Grandpa's Night Out
A short story by:
Troy More
If there's one thing that sets apart those who grow up in the country from those who come of age in the urban jungles, it's the strong family bonds that form as we struggle together to tame the harsh, unforgiving prairie.
And if you believe that one, I've got some prime farm land in the Yukon that you can have at a good price.
Despite what you may have seen on the Waltons, we rural folk dealt with the same stresses and strains that any other families did, it's just that all the writers and TV people live in the city and, like members of parliament, rarely venture out to find out what's really going on.
Up until my sixteenth birthday, all these stresses and strains were just rumours about what was going on with other families. Things like how only couples seemed to be going to the parties at Mr. and Mrs. Winters' house. And how everybody ran into the bushes and hid that time when Constable La` France dropped by to return Mr. Winters' wallet which some good neighbour had found. And I'm not even gonna mention why all the sheep were scared of old Mr. Flannery.
Those things aside, life was pretty serene on our little farm outside Mosquito Flats. That is, until my grandparents got divorced. After thirty-nine years of marriage, Grandma decided to fulfill her dream of living a quiet life on the coast. Grandpa just couldn't bring himself to leave his beloved fields of dust, grasshoppers, and occasional grain.
Gramps mostly kept to himself after that. When he wasn't working the fields, he was spending hours fishing out of his little wooden boat on the waters of nearby Lake Sukumunder. He rarely came home with anything other than a nasty sunburn, but it kept him busy.
One night it all changed. I was sitting on the porch digesting my supper, and waiting for my buddy Waldo, who already had his driver's license, to pick me up for a night of cruising the lively street that was our town. My parents had suggested I spend some time with Gramps, but he seemed to be keeping to his room that night. I figured it would be easy to sneak out, as he would likely sleep until dawn.
"Eddie!"
I looked behind me to see Gramps standing there with his car keys in hand. The scent of Old Spice strong enough that the geese flying overhead began to veer west to avoid it. By the look on his face, I could tell that he was up to something; that he had a definite plan for the evening. In proper historical perspective, I guess you could say that his
was the night that Grandpa snapped, but that's of little importance now. All I could think of, was running.
Just then, Waldo pulled into the yard in his Mom's old pickup truck. Waldo, who had a particular talent for sizing up a situation at a glance, took a look at the sixty year old "swinging single" standing on the porch with his frightened grandson He slammed his truck into reverse.
While Waldo's mind may have been adept to making quick judgment calls, it was not much for recall. He neglected to remember how we had thrown out the reverse gear the previous weekend, trying to pull our buddy Larry out of a mud-filled ditch. Not that Larry showed any gratitude or anything.
"Shut that truck off boy!" Gramps bellowed at Waldo. "We're goin' out!"
Knowing there was no escape, Waldo reluctantly hopped out of the truck and followed us to Grandpa's slick new Dodge Newport. On the way, Waldo leaned over and whispered in my ear.
"First chance I get, I'm ditching this scene!" he said supportively. I was relieved that Waldo was there to back me up in my time of need.
"When you do, just try to imaging Jenny Bodacia getting a hold of that picture of you in your elf costume from Halloween a few years ago," I said, as a way of letting him know I appreciated his support.
"You boys ride up front with me." Gramps said as he climbed in, "There's lots of room."
"Actually sir," Waldo interjected, "I read somewheres that the safest place for a passenger to be, in a accident, is layin' down on the floor of the back seat, outta th' view of..."
'Crissakes boy, we ain't gonna be gettin' in no accidents! Now get in!"
As we pulled out of the lane, Gramps rolled down the electric windows and mashed down the throttle. We barreled off into the prairie twilight; three rebels without a hope. Waldo reached into his shirt pocket, pulled out a cigarette and began to light it up.
"What in the blazes is that?" Gramps asked Waldo, with a stern look in his eyes.
"Uh..." Waldo replied.
"I haven't seen one of those old army surplus lighters in ages!" He grinned, pulling out his own pack and accepted a light from Waldo. "Eddie here doesn't smoke, but I'm sure he doesn't mind us lighting up in the car."
"Of course not Gramps." I replied, becoming uncomfortably aware of the pack in my jacket pocket that I had been waiting for hours to get at. "The smell doesn't bother me a bit!" I said, playfully grinding my heel into Waldo's foot.
As we approached the outskirts of town, Gramps popped in a tape and turned the volume up full. The speaker in the dash was crackling with obvious pain.
"Listen to that sound boys!" Gramps boasted, "They don't make speakers like that anymore!"
"They haven't made eight-tracks in years either!" Waldo commented, a split second before I elbowed him in the ribs.
"Had to have it specially installed," Gramps went on, "at a shop in the city last year."
"Not to be a bother Gramps, but do you really think Hagwood Hardy was meant to be played so loud?"
"Maybe you're right, boy," he mused; then shouted, "Get me that Floyd Kramer tape outta the glove box!" As I complied to Grandpa's request, I had a flash of brilliance. I knew how to get out of this one!
"Hey Gramps," I piped up, "do you wanna have a real wild time tonight?"
"Oh, believe you me boy, that's exactly what I'm counting on. And with three wild, single fellas like us on the prowl, what else could we want?"
"Well," I said hopefully, "Horsepuck Ridge has three streets, a bingo hall, and it's only seventy miles away!"
I thought that the very least I could try and do was to use the lure of the big city to steer Gramps away from where we would be seen. Even if none of our friends saw us, old Mrs. Argus (the town
gossip) would find out and have the story humming down the party lines to the far corners of the township. Then on Monday morning, it would be all over school that Waldo and I had spent the night out partying it up with my grandfather. Not that I have anything against my grandfather, but let's face
it -- when you're in your teens, it's just not acceptable to be seen enjoying your family's company.
"Nonsense!" Gramps retorted. "I been living in this town for over fifty years, and I'm tellin' ya', there's more fun things to
do here than you can shake a stick at!" Barring the fact that I had no idea what that saying meant, I knew I was finished. Monday morning I was a goner.
We rumbled into town with the crowd, hanging out in front of Foon Yuk's Chop Suey House, staring at us in amusement. Unfortunately, Foon Yuk's was the only restaurant in town and everybody who was too young to get into The Stubblejumper Saloon hung out there. That included everyone we went to school with. It might not have been so bad if Gramps hadn't dropped the car into neutral, and revved the snot out of his big V8, and yelled "Yahoo!"
"This place looks like it's got some action!" Gramps smiled as he cranked the wheel and gunned the throttle, sending gravel flying as he turned back up the street and pulled up beside Foon's. I remember wishing at the time that Gramps had still kept his old .44 in the glove compartment. I was unsure as to whether I would've used it to force him to drive away at gunpoint or do the honourable thing and end my suffering right then and there. Waldo, on the other hand, seemed rather amused with the old fellow's antics.
"I sure like the way you drive, Mr. Putnum!" He grinned, "Think you could teach me a few tricks someday?"
"You're too young to learn how to drive like I do." Grandpa cautioned him as he slapped it in park, "Ya ain't been around enough to have seen the Judge passed out!"
"Judge Draco drinks?" I asked with a note of incredulity in my voice. Gramps was quick to shoot me one of his stern looks.
"Shush up boy! Do you want the whole town to know?"
"Well, what's the big deal?" I asked, "If the county Judge is a drunk, why should it be kept hidden?" Gramps just rolled his eyes and looked at me over the roof of the car.
"Think, Eddie. If the Judge is a drunk, and nobody knows about it but you, don't you think that that information could come in just a little bit handy someday?"
"Ya oughta listen to yer grampa Eddie." Waldo commented as we approached the crowd outside Foon's door. Gramps was obviously flattered.
"Your friend here's a bright boy, son." Gramps said, slapping Waldo on the back. "You could learn a few things from him." Sure I could, I thought. We took a table at the back of the dining room. In the past ten years I had
learned many things from Waldo. Like how to hunt rabbits using only gasoline and a match, how to hotwire a tractor and get into the slowest high speed chase in county history, and how much antacid you can feed to a cow before it explodes. That's was the role model my grandfather just had advised me to follow.
Foon peered out from the kitchen and yelled to our table. "Awight you two!" He said, to me and Waldo, "If you gonna stay here, you gotta eat! And no more cat jokes in fronta other customer you hear?" Funny thing, about Foon. When you were alone with him, he would laugh himself silly at jokes that referred to the absence of stray cats in the vicinity of his restaurant, but if you brought it up in front of other people, he would start yelling at you in Chinese and disappear into the kitchen. For the next few minutes, he would stare at you through the little round window in the door, pointing at you and making chopping motions with a cleaver. What Foon may have lacked in English skills, he made up for with a wonderful gift for pantomime.
After Foon got over his suspicions of us, Gramps ordered a platter of egg rolls and some cokes. When the cokes arrived, Grandpa used his to wash down some of his medicine. What Gramps needed the medicine for, he never said. I assume it must've been a rather rare condition, since the medicine was a special kind that had to be imported from Scotland.
Waldo was getting restless. He had hoped for a more fun-filled evening, and despite how well he was getting on with my grandfather, he was anxious to get going. "So, what are we gonna do after we leave this dump?" He asked.
"I heard that you liddle shit!" Foon yelled from the kitchen. Foon had especially good hearing, which comes in handy when you're stalking stray cats.
His question was answered when Chuck Wytrash strutted through the front door. Chuck was our town's self-proclaimed "stud", and local expert on hooliganism. "Hey look everybody," he pointed in our direction, "Putnum and Hinkley have an old geezer baby sitting them tonight!"
Seconds before his brain engaged, Waldo opened his mouth. "Hey Chuckie! Will you tell your mom to stop callin' me every night? I told her I already have a date for next weekend!"
In the commotion that followed, it was difficult to see exactly what was going on, but I think it was safe to say that Chuck was getting the upper hand on Waldo, before being dropped to the floor by an errant egg roll that came from roughly Grandpa's direction.
"From the way that boy went down, I'd have to say the old Chinaman's cookin' them things a little too long." Gramps commented as he poured a little more medicine into a glass. He handed it to Waldo, who was trying to
mold his windpipe back to it's original shape. "Here, boy. This'll help you forget th' pain."
Gramps strolled up to the window and looked over the dimly lit street. "Who's Duster is that?" He asked.
"What's it to ya old man?" Replied Chuck, noting that gramps had finished all the egg rolls, and was now unarmed.
Grandpa ignored the comment and asked, "What ya got in it, boy?"
"Three forty, four barrel with a full race cam, four speed, and a posi rear end." Chuck beamed. He had carefully invested every cent his father had to spare in the car, and according to him, it was the fastest thing on wheels anywhere in the county.
"That's a good idea son," Gramps nodded, still looking out at the car. "keeping with a small engine 'till ya learn how to handle a real car."
Chuck was fuming. Nobody had ever dared to talk that way about his car. "You saying you got something better, old man?"
Gramps just smiled, then walked over to the counter to pay the bill. "Well son, I'll be down on Horsecart Road if ya wanna find out. Come on boys. We got places to go!"
Waldo and I followed him outside, with Chuck close behind. I was quietly wondering what had caused my grandfather to lose his mind and challenge the fastest car in the county to a race, especially when all he had to back it up was his four door rolling battleship.
"Gramps," I pleaded as we got into the car, "you don't have to do this. We can just go home and forget about it!"
"And wimp out?" He asked, with a trace of disdain in his voice. "That boy needs to be taken down a peg, and it don't look like anyone else is willin' to do it!"
Horsecart Road was the only road nearby that was wide enough for two cars to race side by side. As we turned onto it a little over a mile south of town, Chuck, with his gang of fellow malcontents riding shotgun, was right behind us. Gramps eased the car to a stop, letting Chuck pull up alongside him.
"So old man, wadda ya' willing to go for huh? Pink slips?"
"Sorry boy, I don't gamble. I just do it for fun!" Gramps stated.
"Whatever." Chuck replied, "Count of three?"
"I'm ready. Belt up boys!" Gramps seemed unusually calm for a old guy in a big car who was about to be humiliated, along with his grandson. We sat waiting as one of
Chuck's minions counted down.
"Three...two...one...GO."
As I expected, Chuck quickly jumped ahead of us, spraying gravel and dust all over to the point that we could hardly see the road. Much to my surprise however, Gramps was only four lengths behind as we neared the quarter mile mark at the bottom of the hill. It was then that Gramps demonstrated that the eight track player wasn't the only special option that he had ordered for the car, and I found out just why that big car was so adept at pulling heavy farm equipment around.
"I think it's time I put the pedal right to the floor and showed this little punk just what a four forty six pack was made for," Gramps yelled. When I questioned him later, he explained how my Uncle Ed (who was a Sergeant in the RCMP) had been able to obtain a police pursuit engine for it, back when Gramps had ordered the car.
The engine made a sharp howling sound as Gramps smashed the pedal all the way to the floor, and even though we were already nearing the hundred mile per hour mark, the back tires kicked up a cloud of gravel behind us as we flew past Chuck's, now pitiful looking, Duster.
"See ya later, punk!" Gramps yelled out the window. We reached the crest of the hill. On the other side, something was waiting which would make the evening even more eventful than it already was.
When Constable Serge La`France was first assigned to the Moose Tail RCMP detachment which patrolled the Mosquito Flats area, he had hoped it would be a quiet place which would make his first assignment after graduating from the academy an uneventful one. In most respects it had -- until he looked up and saw four headlights bearing down from the top of the hill at a high rate of speed.
Many people would have panicked in that situation, but you have to remember that Serge was a highly trained professional police officer. He held his cool as Gramps and Chuck each veered halfway into the ditch, letting him slip between the two cars. In further testament to the constable's great skill, I must note here that he accomplished this while (from what I could see briefly as the headlights illuminated him) he kept his eyes closed and made crossing motions over his chest.
Grampa crossed back onto the road, but Chuck had had enough. He chose to turn off and head down another road towards the east. "I think we better slow down Gramps!" I said, while helping Waldo pry his fingers off the dashboard.
Grandpa looked up at his rear view mirror. "Don't think that's a good idea son!" he said. I looked over my shoulder and saw what he meant. The flashing red and blue lights indicated that Constable La`France had regained his composure, and was now looking to extract some justice for our momentary disregard of the Highway Traffic Act. "Don't sweat it boys!" Grandpa grinned, "I got an idea."
Great. That was how we got into this mess in the first place.
With the constable still far behind us, Gramps roared around a curve. The road led into the woods near the west shore of Lake Sukumunder. When La`France's lights were no longer visible, Grampa shut off his lights, then started to pump the emergency brake.
"What are you doing?" I asked.
"God's sake boy, don't you know anything?" He replied, "This way, there's no brake lights to give your position away!" When we had slowed down enough, Gramps pulled off into a driveway, and steered in behind an old shed in the back yard. Seconds later, we heard the siren blaring as La`France roared by heading east, oblivious to our hiding place. Grandpa pulled out a cigarette, offered one to Waldo, then got out of the car. "Think we'll rest here a bit, till things cool down some."
I'd just got out of the car when the yard light flicked on, then a shadowy figure appeared onto the back porch, holding what appeared to be a shotgun. "Who the hell's back there?" The voice bellowed.
"Put that blasted old thing away before you hurt someone, ya' old coot!" Gramps yelled back.
"That you Putnum?" The voice replied. As he flipped on the porch light, it became apparent who's yard we had driven into. My blood froze as I pictured us all in solitary confinement.
"Come on Draco," Gramps retorted, calmly taking another drag on his cigarette. "who else would come visit a miserable old son-of-a-bitch like you?"
"I thought it looked like your car tearing in here." The judge chucked, "You still tormenting the Mounties at your age?" I was stunned by the judge's good natured attitude towards our little high-speed chase. This is the same judge that had sentenced Waldo's older brother Bart to two weeks at hard labour, after he interrupted the judge to protest a parking ticket -- who was busy in his chambers trying to watch the Stanley Cup finals.
"Just teaching the boys a thing or two." Gramps said as he walked up to the porch, shaking the judge's hand. Even at this point, I had no Idea that it was Gramps who had pulled a wounded Sgt. Draco off the beach at Dieppe in 1942, and carried him out to a landing craft to be rescued.
That was one of the many stories we heard that night while sitting on that back porch listening to Judge Draco, and Gramps droning on about old times. Grandpa's affliction seemed to be less rare than I had first thought, as it seems that the judge also kept a rather large supply of Scottish medicine around.
As the sky began to brighten in the east, Waldo was at the wheel, Gramps was asleep in the back seat, and we were heading home. "Ya' know what?" Waldo
yawned then said, "Your grandpa's pretty cool!"
"Told ya so." I answered, trying hard to stay asleep. After we got home, I wanted to sleep till noon the next day, but Gramps had me up at six to help him feed the cows. And just as I had thought, the word got out about our little adventure with Grandpa.
Sure enough, I had to hear all about it at school. I took it like a man at first, but after a while it started to get to me. My patience was beginning to wear thin. I mean really, when your schoolmates have a party and invite your grandfather, isn't it only fair they invite you too?
I would think so.
Copyright © 1999-2007 Troy More
All rights reserved.
Author bio:
" Troy
More a.k.a. wyzaz is a Canadian author who writes humour, science
fiction, and alternate histories. He is the author of several plays, a
hundred or so newspaper columns, as well as humour and science fiction
series in magazines from Toronto to Kuala Lumpur. Along with illustrator
Maritza Campos, he also publishes the single panel cartoon "True
Romance" -- soon to go into syndication. Troy is an op on several IRC
channels, including #Authors
and #Brisbane
(where he's pictured on their gallery pages); he is channel manager for #science_fiction
and Managing Editor for Planet
3 'zine. Troy is also the new editor of "Undercurrents"
-- the Undernet's newsmagazine.
"
Home
|
