The Mentor

by Pat Connid

  After spending the night pool side-- where I'd simply slipped into a hotel and gone up to its swimming deck, covered myself in towels, and slept until a very old guy in a speedo got the fright of his life after reaching for a towel following his early morning swim-- I headed south of the city.

  The Port of Los Angeles is like a large, sprawling city. There’s even stores. If you ever fly into L.A. during the next port strike (because how can a filing clerk friggin' live on 112k, seriously?), you should look down as you circle for LAX-- witness the sea freight backed up for miles off the coast. It's surreal. From the air, it looks like massive skyscrapers have been tipped over by some petulant, infant giant and each have fallen into the ocean shallows.

  There are a lot of trucks lining the east and south walls of the port, but the cars that wheel up each morning, those are in gated lots. That’s because it’s full of BMWs, Infinities, Audis and some flashier muscle-car stuff.

  See, port workers make more than a hundred grand a year. But you've got a better chance of collectively cobbling together a full set of teeth at a Larry the Cable Guy concert than getting a job at the Port. It's all union and from what I've heard of it, gigs go to family of those already working there. That said; don’t ever think you’ll get the nod if you showed up one day a sack over your shoulder and a tool belt around your waist looking for work. It stays in the family. That’s how it’s been, how it is, and how it will be when we’re dead (note: their funerals will likely be catered. So, if you get a chance the grub's probably good).

  Now, the rig driver with the blood-shot eyes who rambles up to the docks to load up makes considerably less than said port worker.

  This disparity is handled in the most respectful way possible there-- which is to say, not at all.

  So, in L.A., truckers there hate the port rats and vice versa. It’s a symbiotic relationship and you may easily guess which sees itself as the host and the other as the necessary parasite. I was looking to use this prejudice to my advantage.

  Since the attacks of September 11th, 2001 it’s far harder to get into airports, loading docks, and Dairy Queens.

  So, the Port Authority does not take kindly to interlopers, you might say. The fence is high, capped with razor wire. The guards have guns and the authority to use them and, frankly, have been looking to shoot someone for a very long time.

  Sure, there were easier ways of finding a trucker going all the way east-- like thumbing it on the interstate, hoping to flag down a rig heading through the high desert and up to Interstate 40. From there, it's straight on 'til morning (or the morning after the morning after that).

  Problem is, I'm not Jack Kerouac.

  And, if you were profiling (or, more germane here, if you were sizing someone up to give them a cross-country ride), yours truly falls into that mass shooter/Unabomber/peckish serial killer/clock-tower sniper category: Misanthropic, twenty-something, pasty-white dude whose hair never looks combed quite right.

  So, breaking into the U.S. Port of Los Angeles seemed like the most promising alternative.

  Surprisingly, the water route is the simplest point of entry. Gotta come up from the south because of the prevailing current, but if you can float low (thank you, fat!) and avoid the little boats with high seats and binoculars, you might get in.

  It took me more than an hour to drift to where I’d be able to get up onto the dock. There are maintenance ladders where crews climb down to service the underbelly of the seagoing vessels. By the time I got to one, I felt like one of those pelicans that were in the paper after the BP gulf oil spill. At least, the pelican had some nice woman with hairy legs trying to towel them off.

  I wouldn’t have access to any sort of manifests that could tell me if there were any Made in Japan™ china shipments heading east nor could I go around asking too many questions. Didn’t want to attract attention.

  I assumed that just about everyone on foot had a visible badge, but I’d already planned for that when I got the hairy eyeball from a hairy dockworker.

  “Hell you doin’?”

  “What’s it look like I’m doing, asshole,” I said.

  “Looks like you don’t got a laminate, that’s what it looks like.” Hearing the words laminate come out of this guy's mouth was like watching a blue tick hound squat and push out a gold brick.

  “You got a fishing pole, I’ll get it back,” I said, slapping my jeans, the grimy water splattering around me, close to him. He took a step back.

  “Ain’t my fault you fell in, you idiot. Lucky you didn’t fall too close to a hull, or you’d be crushed when the first bubbly wave blew by.”

  Theatrically, I took my shirt off and rang it out, the water splattering and splashing at my feet, the disgusting oil slick quickly enraging my new friend.

  “Don’t do that here,” he wailed. “You go up and talk with Roger in the blue booth up there. Get a temp pass and a couple rags and get that up.”

  I held my hand up to him for a moment, gave him a half-hearted wave then headed to find Roger.

  The rags ol’ Roger had got to me quickly. I think he hoped I might change into them, worried I was dripping oily water onto his floor. The “booth” was actually a utility trailer stuffed top to bottom with filing cabinets. The ceiling tiles might have been white once, but now sagged, covered in a sticky yellow film.

  The same color as Roger’s teeth.

  Pulling out a pad of blue temp passes, he poised his pen above it.

  “You stink, you know.”

  I said, “You mean in a smelly way or are you attacking my character.”

  He blinked, face dead. “Let me see your I.D.”

  I lifted a hand toward the door. “It’s drying with my cash, some expired condoms and your sister's phone number on a picnic table.”

  He squeezed the pen harder. “Well, why… what?"

  "Huh?"

  "What'd you say?"

  "When?"

  "You said something about my sister?"

  "No," I said, frowning. "I said something about cash and condoms. Did you hear that as something about your sister? That's a kinda weird."

  Something played across his face like, say, a mini-stroke. Then he started into me again: "Well, what'd you leave your stuff out there for, goddamn it?"

  “Because I don’t want all this oil to stain them,” I said, and plopped into a plastic chair, an action which made an unfortunate gastrointestinal sound.

  Crossing his arms across his chest, he leaned a hand toward an ashtray. I assumed it was an ashtray, but I couldn’t actually see an ashtray. For all I knew it just was a pile of cigarette butts. How the hell did Joe Camel even know I stunk? He must have lost that sense years ago.

  “You gonna tell me what happened?”

  “I was helping with the cargo and—“

  He nearly jumped out of his chair. “You’re not supposed to go anywhere near the goddamn ship! Our guys do that.”

  “Just trying to help.”

  “Do we look like we need any help here?”

  I chose to keep my mouth shut on that because, one, it was too easy and, two, I have standards when it comes to sarcasm. Instead, I pushed his rage button a little more. Had to be careful though-- there's a delicate balance and very important distinction between manipulation and trigger.

  “I could probably do it a damn sight better than your lazy lot here,” I said as he spit the smoke from his mouth. “Now, why don’t you give me what I need—“

  He stood and poked his finger into my chest. “You don’t tell me what to do, boy. Go get your soggy I.D. and march your flabby ass back here.”

  I threw the rags down onto the desk, sending a few butts from his cigarette sculpture to the floor.

  “You clean your own mess then.”

  He leaned onto his heels, tilted his head back and gnawed on his cigarette. I wondered for a moment if I’d pushed it too far. Sneaking into the Port of Los Angeles was not the best—

  “You got five seconds to pick those up
or I call security, and you’ll spend the night in jail. We even got one right here at the Port. And while you're drying out in a cell all night, we can tag your haul for Customs investigation. Hope you don't got nothing that'll spoil.”

  I opened my mouth, closed it again, nabbed the rags and then stormed out the door.

  Once outside, breathing fresh air, I cut quickly toward a long row of warehouses. Spotting a large open crate, it seemed best to slip into its darkness for a moment, and I stepped inside.

  I pulled the short blue stack of passes out from the folds of the rags and groaned a little. Sure, sometimes the lamest tricks are the best ones because no one expects you to try them anymore. Doesn't make them any less lame.

  When ol’ boy started to calm down, the sparklers in his mind fizzling out as his hatred of yours truly faded, he’d soon realize that I’d swiped them when I’d picked up the rags.

  Spotting a guy with a clipboard, I sided up to him and asked to borrow his pen. Without looking up, he replied with a suggestion that I believe would be morally questionable if not physically impossible. I turned away, and just slapped the blank patch on the left side of my chest. Luckily, the patch was navy blue if one were to use a pen, you couldn’t see it very well. I didn’t need to work long, just enough time to make it into a rig.

  If the interior of the docks had been conceived of some master plan, its exact design escaped me. It felt more like the construct of an adolescent child-giant, if the kid one birthday had been given a weekly mailing from the Waterway line of Brio. Each Saturday a new package-- it could be a Cigarette-Stained Managers' Trailer ™ or E. Coli-infused Toilet/Shower Stalls Module™-- and the child would simply slap the new chunk down next to wherever the previous had been plunked down.

  Five minutes later, following the smell of grease, I found a roach coach with umbrella tables scattered in front of it.

  A couple truckers were milling around.

  Some gave me a once over, either giving me a shake of the head or a quick laugh. Still recovering from my oil-water swim-- and without a mirror, I couldn't tell… but I'm sure I was about as welcome a sight as some oft-putting industrial-themed minstrel show-- none of the truckers invited me for a chat.

  “Man, you stink,” the greasy man with the paper hat said.

  “Been hearing that a lot recently,” I said, walking up to the man behind the register. “Pizza and a coke.”

  He plugged his nose with his fist and walked away to get my food.

  Off the cemented patio area, there was a large stone planter doing a poor job of holding a collection of azalea bushes gone mad. Sitting on the edge of the planter was a guy eating a polish sausage alone.

  “I’m looking for a spot downwind,” I said and he looked up to me with deep chestnut eyes, pausing briefly as he ate, watching as I settled in.

  “Sorta fell in and the fellahs over there don’t want me too close,” I added, pointing over his shoulder. “You don’t mind if I grab the other half of the planter’s ledge.”

  He shrugged. “It’s not mine. I don’t believe I have any say in if you go there or not,” he said in a clipped accent. His brown hand folded around the last half of his sausage and he pressed into his mouth until there was nothing visible. I was impressed: for a small dude, he had a big mouth.

  I pointed at him and said, smiling, “You know there’s places in West Hollywood where if you did that, some guys would probably throw dollar bills at you.”

  Mid-chew he stopped and looked at me, wide-eyed. A moment later, he buckled over nearly choking on his food. Walking past him, I put my soda and pizza slice on the planter. By the time I’d gotten a bite or two out of my food, he’d regained his composure.

  “Hell, that was funny,” he said. “Haven’t laughed like that in days.”

  “Glad to hear,” I said.

  He then looked at me serious. “Now, wait—you’re not from West Hollywood are you?”

  I raised my hands. “No, no. I’m a Georgia boy.”

  He laughed again and slapped the planter with an open hand. He pointed and said, “I was making a joke just then. Just kidding.”

  “And I know you aren’t from West Hollywood.”

  He shook his head, the smile melting a little. “No. Guyana.” His eyes locked on mine.

  “Never been, but I’ve always wanted to go to South America. I hear the women are crazy.”

  His teeth were white as sun-bleached bone. Tipping his forehead toward the tables, he said, “These guys think I’m Middle Eastern, for crissakes. It’s about time someone had a globe as a kid.”

  “Yeah, had one but, to be honest, I wanted a puppy.”

  “And you got a globe instead.”

  “Had a hell of a time teaching it to fetch. ‘Rollover’ was a snap, though.”

  Another peal of laughter and he stuffed the remainder of the polish in his mouth, chewing and chuckling at the same time.

  “Gotta go,” he said.

  Nodding. I said, “Where to?”

  He gathered his trash and said, “Birmingham.”

  “Alabama?” I sipped my drink and added: “Really?”

  "NORMALLY, I DON'T LIKE to share my cab,” the man who’d introduced himself as Abe said when he’d eventually agreed to let me tag along. A quick look at my blue (and blank) temporary I.D., and he probably knew something was up. But, I guess I just have that kind of face. That and I offered to share the driving.

  No, I don’t know how to drive a rig. Yes, that would be a problem. But, I needed to be off the port and headed back home.

  “Abe, I appreciate you making the exception.”

  “There was a time you could pick up hitchhikers,” he said and adjusted the seat slightly, fiddled with the mirror, propped a two-liter bottle soda up in a gray plastic holder, bolted to the dash. He did this all as he drove, as if he had done it a thousand times before, like a ritual or prayer before hitting the open road, some 18-wheeler's genuflect.

  Abe’s hand went up to a poor excuse for a mustache, and he scratched it with a couple bent fingers. He said, “Even back in the day, I didn’t pick up the white hitchhikers.”

  “Abe, I appreciate you making the exception.”

  He smiled wide and nodded like he’d finally accepted his choice wasn’t going to turn out to be a bad one.

  “You hear on the news about stuff all the time. Out here, I can listen to satellite radio because regular radio is so terribly terrible. Mostly I like the talk shows, but many of those are pretty incendiary,” he took a small hit of his soda, jerked the clutch with his arm and we were at cruising speed. “The news is good, too, and you have to keep up. But as for hitchhikers, it’s simple… Now, anytime you hear about someone pulling a gun at a club? That’s a black guy.”

  Still trying to get comfortable, fiddling with the seat pillows, I said, “Well that sounds a little racist.”

  “No, no. I’m brown, so it’s not.”

  “That how it works?”

  “Nobody told you?” he said and grinned again. “Some guy rams a van full of people into a Chevy compact heading into San Diego, that’s a Mexican guy,” he said, checking his mirrors. “But, you hear about the guy who kidnaps eighteen people, ties ‘em up, bleeds them with leeches until they’re dry and makes a two-person tent out of their entrails--”

  “White guy.”

  “Hell, yes,” he said and stared at me. “Crazy sonsabitches you guys are. I don’t know where it comes from. Always eating someone’s pancreas and making lampshades out of people.”

  Finally getting settled, I asked: “Is pancreas good?”

  His eyes darted toward me. “Mine isn't.”

  Chapter Nine

  We’d hit some serious storms in Louisiana, but I’d slept through most of it. After Abe blew his horn at a Lexus that had weaved in front of us, no more than two feet from the bumper, I was up for the rest of the trip.

  Early on, it had become clear to my travel companion I didn’t know the first thing about driving
a rig. I offered to learn, but he said something about novices frying the clutch and that had been pretty much the end of the conversation. Thankfully, he didn’t seem too upset nor, actually, too surprised.

  Admirably, he’d driven straight through until we finally stopped an hour inside the east border of Texas. Abe, my Guyanian pilot, was a machine.

  I’m sure the White Crosses he was popping every four hours could take some of the credit, too.

  Deeper into the country, the sky had become dark as Midwest oil and I could see Abe was fading. A sign notified us that a rest stop was ahead, and I was a little relived when he pulled the rig down the next ramp.

  Before he’d slept, he’d made me promise to wake him in exactly two hours and fifteen minutes.

  “My body has a forty-five minute sleep cycle,” he’d explained.

  “Okay.”

  “And distances like this… with the pills… I’ll need just the three sleep cycles to make it the rest of the way.”

  I popped the door open as he slid to the back of the cab where the bed was waiting for him. “How’d you know you’ll fall asleep right away?”

  “Right,” he said and nodded. “Add about two minutes to the time.”

  “You can fall asleep that fast?”

  He nabbed a pillow and punched it fluffy. “Shouldn’t be a problem. I fell asleep at the wheel four times in the past half hour.”

  I laughed, dropped to the dew-damp pavement outside the cab. “You’re kidding right?” The yellow windbreaker that Abe had leant me flapped slightly in the very light breeze.

  “Two hours, seventeen minutes. Start now.”

  Walking the lot to stretch my legs I saw that several other rigs had also parked for a quick break, each with running lights glowing in the dark. Closer to the restrooms cars dotted the grass line. One of them was small and stuffed to the back windows with clothes, boxes, blankets… I’d moved enough times myself to recognize someone else in the middle of that process.

  When a couple emerged from opposite bathrooms at the exact same time with puffy, tired faces I knew they were the moving couple. Neither said a word, a quick smile, hands falling together like two paired magnets, intertwining briefly, then they both headed to their respective car doors.