Road to Mississippi

Chapter 1

By Searon

Wednesday July 15th

Daniel and I spent the night at Mickey's house with his father Mike, and his brother David. Mike's green Datsun pickup truck was parked inside his garage and Daniel's Honda Accord in their driveway. I had my firebird parked across the street along with my van. Inside the house Daniel, Mickey, Mike, David, and I all hung out in the living room watching movies. I showed Mickey how to get some movies onto his Zune for the road trip. He packed his mini notebook as well to plug his Zune into so it could charge. I got myself a Virgin Mobile prepaid cell phone for the road trip. That way I could use it for emergencies and to call my family letting them know I made it from place to place safe. Daniel had accidentally given my number to my ex; Shayne's mom, while he was half asleep and she called him. So I was getting calls all through the road trip from her that went to voicemail.

Daniel used to have long red/black hair a few weeks before this, but he decided to cut it all off. So now his hair was short dirty blond, brown looking almost unless you get a close look. He is a skinny guy weighting roughly 130 pounds. He has medium eyebrows, and very long eyelashes. There's part of his birthmark still on his forehead that used to look like a large mole, and now it's all but gone. He is the kind of guy who is straightforward and always speaks his mind. He can be told anything and remember it for the rest of his life. When it comes to directions there is nobody better than Daniel. If he'd been there once in the last 10 years, he'd still remember exactly how to get there and back. He also had become very mechanically inclined with vehicles during the last year from spending time with his uncle working on cars. Besides that I've known him all of my life, since he was born when I was 3 years old. His grandmother and my mother were close friends, and his grandmother even babysat me when I was younger. He is pretty much my brother by growing up together; he looked up to me when we were younger. We are brother brothers except in the literal sense because we were never stupid enough to mix our blood together.

Mickey has short brown hair and a beard coming up to a soul patch with no mustache. He weights around 250 and freckles on his face. He has thin eyebrows and a forward, kind personality. He is really laid back and good at hands on. He was laid off his last job as a machinist of some sort, and was unemployed at the time being. I've known him for years, and during Fourth of July while blowing up fireworks with him and his father where my mother lives I talked to him about my trip. I told him that I was planning on moving to Mississippi by driving. When I hung out at his house on July 5th after buying fireworks with him and his father we talked about it more. He said depending on when it was he'd be more than happy to help me move. With him being unemployed he had more than enough time to help when he was enrolling in job core.

Mike is Mickey's dad. He's tall with light brown hair, and a very large bald spot above his forehead. He wears a hat all the time, probably all his life, which is why he has the bald spot. He has a mustache and clean-shaven everywhere else. He's in his forties and weights around 230 with a belly. He was my mother's boyfriend a long time ago. They started going out when I was about 4 years old, and they were together until I was about 15, when my mother and I moved to Salt Lake City, Utah. We moved there to be with my grandmother in her final years. I've never thought of him as a father figure, more like a friend from time to time. He went through a lot with my mother due to her being bipolar. He was never educated very well; I think he was put in a special school as a child. He isn't good at spelling and his smarts come to simple things only. He is good with cars, as long as they are the old models. His son David is a lot like him, a little slow and simple. Mickey however is more like his mother.

Then there is me. I have short brown hair, and a beard and mustache with sideburns going down from my hair. I didn't shave for a while before the trip, and I didn't shave during the entire road trip. I have green eyes and wear glasses, I weight roughly 160 pounds and I have dimples on my cheeks when I smile and a clef chin. I am a very laid back person, who hides in the crowds without being noticed. I am very shy when it comes to talking to the opposite sex. I usually just admire from afar, not knowing exactly how to approach. I don't always speak my mind, but I'm always truthful. I believe that honesty is the best quality someone can have, which is probably why I've never done well with women. Women usually get with liars who tell them whatever they wan to hear to their face and act totally different behind their back. I act on a medium level on both; I'm not any different behind your back than I am to your face.

Mickey's brother stayed up with us for a little bit, but he had to work in the morning so he ended up crashing on the floor behind the couch in the path to the computer. He had promised he'd wake up in the morning and make us breakfast as a goodbye present before we left.

Mickey fell asleep on one of the couches, and Daniel crashed in a chair. My son Shayne and I fell asleep on the floor in front of the coffee table. It was about 2-2:30 in the morning by the time I finally passed out. It's hard to get to sleep when all you're thinking about is the next day.

I woke up at 7:00 in the morning with Mike and Mickey already awake and Daniel and I just getting up. Shayne was awake and hungry. I made him a bottle of formula and changed his diaper. Mickey finished getting movies on his Zune. We were planning on leaving first thing in the morning, however Mike had forgotten to take out road trip money from his account. So he wanted us to wait until his bank opened so he could withdraw money from it and then go. Daniel and I were trying to tell that Chase bank was all across the country, and we needed to get started and on the road we could stop in a town and find one. However he wouldn't listen to us. We got ready and packed Mike, Mickey, and Daniel's bag in the vehicles. Mickey and Daniel were driving the van, while Daniel and I were driving in the Firebird. We stopped at a Safeway, to get some groceries for the road trip and to for Mickey to say goodbye to his mother. His mom works in the Safeway Deli. We walked around and got two 24 packs of water, some snack food, baby food, and instant drink packets. Daniel was getting the baby food, picking whichever ones Shayne pointed at and putting them in the cart.

After getting everything we needed and Mickey got to say goodbye to his mom, we went over to Chase bank. We waited in the parking lot, while Mike got money out. I had two atlas books, one in the Firebird and one in the van. I showed everybody the rough course from Washington to Utah.

We got on the freeway and headed down I-5 South. After crossing the beautiful Columbia River separating Washington from Oregon we entered Portland. After a little bit on the freeway in Portland we took I-84 East. This took us through northeast Oregon. After getting out of the towns the scenery was extremely beautiful. There are green trees and large forests everywhere in Oregon. We passed Multnoma Falls, Daniel and I were in the lead and I was thinking about stopping but decided to keep on going. We were already running late thanks to Mike's detour at the bank.

As we were driving we kept in contact through our CB radios. We kept pointing out things in the forests we saw, scenery, falls, and unique trees. We stopped at a rest stop after driving for a few hours. We all got out and stretched. I fed a jar of baby food to Shayne and we all relaxed in the shade. It was a pretty hot day, temperature about in the 90s. After we relaxed for a while we headed back out.

The next place we stopped was a truck stop in Biggs, Oregon. Daniel and I went in there to get a carton of cigarettes. I was going to get a carton of Native American Spirit Perique blend. However, they didn't have them there. Instead I got Native American Spirit Menthol. Daniel is a smoke-a-holic and needed some cigarettes. So I got him two packs of his Camel Wides and my carton so he could smoke some of those as well. After we got out Mickey and Mike were getting McDonalds so we got some double cheeseburgers, smoked, and then left.

When we got to around Pendleton we entered Deadman's Pass. It was a large hill range where the road went up and down. Mickey was going about 60-70mph on the way up the hills. He had his foot all the way down on the floor. My firebird was getting now power on the way up. This was in the desert part of Oregon in the northeast. The Oregon dry area isn't like hard dirt and cactus, instead it has dirt and shrubberies. Much like sagebrush, and when it rains the smell of fresh spice is all around in the air that it's intoxicating. It didn't rain while we went through it this last time, but the first time I came from Washington to Mississippi with my father in an RV I remember it quite well.

As we neared Deadman's Pass we lost our CB Radio contact. Mickey was driving the firebird with me as the passenger, while Mike was driving the van with Daniel was passenger with him. The CB Radios kept going in and out. We were having some trouble heading up the hills with the van getting hotter temperature.

"The van is overheating, pull over!" Daniel screamed on the CB. That was the most we could get out of the CB, surrounded by static.

We were still climbing high, and there were no exits for a while, and the shoulders were small. The mountain was on our left and nothing but de-elevation on our right. Mickey and I kept climbing up trying to find an exit. I knew I saw a sign somewhere that it wasn't that much longer. After we kept heading up, we lost Mike and Daniel. We finally found the exit that veered off on the right to a country road. On the left off the exit was an overpass over the freeway. We went right first, and pulled down another road and stopped. Mickey took the handheld CB and headed to the overpass to try and make radio contact. I went to the backseat and checked on Shayne. He had a shitty diaper, and it was coming out of his diaper. He began to grab it with him hands and start to play with it in his hands. I quickly got out the wipes and cleaned up his hands and leg. I pulled him out of the car seat and put him in the front seat where I took off his diaper. I cleaned him up real good and then put a new diaper on him. After that I had to clean up the car seat some as well, he made quite a mess.

I put Shayne back in the car seat and got in the driver's seat. I pulled the firebird forward and headed to the overpass. It was about 100 yards away, I parked on the side of the road before the overpass and got out.

"Have you seen them yet?" I yelled across the street.

Mickey shook his head, and tried the CB again. I kept an eye out from the car. There was no van to be seen climbing up that hill. We stood there for over 15 minutes before we finally got some cluttered static on our CB. We yelled into it trying to contact them.

"Can you hear us?" We both yelled into the phone.

Finally we saw it in the distance we both jumped up and down raising our arms so they could see us. Instead they passed the exit, we rushed to the other side and kept yelling and throwing our hands in the air. Finally they pulled over on the shoulder right before the on ramp to the freeway from our exit. We jumped in the car and turned around then made a left at the road heading to the freeway. We pulled over on the left shoulder from the on ramp, parking nearly in front of the van to the right. We jumped out of the car to see how they were doing.

"Man what the hell happened?" I asked.

"Dude I told you to pull over, we were overheating badly," Daniel said.

"I was trying to make it to an exit, I didn't know it was that bad. Stupid damn CB radios aren't working worth shit," I said.

"So what did you guys do?" I asked.

"We sat and waited for it to cool down. Mike took off his shirt trying to scare everybody away from us I guess. Then the radiator was bone dry so we had to put water in it. All the damn water gallons are in your car so we had to sit there and pour all the water bottles into the radiator." Daniel said.

"Well, shit." I said.

I walked back over to the firebird while Daniel and Mike smoked their cigarettes. I opened the truck and looked in it for the water gallons. I didn't see them anywhere, only our bottles of water.

"What are you looking for?" Mickey asked.

"The gallons of water," I said.

"I packed them in the back of the van," Mickey said.

I looked at him and shook my head. I went over to the back of the van and hassled with the back door until it opened. I looked through the packed van until I found 3 gallons of water. I pulled them all out as Daniel was walked up with a cigarette in his mouth.

"You dumb ass, the water was in the back of the van," I Said.

He looked at me and at the jugs, "Son of a bitch, Oh well." Daniel said.

I handed him a jug of water and he grabbed it and headed to the van's hood to fill it up even more. The rest of us stood and talked by the firebird. After Daniel had it filled up and closed the hood he came and joined us. After about 10 minutes of talking over by the firebird, a sheriff pulled over behind the van.

"Crap a cop," Mickey said.

"Someone should go talk to him," Mike said.

"I got this," I said.

I walked down to the sheriff car behind the van as he was getting out of his door.

He had short brown hair, clean-cut shave and sunglasses. "Is there a problem here?"

"No everything's fine here. Our van overheated climbing these hills here. We had to pull it over to fill it with water, and now we're just waiting for it to cool down," I said.

"Alright," he said. He took another look at the van and the three of them standing by the firebird talking and got back in his car. I walked back up to the other three and we talked about it for a while. They were impressed how easily I handled it and I told them what I told him. After a few minutes the sheriff left, probably after first scanning our license plate.

Another few minutes of us standing there a Subaru pulled over on the shoulder in front of the van. A man in his thirties got out and walked over to us. "Is everything ok here, you guys need any help?"

I walked up to him, "Everything's fine, we just overheated climbing the hill and needed it to cool down and fill with water."

"You guys need any water? I always carry plenty of extra going on road trips." He said.

"Sure, we could use some if you have extra to make sure we can get to a town," I said.

Mike and him started talking, and shared some pointless stories. "How much longer until we're off this mountain range?" Mike asked.

"Not too much longer, probably less than an hour until you're going downhill," he said.

"Thanks for everything," we said.

After he left we got back in the vehicles and headed out. I drove the firebird this time. As we took off I kept us at 75-80 mph. Instead of flooring it like Mickey had done, I just eased on the gas little at a time until I had the speed I wanted. It wouldn't climb any faster than that, and I used the momentum when it leveled out and went slightly downhill to climb the hills.

We arrived at the rest area at the top of Deadman's pass during evening. We rested there for a while. We got out the vehicles and went up to a bench where we smoked and rested. Shayne took to walking around in the grass and playing in it. Everyone stopped in the restroom before we left. I sat with Shayne by the sidewalk next to the restrooms. There were a bunch of stones scattered on the inside of the sidewalk next to the restroom and grass on the other side. Shayne sat on the sidewalk and made several piles of stones that he grabbed and put onto the sidewalk. I let him continue to make piles until we had to leave.

I called my dad and step mom to let them know of our progress. We packed ourselves back up in the car and headed back on the road.

After a while of driving we were getting close to the end of Oregon. However we were getting low on gas. We finally reached a town before the end of Oregon; I was driving the Firebird with Daniel in the passenger seat. We pulled over in the town, and pulled into a Love's, a truck stop. I didn't see a Chevron anywhere, so I decided to ask inside if they knew of any Chevrons. It was about 11 in the evening. Mickey looked tired from driving and went in to the truck stop to use the restroom.

I went in the store and after looking through the store a bit I went over to the cashier, "Are there any Chevron's around here?"

"There's one in town but it's not that close." The short dark brown heavier set lady told me.

"I'm on a long road trip and I only have a Chevron card for gas, how far away is it?" I said.

"I don't know exactly where it is. I'm not sure if it's still open; it might have closed for the night."

"Hmm… alright." I said and walked around the store looking at the souvenirs. In Oregon it's Illegal to pump your own gas. They have to pump it for you.

I went back up and bought a 5-hour energy shot. I don't drink them; in fact I wasn't even tired though I've driven for over 8 hours. The only two breaks I had from driving were when Mickey drove from before Deadman's pass, and the small break where Mike wanted to drive my firebird for a while. Mickey had been shooting the 5-hour energy drinks. He'd been driving the whole time; his father Mike probably drove 2 hours in the van for him, but he still hadn't gotten any sleep. In fact none of us had got any sleep. The road trip had us all so excited and pumped up that none of us found any rest.

The cashier asked a male worker there about the Chevron and he said it was open for another hour.

"Alright thank you," I said.

I walked outside to Mike and Daniel smoking, and Mickey sitting in the driver's seat of the van. I got in a huge argument with Mike and Daniel about the health of my mom, until I yelled at them, "FUCK OFF, I don't want to talk about this anymore."

Mickey came out and asked what was up. I told him it was nothing and I was done talking about it. I told them about the Chevron, and how it seemed we didn't have time to make it to it. We wanted to restrain from using any cash on the road trip as much as we could, especially since we didn't have too much to spare on the long road trip. My brother had shorted my check and was supposed to be paying me during the road trip when he got his check in. Shayne was sleeping in the car seat.

I went through the backseat until I found a large plastic McDonalds drink cup. I grabbed it and set it on the hood, and took out my carpet knife. I cut it in half and stuck the part with the lip on it under my right headlight and lifted the light and pulled the partial cup forward. I held it onto my car and it kept my headlight up. I got some duct tape and taped it up like that.

I pulled out the atlas book and checked which town we were in. My firebird had a quarter of a tank, and I wasn't sure if I was going to make it. We were in the last main town of Oregon. I figured we could make it to the next small town in Idaho.

I gave the 5-hour energy shot to Mickey.

"I already got one." He said.

"Well, use this when you need it later then." I said.

We got back in the vehicles and headed out.

We made it to a town in Idaho where we were able to fill up the vehicles.