Box

13

Dr. Gideon Box.

I’d never seen a monster truck before, except when flipping through channels on TV. And even then I had no concept of the actual size until Darrell roared up in a cloud of dust.

“What the hell?” I say for the second time.

“You’re lookin’ at what happens when a redneck inherits a quarter million dollars,” Trudy says.

“How tall is that thing?”

“Eleven feet. The tires alone are sixty-six inches.”

A tall, thin, angry man jumps down from the platform and races to the passenger side of my rental car. He pulls the door open, takes in the scene. Sees my unzipped pants, and what’s left of my mighty sword. Sees Trudy’s hands dripping with evidence.

“You whore!” he shouts.

She slaps his face with a wet, sloppy, smack and yells, “Drive away, Gideon!”

“Gideon?” he says. “What kind of pansy ass name is that?”

He tries to grab her. “Get out, Trudy!” he yells. “Now!”

“Drive on!” she yells, trying to push him away.

“Oww!” she yelps as he grabs her hair.

I fire up the engine and try to figure out how to maneuver around the giant truck. I settle for backing up two feet, and sharply cutting the wheel. But before I can throw the car into drive, Darrell punches Trudy’s face, and rears back to hit her again.

“Come here, asshole!” I yell.

He stops in mid swing.

“What did you say?”

“I said, come here, you ugly piece of shit.”

“You tell him, Gideon!” Trudy says.

“You’ll want to stay out of this, Gideon!” he says, making fun of my name. “And don’t worry, I’ll come over there, soon as I finish dealin’ with my woman. Then I’m gonna fuck you up country style. Get out of the car, Trudy.”

“No! Fuck you, Darrell! Drive on, Gideon.”

“Yeah,” Darrell says, “Drive on, Gideon, if you think you can outrun Big Edna.”

“You named your truck?”

Trudy screams bloody murder as Darrell pulls her out of the car by her pony tail and throws her to the ground.

“Help me!” Trudy yells.

“Help me, Gideon!” Darrell says, mocking her.

Instead of jumping out of the car to defend my lady, I put the car in gear and spin out. I fish-tail around Darrell and Trudy, and start to speed away. Darrell runs five or six yards behind me, screaming at me, calling me a coward, and so forth, but is shocked when I suddenly throw the car in reverse, floor the accelerator, and plow into him before he has time to react.

I jump out of the car and help Trudy to her feet.

“Are you okay?”

“I thought you ran out on me.”

“I had a plan.”

“You sure? Or did you improvise after-the-fact?”

“I’m sure.”

“Thanks, Gideon. I always had a good feelin’ about you.”

I decide not to remind her we’ve known each other exactly two-and-a-half hours.

We follow the monster truck’s headlights with our eyes until we see Darrell’s body. He’s lying in a heap, like a rag doll dropped from a great height. I note the distance from the car bumper to Darrell is a full fifteen feet. I was probably going thirty miles an hour when I struck him.

It suddenly dawns on Trudy he’s not moving.

“Oh God, Gideon! Oh, my God! I think you’ve killed him!”

We hurry over to him. I take a knee and check his vitals.

“He’ll live,” I say.

“You’re sure?”

“Positive.”

“Why isn’t he moving?”

“He’s moving in slow motion.”

“What’s that mean?”

“He’s suffered significant trauma. It’ll take a few more seconds for his brain to catch up. He’ll vocalize his feelings soon enough.”

“What’s that mean?”

“You’ll hear him.”

“When?”

“Any second.”

She does. He starts screaming, crying, rolling around in pain.

“He’s hurt bad,” Trudy says.

“I won’t deny it.”

He rolls around some more, but he’s fussing about it less. His strength is failing. His energy winding down.

“It’s like watchin’ cheese slide off a cracker,” Trudy says. Then asks, “You sure he’ll live?”

“Yes. But it won’t be pretty.”

“He weren’t pretty to start with.”

“I’ll get the morphine.”