the empty road - 16. the window

by bofa xesjum

part sixteen of forty

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the road runs on and on and on, as the night turns to day, but no wanderers walk beside it. there are no lonely cafes with a single gas pump, only malls with huge parking lots and liquor stores. john pulls delilah into one of the lots, gets out in the rain and heads to a mcdonalds. there are no other customers, only two women behind the counter, one of them a teenager. not a likely spot for the beginning of an exciting adventure, but john is not disheartened. he knows his prospects will improve when he gets deeper into the heart of america. the bleak land where the flowers of violence bloom in the undergrowth of desperation. where. everybody had a story to tell, and all night to tell it. but now it is morning and john suddenly feels a great weariness. he orders a bacon egg and cheese breakfast sandwich and coffee. the woman who is not a teenager watches him pay.. his card is not accepted by the little machine. neither of the two women make any comment. john pays with a ten dollar bill. the older woman gives him change. he leaves a dollar tip. john finds a seat. beside the window. and looks. outside. next

the empty road - 15. the wanderer

by bofa xesjum

part fifteen of forty

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andy and al fisher sold the pizza shop, and the new owners decided to convert it to a nail salon. the nail salon did not employ any drivers, and john prester was out of a job, just like that. he was entitled to three months unemployment under the state law, but made no effort to collect it. he decided to become a wandering adventurer, and to fight crime and evil wherever he found it, he had been saving his hard earned money, to get into some kind of police academy now he took the money and bought a 1992 ford f-150, to roam the countryside. john named the 1992 ford f-150 deiilah, and painted it a dark military green.. he hoped it would strike fear into evildoers, all over this great land. over this once great land, now brought low by corrupt spineless bureaucrats and by even more corrupt and evil politicians, and the media. all that was just words - it was time for action. john eased delilah on to highway 66, heading west. the night was cool and calm, like john himself. maybe his heart was pounding, a little. he quickly got into his groove, bad guys, here i come! the night was dark. it was time. payback time. now. next

the empty road - 14. the dreamer

by bofa xesjum

part fourteen of forty

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when the smoke cleared, the manager of the pizza shop fired joe dave rogers, whom he never really liked anyway. bill grady, the manager, was the brother-in-law of the owners, andy and al fisher, whom hardly anybody ever saw . the other employees, especially the drivers, mostly sided with joe dave, whom they considered a real good guy. but mot enough to actually do anything except to ignore john prester even more than they had.. for a while, joe dave would come around to the shop sometimes and buy a slice. but then he stopped and everybody sort of forgot all about him and the fight. all the other drivers except john went back to school or found other jobs the last was janie jones, who gave john a hug when she left. john continued going to the library and reading about the intelligence services. which he still continued to dream of joining, somehow, some way. once in a while, he suddenly thought of janie jones. and of her hug, which he had never expected. he guessed some things were hard to explain. and that had been one of them. maybe janie was just a hugger. that must be the answer. john dreamed about janie. not every night. just sometimes. janie. next

the empty road - 13. the job

by bofa xesjum

part thirteen of forty

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thwarted in his attempt to become an assassin, john got a job delivering pizza and other types of fast food. he delivered mostly to the suburbs and to small towns so the job was not was not particularly dangerous . how john wished it was more dangerous, so that it would give him a needed feeling of self-worth! he saved his money to take classes in martial arts and to buy weapons to practice with. everybody in the modern world is a dreamer and wants to be more than they are. john did not hang out after work with the other employees at the pizza shop. the other employees did not like him much and did not like his attitude, a fellow named joe dave rogers took a particular dislike to poor john. one night john got lost delivering a pizza with anchovies to westwood. it took him forty-five minutes to get back to the store. joe dave rogers saw fit to give john the business. john ignored him, but joe dave kept on going. you think you are something, don’t you, preston? maybe this will teach you some humility. janie jones, another driver, butted in. it started to get ugly. don’t you get involved. you don’t approve? too bad. fight! next

the empty road - 12. the graduate

by bofa xesjum

part twelve of forty

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it is a shame that many people lead boring lives, instead of being famous artists or prophets or world leaders. there are a lot of people like james and eileen prester in the world , almost too many to count. the first words john prester ever remembered hearing were james’s admonition, you are going to have to support yourself. john took his parent’s words to heart, and spent long hours wondering what fate held for him. in third grade, the teacher asked john what he wanted to be when he grew up. john replied that he did not know but was carefully exploring and considering his options. the other children found john’s answer highly amusing, and never let him forget it. he was nicknamed johnny options for the rest of his days in school. john graduated from high school, knowing exactly what he wanted to be. he wanted to be a trained deadly assassin, killing bad people. he wrote a resume on his i-pad and e-mailed it. to the president of the united states of america, he never really heard back from the president. three months later he received a letter. very short and not saying anything. with the president’s electronic signature. you know the rest. john was disappointed. not defeated. no. next

the empty road - 11. the dream

by bofa xesjum

part eleven of forty

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james prester believed in the american dream, and all he wanted was a house of his own with a lawn. he knew that he had to have a wife, and he accepted that as part of the grand bargain. james had a job which he could not describe to people who did not have the job themselves. james and a fellow named sid rafferty often sat at the same table in the company cafeteria. sid lived with his mother and sister in a little house on the edge of town. sid’s mother wanted sid or the sister, preferably both , to find their own places. she pestered the sister to get married, and sid, too, but not so much. sid volunteered to help the sister, whose name was eileen, catch a man. to make a long story short, james prester and eileen rafferty married. james seemed happy with the arrangement, eileen maybe not so much. when not working or sleeping, james puttered around the house. when not working or sleeping, eileen mostly watched television. five years after the marraige, john was born. he looked more like eileen then john. james did not notice, or care. john was a quiet child. the years went by. is that all? for now. right. next

the empty road - 10. the dime

by bofa xesjum

part ten of forty

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despair. total despair. where am i? how did this happen? how i wanted it all. i wanted mom to be proud. and i wanted to conquer the world. > where did it all go wrong - so wrong. hey john citizen, do you know where you are? i know very well where i am, my friend - hell! kind of dramatic aren’t we - i only wanted a dime. i mean if you can spare it - i would not ask otherwise. i am sincerely sorry for the outburst - i have had a hard life. i have had a hard life too - and believe me, i feel your pain. it seems like it was only yesterday that i had the world at my feet. a word to the wise, friend, be a bit more specific when you tell your tale. thank you, i will try to remember that advice, which sounds very sound indeed, i must say. begin at the beginning, and do not omit any details, especially the most painful, and the most humiliating. remember, it is good to make them laugh, but you will get nowhere unless you also make them cry. and with those parting words, the shadowy stranger left john prester alone in the wind and the rain, as before. next