Crazy Little Thing

by Layce Gardner

  Claire covered her eyes with both hands.

  The old farmer saw Ollie’s van in the nick of time and swerved over to the left lane. He passed by slowly – toodling along at no more than twenty miles an hour – as he witnessed the wheelchair bump lightly into the van’s front bumper and the Highway Patrol burn rubber a good fifty feet before screeching to a stop only inches from G-Ray’s knees.

  Claire peeked through her fingers and saw the old farmer tip his straw hat as he toodled on by.

  The patrolman jumped out of his car, took off his hat, threw it to the ground and put his hands on his hips. “What the H.E. double hockey-sticks is going on here?”

  Jailhouse Rock II

  The police station looked like the third ring of a Shriner’s Circus. Everyone was yelling at once. Ollie, Claire, G-Ray and the Patrolman were all telling their side of the story to Sheriff Sam Hill. Even EZ was awake and putting in her two cents worth.

  Sheriff Sam Hill looked like Jackie Gleason in that movie Smokey and the Bandit. He chomped on the wet end of an unlit cigar with his boots on his desk, peeking over the mountain of his belly. He looked stupid, but Claire knew that was a disguise. Behind that stupid good ol’ boy personae lurked the personality of a honey badger.

  The patrolman had wasted no time in rounding them all up into his car and bringing them to the police station. Claire had seen Sheriff Sam Hill look them up and down and she could almost hear the cash register in his head dinging as he totaled up how much money they were worth. His squinty peppercorn eyes looked her up and down and she shivered under their cold gaze.

  EZ was tottering around in circle, shouting to everybody and anybody, “I don’t remember anything after the Bananarama concert. Until I woke up with G-Ray on my lap. I was headed down the road at an ungodly speed. I was looking death in the face. Or maybe that was G-Ray’s face. None of this was my fault. You must believe me. I don’t belong in jail.”

  G-Ray was adding to the confusion by shouting his story. “I was on top of the van and my tocks were talking to me. They get all tingly feeling like how your arm or leg feels when it falls asleep except this is more like my tocks are waking up. And that always means something bad is about to happen. I looked up to the sky expecting to be beamed up by aliens any second but instead the van starts moving and I grab onto the luggage rack. And then the van stops moving and then I’m flying! Flying, Dood, flying! I tumbled into EZ’s lap and we rocketed down the road. It was like I was Superman, but without the leotards and cape.”

  Ollie is trying to be heard over the ruckus. “We didn’t break any laws. None! I never even broke the speed limit. Is there a law that says you can’t drive a wheelchair down a state highway? Well, okay, there probably is. But is there a law that says you have to drive your car forwards, and not backwards? Well, okay, there probably is. But you can’t lock us up! I want a lawyer. Any lawyer but Scarlet. I’ll take a public defender. Get me a public defender. I have rights!” Oscar wiggled around in her backpack. She shoved the pack behind her. They could take her but they couldn’t take her dog.

  Everyone shushed the moment Claire handed her now scuffed and dirty phone across the desk to Sheriff Sam Hill, saying, “Our lawyer would like a word with you.”

  Silence blanketed the group as Sheriff Sam Hill held Claire’s smart phone to his ear. “Sheriff Hill, here.” Scarlet’s tinny voice squawked on the other end of the phone connection. Sheriff Sam Hill listened intently.

  “No,” he said.

  He listened some more.

  “No,” he said.

  He listened more.

  “No,” he said.

  He listened even more.

  “Warmer,” he said.

  He listened some more.

  “Done,” he said, handing the phone back to Claire. He looked at the patrolman and ordered, “Get these bozos out of here. Drive ‘em back to where you found them.” He looked at Claire. “Get back into that clown van of yours and get out of my town. I don’t want to see hide nor hair of you after the sun sets. Got it?”

  Claire nodded. Ollie, G-Ray and EZ all high-fived each other and group-hugged. Claire tugged Ollie’s arm and headed for the door, saying, “Let’s get out of here.”

  Once back on the street, Ollie said, “How’d Scarlet get us out of this one?”

  Claire said, “I have a feeling Scarlet is the proud owner of two hundred tickets to the policeman’s ball.”

  Claire discreetly tried to scratch her butt. Maybe it was Ollie she was allergic to.

  Walk Like an Egyptian

  Ollie vowed to keep her mouth shut about Scarlet from here on out. She owed Scarlet that much. After all, she had bailed them out of trouble twice. She would sincerely hate to be in Claire’s shoes right now.

  EZ was in the back of the van with her Walkman cassette player plugged into her ears. The tinny sound of the Bangles’ “Walk Like an Egyptian” could be heard leaking out of her earphones. G-Ray was sprawled across the bed, sleeping, with Oscar nestled in his arms. Claire was busy on her phone again.

  Ollie drove. She bit her lip. She wasn’t going to bitch about the phone. If Claire wanted to spend all her time in virtual world, so be it. She wouldn’t bitch about it. She wouldn’t say a word. Not one thing. Not one word. She wouldn’t even think about it.

  “What the hell do you do on that phone all the time?” Okay, so she said something. So, sue her.

  Without looking up, Claire answered, “Scarlet isn’t answering my texts.”

  “Maybe she’s at work,” Ollie said.

  “She takes her phone with her everywhere.”

  “Maybe she’s on the toilet.”

  “She takes her phone with her everywhere.”

  “Eww,” Ollie said, making a face. “You mean she texts while she’s pooping?”

  “Scarlet doesn’t poop. She’s above pooping,” Claire said.

  Wow. Ollie thought that sounded a little harsh. “She’s probably mad. She did just bail you out of jail and then bail us out.”

  “You’re on her side now?” Claire asked.

  “I didn’t realize there were sides. But now that you mention it, I guess I’d have to be on my own side.”

  “And what side is that?”

  “What do you mean?” Ollie asked.

  “If you have a side, what’s your mission statement?”

  “Mission statement?”

  “Yes, Ollie, what do you want? What is it that you want out of life?”

  Ollie was at a loss. “I didn’t know I had to make a statement.”

  “See, that’s your problem,” Claire said. “You travel through life without a destination. How do you know when you’ve arrived if you don’t know where you’re going?”

  Ollie was confused. “I didn’t realize I had to have a map. I can’t even fold one of those things correctly.”

  “Of course,” Claire said.

  “I haven’t changed, you know. I didn’t pretend to be somebody else. This is the person you married. It wasn’t like I was hiding anything.”

  “What?”

  “What what?”

  Claire said, “I didn’t understand a single word of your rambling.”

  “Of course you didn’t,” Ollie said.

  “You know what?” Claire said with that tone in her voice that signaled her dander was up. “I don’t think this thing is going to work.”

  “What thing?”

  “This divorce thing.”

  “That’s why we’re getting divorced, Claire. Because it didn’t work. That’s the whole point,” Ollie said.

  “Stop the car.”

  “What? Why?”

  “Stop the car,” Claire said louder.

  “I’m not stopping the car in the middle of the highway,” Ollie said.

  “Fine, I’ll jump,” Claire said, opening the door.

  Ollie slammed on the brakes and swerved to the right of way. She threw open her own door. “You’re not leaving. I’m leaving.” She hopped out of t
he van, firmly closed the door, and walked off down the highway.

  Claire jumped out of the van and slammed her door shut behind her. “You can’t leave! I’m leaving!”

  “I can, too, leave!” Ollie said without turning around. “You don’t have the market cornered on leaving.”

  Claire ran and caught up with Ollie. She walked alongside Ollie, matching her step for step. “I’m leaving.”

  Ollie nudged Claire out of the way with her shoulder. “No, you’re not. I’m leaving.”

  Claire nudged Ollie back. “No, I’m leaving.”

  Ollie pushed Claire with one hand. “I’m leaving.”

  Claire pushed Ollie back. “I’m leaving.”

  Ollie stopped and pushed Claire with both her hands. Claire stumbled backwards. “I’m leaving.”

  Red-faced, Claire pushed Ollie hard. Ollie fell on her butt. “I’m leaving!”

  Ollie’s eyes widened. “Let’s both leave!” Ollie ducked her head and rolled, taking Claire’s feet out from under her. They fell into a heap and rolled across the right of way, down the embankment and into a ditch of dirty water.

  Claire stood and sputtered, “What the hell, Ollie?”

  Then she saw what Ollie had seen. The van was on the move. It had been headed straight for them and Ollie had rolled them both to safety.

  “You didn’t put on the emergency brake?” Claire said.

  “How was I supposed to know it was going to do that?” Ollie said.

  They watched the van roll down the highway and out of sight.

  “What now?” Claire asked.

  “We walk,” Ollie said. “It’s not going fast enough to hurt anybody even if it does crash into something.”

  Claire and Ollie walked down the highway side by side, matching stride for stride.

  “This is the kind of thing I hate about you,” Claire said.

  “I didn’t do anything!” Ollie said.

  “Stuff like this always happens around you. We can’t just drive to Des Moines and get a divorce. Oh no, that’s not the Ollie way. We have to get thrown out of the Hard Rock and thrown into jail – twice, mind you – and then lose the van.”

  “I would like to take this opportunity to point out that it was you who took a Bruce pill and jumped in the pool, not me.”

  “I hate you,” Claire said.

  “I hate you more,” Ollie said.

  “I hate you most.”

  “I hate you more than most.”

  “I hate you the mostest,” Claire said. She kicked a rock down the road.

  Ollie said, “Why do you always have to have the last word?”

  “I don’t.”

  “There. You did it again,” Ollie said.

  “No, I didn’t,” Claire argued.

  “Then prove it. Let me say the last thing.”

  “Okay.”

  “See? You did it again.”

  “I’m just responding is all,” Claire said.

  “Let me have the last word for once,” Ollie said. “I bet you can’t. You have to say something.”

  Claire opened her mouth. Then shut it. She clenched her jaw. They walked in silence for fifteen, twenty, thirty seconds. Finally, Claire couldn’t stand it anymore. “Your last word is always stupid.”

  A car whizzed past them. It was the same sports car as before. The one that had the words “Just Married” soaped across its back window and tin cans dragging along behind it.

  Ollie and Claire watched it pass. Neither said a word.

  Onward Christian Soldiers

  Twenty minutes later Ollie and Claire were still walking down the side of the road. Claire had her shoes off and was walking barefoot in the grass.

  “It’s not safe,” Ollie said. “That’s all I’m saying.”

  “My shoes weren’t made for walking.”

  “Why would anybody buy shoes that weren’t made for walking?” Ollie posed. “Doesn’t that defeat the purpose of shoes?”

  Claire ignored that remark. “I plan on taking precautions,” she said. “Hitchhiking can be safe if the proper precautions are taken.”

  “What kind of precautions?”

  “Well, for starters, if the car stops and has one of those fish decals on them then they are probably safe.”

  “The fish decal that means they’re Christians?”

  “Yes. Christians will be good Samaritans and pick us up. They won’t kill us.”

  “You think so, huh?” Ollie sniggered. “It’s Christians who do most of the killing in this world. If you’d ever read the Bible you’d know that.”

  “What do you know about the Bible?”

  “I went to Bible Camp when I was a kid,” Ollie said. “It’s where I first kissed a girl.”

  Claire waved her off with a flick of her wrist. “Here comes a car now. Watch this.” She stuck out her thumb in the universal hitchhiking signal.

  “That’s a van,” Ollie protested. “You don’t want to get in a van. Serial killers drive vans. Haven’t you ever seen one of those movies? They’ll lure you inside then the next thing you know they’ll be wearing a dress made out of your skin.”

  The joyous sounds of people singing the hymn “Onward Christian Soldiers” reached Ollie’s ears. As the van stopped so did the singing. The window rolled down on the passenger side. A man with a mustache was driving. Ollie didn’t like men with mustaches. She thought they were hiding something.

  A blonde woman smiled at them from the passenger seat. Ollie peered into the back of the van and saw ten or more smiling faces. “Hi, we’re members of C.R.A.P.S., the Christian Reformation and Proclamation Society and we’re on our way to a Holy Word Convention in Des Moines,” the blond woman said. “Do you two need help?”

  “Nope,” Ollie said quickly. She took a step away from the van. She thought they looked like Stepford Christians. Vacant eyes. Plastic smiles. Too much hairspray. Button down short-sleeved shirts for the men and culottes and support hose for the women. Not that Ollie could actually see the culottes and hose, but her imagination could and that was kind of the same thing.

  “Yes,” Claire said. “I could use a ride.”

  “Well, hop on in,” the blond woman said. “The more the merrier.”

  “First I need to ask you some questions,” Claire said. “Do you have any outstanding warrants?”

  “No, I don’t believe so,” the woman said.

  “You don’t drink and drive, do you?” Claire asked.

  “Oh no, we don’t drink at all. We don’t even drink wine at communion. It’s grape juice,” the woman said proudly.

  “Do you plan on killing me?” Claire asked. “I know that’s blunt, but I would appreciate an honest answer.”

  “No,” the woman said. “We’re still full from the last hitchhiker we killed and ate.”

  Claire stared at her blankly.

  “That was a joke,” the woman said.

  “Oh,” Claire said. “Next question. You weren’t planning on raping or pillaging me were you?”

  “I don’t know how to pillage.” The woman turned to the man. “Honey, do you know how to pillage?”

  “Isn’t that the thing all the youngsters are doing?”

  “No, that’s twerking.”

  “Working? The kids I know don’t work,” he said.

  Everyone in the van laughed uproariously like that was the funniest thing they’d ever heard. Their eerie laughter gave Ollie a bad case of the willies.

  “I’d love a ride,” Claire said. She opened the side door and hoisted herself inside. She turned back to Ollie. “Coming?”

  Ollie shook her head and whispered, “Claire, I don’t think this is a good idea. You don’t know these people. I don’t like their sense of humor.”

  “Bye, Ollie.” Claire slid the door shut and the van moved on down the road. Ollie stared after it.

  Well, Ollie thought, so much for sticking together. She sat down on the side of the road and put her head between her knees. She wished for the ump
teenth time that she could get a magic knife and cut out the part of her heart that loved Claire. It would be like cutting out the bruised part of an apple. She would throw away the bruised, icky part, stick the rest of the apple back in her chest and then she’d be okay. Sure, a part of her apple would be missing and she’d probably never love again, but that would be so much easier than what she was feeling right now.

  Ollie heard tires screech and gravel crunching. Her first thought was that Claire had directed the Christians back to rescue her. He heart lifted at the thought and she silently cursed herself for letting Claire have that much control over her apple.

  But it wasn’t the Christians at all.

  It was G-Ray driving her van. He grinned at her. “Need a ride?”

  Oscar barked happily when he saw Ollie’s face.

  Ollie jumped to her feet and threw herself into the passenger seat. She pointed at the road ahead. “Follow those Christians!”

  Chocolate Jesus

  The Christians turned out to be nice people. A tad on the boring side perhaps, but nice all the same. They didn’t pillage or twerk Claire. In fact, they delivered her right to the door of the house where she was supposed to live with Ollie for the next three months. They even gave her one of the goody bags they were going to pass out at their convention.

  Claire waved goodbye as their van pulled away. She turned and eyed the house warily. It didn’t look promising.

  She pinched her nostrils together just in case it smelled as gross as it looked and crossed to the middle of the front yard so she could see the house straight on and get the full effect. It was lopsided. If it was a hanging picture, she’d move it up an inch on the left and then it’d be straight.

  The windows were dirty and cloudy. The paint was peeling. The porch boards were warped and broken. The house reminded Claire of an aging clown whose make-up had been smeared. Not an evil clown like the Joker, but one of those crying clowns that you just knew were alcoholics when out of their make-up.

  Claire sat on the porch steps and closed her eyes. She made herself feel better by visualizing what the house had looked like in its prime. Then she had an idea. Maybe they could restore the house to its former glory. What else did they have to do for the next three months? Claire loved those old 1980s movie montages where people did things like clean up houses in thirty seconds or less. She imagined herself and Ollie doing an Animal House cleanup on this house. Maybe they could even buy the house from the professor who was on sabbatical. And then she and Ollie would live happily ever after.