, half asleep, “Is that a sword in your pocket? …”

“Hush. Go to sleep,” Hugh whispered. Then his last thought before drifting off was, it’s definitely time we got married.

Hugh awoke to pounding on his driver-side door.

“Wake up sleepy heads.”

It was Roly. An early riser, as always. He held a take-out container with three coffees and breakfast sandwiches.

Hugh climbed over Jenny, and scooted to the front of the cab to unlock the door for his brother. “Come on up. Anybody bearing coffee is always welcome.”

Roly passed out the coffees and sandwiches, then he sat in the passenger seat, which he had swiveled toward the sleeper. Hugh sat on the edge of his bed. Jenny sat up with her back against the “headboard” of the sleeper.

“I want to get an early start back to home,” he said. It hadn’t escaped Roly’s attention what the sleeping arrangements had been.

“Thank you so much for bringing Jenny out to me,” Hugh said. “I owe you a big one, little brother.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll keep that in mind,” Roly said.

The three sipped coffees, and ate their sandwiches in companionable silence.

“Jenny has told us all about the accident,” Roly said. “That must have been really bad. How are you handling it?”

“It is what it is,” Hugh replied.

Truckers are the original fatalists. Most truckers learn early in their careers the futility of railing against things they have no control over – the irritable and often hostile shipping office personnel they deal with, dispatchers and other trucking office staff who have no idea of the conditions truckers have to drive in, the constant exposure to weather and other adverse elements, and the frequency and severity of the driving hazards and accidents they witness or get involved in.

“It is what it is,” is often heard in trucker conversations.

“It was bad enough, but it’s far from over.”

Hugh brought Roly and Jenny up to date with details about Charlie’s fake kidnapping and the insurance and lawsuit scam, about Charlie’s ride-along with him, and about her finally getting off of his truck to ride with James.

“Poor James,” Roly and Jenny said simultaneously.

“Speaking of Charlie,” Hugh said and pointed with his chin outside the window. Charlie walked toward the truck with her overnight bag hanging from one arm, and a take-out container with four coffees and breakfast sandwiches in her other hand.

“Wow! She can’t be that bad,” Roly said. “Bearing coffees.”

“Howdy, gang,” Charlie said. “Permission to board.”

She looked to be in high spirits. The overnight stay in the