BACK AND FORTH BY PETER NOLAN SMITH CHAPTER 1 - THE FIRST TEN MILES

The Arborway trolley rattled on the Centre Street tracks toward Forest Hills. Two longhaired men and a young blonde woman in a peasant dress sat on the wooden seats of the near-empty streetcar. Each had a travel bag at their feet.

Sean Coll unfolded a map of America and his New York friend pointed to the West Coast, saying, “I can’t believe we’re driving cross-country in a station wagon.”

“We could have taken your car.”

AK owned a 1971 Pontiac Firebird.

“Yeah, with four bald tires and a blown piston. I doubt we could have made Cleveland.”

“So a ride’s a ride, plus we can sleep in the back.” The twenty-one year-old defended the station wagon, since his father had bought a new one every three years until his six kids were old enough to drive their own cars.

“We could have waited for a Cadillac,” argued AK.

“The station wagon was all the Drive-Away company had going to California and I’m all about CALIFORNIA DREAMIN, instead of DIRTY WATER.”

“I second the motion. Boston to Sacramento, but what if the owner says no?” Pam was hot to reach her fiancee in Mendocino.

“It’s too nice a day for him to say anything other than ‘yes’, plus we already signed a contract with the DriveAway company. Here’s our stop.”

Sean tugged on the stop line. The trolley screeched to halt. The trio got off and proceeded down the sidewalk. Trees wavered with the spring wind under a cloudless morning sky. As they neared the pick-up address, he said, “Let me do the talking.”

166 Boynton was a three-story family wooden dwelling. A middle-aged man waited on the sidewalk. A porcupine crew cut topped an erect posture and both his chino trousers and white tee-shirt had been ironed to a razor sharpness.

“Shit, he looks like a Marine.” AK pushed back his long hair.

“A career Marine too.” Sean stood up straight.

“He won’t be happy to see hippies.” Pam’s blonde hair flowed over her shoulders and her filmy dress swayed with the twenty year-old’s easy gait.

“Just smile and make nice.”

The car owner spotted the three of them.

“I guess you’re my driving team.”

“That’s us.”

The older man tapped his watch.

“It’s 9:10. You’re ten minutes late.”

“Sorry,” said Sean.

Men of his age and conviction preferred an apology to an excuse.

“I suppose ten minutes is better than fifteen. The name’s Jake Moore.”

The forty year-old seized Sean’s hand.

“Pleased to meet you.”

The young Bostonian met the firm grip with strength and his knuckles did not buckle under the pressure. Jake released his hand and Sean introduced his friends.

An older woman in her early forties sat on the porch. Her black dress testified to a period of mourning. Sean bowed his head in respect for her loss. She bit her lower lip and gazed at her folded hands.

“That’s my wife.”

“My condolences.” Sean avoided asking who had died, but the deceased had most certainly been a close family member.

“Thanks.” Jake’s steely eyes studied Sean’s shoulder-length hair, regarded AK’s ponytail, and then warmed to Pam’s free-flowing blonde locks.

“You from Boston?”

“My grandmother lived a couple of blocks from here on St. Joseph’s Street. My grandfather operated trolleys out of Forest Hills.”

“Irish?”

“Half and half. The Yankee side arrived on the Mayflower and my Nana sailed here from Galway at the age of 14 in the year of the Crow. She came off the ship and broke her shoe like Cinderella, except she worked as a maid in a Marblehead mansion.”

“Which is much better than slaving in a Connemara potato patch. My grandmother came over in the Year of the Pig. What about yours?”

“The Year of the Crow.”

Their shared heritage and accents narrowed the generation gap.

“We thought the year had something to do with Chinese Astrology, but my grand never told us yes or no.”

“Those women from the West of Ireland carried their secrets to the grave.”

“What’s your family’s name?”

Sean told him.

“There were four daughters. Older than you, but my uncle served with in Korea,” he said Uncle Jack’s name.

“I heard about Captain Jack. His platoon fought off hundreds of Chinese Communists to save a retreat column from Chosen Reservoir.”

“He was the only officer to see the dawn.”

“Never had the honor of meeting him.” Jake pointed to the driveway.

“That’s the car.”

The Ford was no normal family station wagon off the lot. Its chrome details had been polished to a high sheen and the fake wooden paneling was unblemished by dings. The tires were Pro-Trac 60s and Jake strolled over to the station wagon to pop the hood.

“This 1967 Ford Torino has a 428 FE motor with a three-speed automatic transmission and a Cobra-Jet engine.”

“Wasn’t the same engine in Steve McQueen’s ride in BULLITT?” AK stepped closer to admire the V-8.

“Ford stuck a 390 into that Mustang GT, which had a lighter chassis than the Torino.” Jake launched into a minute-long monologue extolling his car’s speed. “This baby can do a quarter-mile in 14 seconds.”

“Cool.” Sean nodded his head in approval and said, “My only car was a 1964 VW bug and its top speed was 85.”

“85?” Jake asked with a laugh and shut the hood.

“Downhill with a tailwind in the White Mountains.”

“You know telling someone about speeding isn’t the best way to persuade them to give you a car.”

“I’ll make sure that he keeps the speed down,” Pam assured the owner.

“I had hoped for someone more like me to drive the car, but there’s not many of me in Boston these years.” Jake inspected their eyes.

“More than you imagine.” AK and Sean had earlier smoked a joint this morning and Sean wished he were wearing his sunglasses. “South Boston keeps supplying the Marines with warm bodies. JP too.”

“Sounds like you protested against the War.” His statement was an accusation more than a question.

“Yes, but when I was 17, I enlisted in the Marines.”

“And?”

“My mother wouldn’t sign the papers.”

“She was against the War?”

“No, she is a devout commie-hating Catholic, but she loved me too much to allow my fighting overseas in a war and threw the papers in the trash.”

“After which you became a hippie?”

“Something like that.”

Sean spared him the story of how an older friend had come back from Viet Nam in 1968, preaching Muhammad Ali’s creed that no VC had killed anyone in the USA.

“There’s a lot of ‘something like that’ going around.” Sadness tainted his words and Jake’s fingers twitched a request.

“Let me see your driver’s licenses.”

AK and Pam handed over their out-of-state driving permits. Sean’s had been issued from the Boston DMV.

“Any outstanding warrants or violations?”

“None.” Sean answered, although last autumn he had been arrested after a high-speed chase in a VW from Pam’s college. His Uncle Jack had gotten all the charges thrown out at court. He knew the judge.

“Well, the faces match the photos.” Jake handed back the IDs and glanced over to his wife. “We drove out here for a family visit. Normally I’d drive back, but my wife can’t bear seeing those cornfields again.”

“It is a long ride.” The distance from East Coast to West Coast was almost 3000 miles.

“You ever been cross-country before?”

“I haven’t driven it, but I hitchhiked back and forth twice. The first time was in 1972. A Super Bee picked us up in Iowa and the driver drove 100 or better most of the way to Reno. My friend and I completed the trip from Boston to San Francisco in about fifty hours.”

Pam and AK dismissed this claim with matching smirks.

“Fifty hours averages out to about 60mph.” Jake stepped away from his car.

“The driver was in a hurry to reach LA. We didn’t stop much.”

“People have been hitchhiking since Jonah rode in the whale. When I was stationed in Key West I hitchhiked to Boston on my long leaves. The drivers told stories, which probably weren’t true, almost as if they were trying to change their lives, if only for the time I was in their car and that’s the beauty of the open road. You become someone different with a new name and a new past. You get out of the car and you go back to who you are. There is no escaping the future of you.”

Jake’s unexpected insight constructed a connection between soldiers, sailors, college students, hoboes, tramps, beatniks, runaways, and hippies traveling the highways of America.

“No one believes my story about making the trip in fifty hours.”

“All stories are true, if interesting.” Jake clapped Sean’s shoulder.

The War in Vietnam was coming to an end and they had lost their hatchets instead of burying them.

“As for driving cross country in fifty hours, I’d appreciate if you take it easy on my car.”

“Driving fast in America is against the law now.” Pam opened the station wagon’s rear door and examined the car, which seemed to pass her inspection.

“These idiots in Congress think driving 55 will save gas and free us from the Arabs. There’s no shortage of gas.” Jake’s face reddened with anger.

“I agree with you.” Sean had seen the tankers riding low on the outer roads of Boston Harbor.

“How you planning to go out West?”

“We’re driving straight from here to the Rockies. I’ve always wanted to see them.”

“They’re beautiful this time of year with the snow up high.” His voice became dreamy, then he said, “You be careful on the road. Nothing the state troopers like better than arresting hippies for speeding.”

“Thanks for the warning. The station wagon should provide camouflage for a passage through the Midwest.”

“Why are you driving cross country?” Jake stared Pam, who was braless under her paisley dress.

“To visit my fiancée,” Pam answered and continued, “He’s doing an internship at a hospital north of San Francisco and I’ll be working at the same hospital as a training nurse this summer. Harry and I met in high school.”

“You and he are high school sweethearts like my wife and me.” Jake glanced to the woman in black. “Somerville High School. Class of 1950.”

“Xaverian 1970. My high school sweetheart and I broke up senior year. I just graduated from BC with a degree in economics.” Sean volunteered this information to change the subject from young love.

“What about a job?” Jake asked, as if he had served in the military without counting days or years.

“I drove taxi to pay for college. I probably worked too many hours past midnight and graduated at the bottom of my class.”

“His diploma read ‘sin laude’.” AK had told the same joke at Sean’s graduation party and his father hadn’t appreciated the Long Islander’s humor, yet his mother had beamed with pride after the graduation ceremony. Her mother had not finished grammar school back in the Connemara.

“You graduated, but what about getting a real job?”

“I’ll be a substitute teacher at South Boston High School come the fall.” Sean had taken no education classes in college, but his older brother’s friend had been elected onto the Boston School Committee and a teaching spot had been a reward for Sean’s having working on the campaign.

“I’d rather face a banzai charge than a room filled with teenagers.”

“Yeah, I feel the same way, so when AK’s friend invited us out to Encinitas, I figured to take one long last beach vacation. 65 is mandatory retirement age for a teacher, meaning I will be working well into the next century.”

“Yes, they don’t have a twenty and out.” Jake continued to hold onto the keys.

“No, they don’t. We appreciate your letting us take your car.”

“And I guess I appreciate your driving it. One more thing my car engine guzzles gas, so I’m giving you an extra $100 for the trip. Those Arabs are killing us at the pump.”

“You have that right.” Sean laid more blame on the oil companies.

“And I want you to fill the tank up when the gas gauge hits half and use the highest octane from Sunoco.” He handed over the keys.

“Yes, sir.” Sean smiled at Pam and AK. They were minutes away from hitting the road. “We’ll see you in six days.”

“Make it seven and you’re in for a treat; the Great Plains, the Rockies, the high deserts, the Sierras, and finally the Golden State of California.” Jake had obviously driven the road more than once.

“And don’t forget the Mississippi.” Pam beamed a smile revealing her happiness to be heading west.

“It’s a big country.”

Jake and Sean signed the matching contracts from the drive-away company and he told Pam, “Make sure they drive my car safe.”

“I’ll keep them between the white lines. You have my word.” The blonde stored her bags in the car and sat in the rear.

“You do that, Pam.” Jake studied her face for a few seconds, as she rolled down the window. “She reminds me of someone.”

“To me she resembled the singer from The Band Named Smith.”

“They had a hit with BABY IT’S YOU.”

“Yes, they did.” Sean was surprised that he knew the group, but Gayle McCormick was very attractive. “See you in Lodi.”

He tossed his canvas bag in the station wagon, sat behind the wheel, started the engine, and reversed out of the driveway. After beeping the horn they headed onto the Jamaica Way, the engine running strong and smooth under the hood.

“For a second Jake seemed like he wasn’t giving us the car.” AK unfolded the map of the USA.

“Why?”

“Because of your admission to being a traitor.”

“I was telling him the truth, besides Pam had him wrapped around her little finger.”

Sean drove past Jamaica Pond in the slow lane.

“The power of feminine wile.” The blonde smiled at Sean in the rearview mirror.

“Something never to be underestimated.”

“Only a fool would do that.”

Pam breathed in deeply.

“This car even smells new.”

As a child of the suburbs Pam liked things clean.

“And why wouldn’t it be? Jake’s in love with his car.” Sean rolled down his window. The morning smelled of spring.

“Car love is a man thing. Sometimes it seems like my boyfriend loves his car more than me.” Pam tied a scarf around her head to keep her hair from getting snarled in the wind.

“What kind of car does he drive?” asked AK.

“A 1974 Mustang II.” She sounded disappointed. “It’s red.”

“Nice.”

Sean didn’t mean it, because Ford had dumped a Pinto engine into the classic Mustang to sacrifice power for fuel efficiency. “He drive it cross country?”

“No, he sent the car out on a train and flew to pick it up in San Francisco.”

“That’s one way of crossing the country.”

Sean didn’t like her fiancée and his choice of a car reinforced his disdain.

“Are you making fun of Harry?”

“Not at all. My VW is on its last legs and I don’t have a girlfriend to love.” Sean steered past the hospitals off the Fenway.

“Funny.” She didn’t mean it.

Sean cringed at stepping on her toes this early on a long trip.

“Wonder what Jake listened to on the radio.” AK pushed a button.

Wildman Steve was cuing up America’s surprising # 1 hit ROCK THE BOAT by The Hues Corporation. AK’s fingers plunked at an imaginary keyboard. For a longhaired white boy from Levittown Long Island he had a lot of soul.

Sean obeyed the traffic lights through Boston and the sun flashed off the Charles River to the right of Storrow Drive.

A bearded hitchhiker stood at the Brighton Mass Pike exit. His leather jacket was a patchwork of different colors and his jeans were torn at the knees. Sean veered over to the breakdown lane and braked a hundred feet before the tollbooth.

“What are you doing?” Pam asked with alarm.

“Stopping to give him a ride.”

“He could be an ax murderer.”

“I’ve hitchhiked across the States more than once and never ran into an ax murderer.”

“There’s always a first time.”

The ragged longhair waited by the rear passenger door. Closer up he was older and rougher, but karma overruled Sean’s apprehension.

“Next week I’ll be hitchhiking down the coast of California. If I don’t pick up hitchhikers now, then I might be stranded in Big Sur for days. Let him in.”

“Okay, but I’m not happy about this.” Pam slid over to the driver’s side. “If he starts anything, I expect you to take care of it.”

“I promise I will.” Sean reached back to unlock the rear door.

“Thanks for stopping. The name is Bill.” A thick Southern accent slithered from his chapped lips.

“Where you headed?”

“California.” Sean had friends from Dixie. Not all of them were rednecks.

“Damn, I always wanted to see the fuckin’ weirdos out in Cally.”

“Weirdos?” asked AK.

“Yeah, Satanists, drag queen, queers and fags.” Bill was no hippie.

“Where you going?” Sean hoped only a few miles.

“I’m joinin’ a fuckin’ carnival for the summer. We travel from Biloxi to Texas and up into the wheat fields. I specialize in bumper cars. How ‘rubes’ drive them says a lot about them.”

“How so?” AK faced Bill

“Cautious ‘straights’ play it safe. Aggressive ‘squares’ go for fucking head-ons. You look like in-between.”

“Meaning what?”

“In-betweeners get sandwiched by aggressive ‘squares’. They don’t stand a fucking chance in life. That’s you.”

Bill had been in the car for less than two minutes and Sean regretted having stopped for him.

“Where you coming from?”

“I spent the winter in a fuckin’ loggin’ town up north in Northeast Kingdom.”

“Vermont.” Sean was a native New Englander.

“That’s right. Them damned Yankees don’t give a rat’s ass for crackers like me. Last night I was in a bar on a river. They had a live band.” His hands draped over the seat. The knuckles were scuffed with scabs. “The pansy-assed guitarist wouldn’t play FREEBIRD. Fuckin’ Yankee.”


Pam sighed in disapproval of his favorite adjective.

“Sorry, Sunshine, if I offend you, but I was brought up five miles past the fuckin’ wrong side of the tracks.” He slid closer to her, as the radio station segued to HOLLYWOOD SWINGING.

“Why you listening to this fuckin’ disco shine crap?” Bill barked over his shoulder.

“Fucking disco shine crap?” Sean regarded their passenger in the rearview mirror. His face was swollen from hard drinking and well-aimed lefts and rights had flattened his nose. Sean’s grip tightened on the wheel.

“Yeah, I hate fuckin’ disco.”

“This isn’t disco.” Kool and the Gang’s song had been a big hit at the 1270, where gay boys loved dancing with straight boys and the deejay spun the best dance records in Boston. “This disco shine crap is climbing the R&B charts and the band is a thousand times more hip than that BAND ON THE RUN bullshit by that loser Paul McCarthy.”

“Loser? The Beatles are the fuckin’ best band in the world.”

“HEY JUDE sucks.”

“Does not, you Mick sword-swallower.”

“What’d you say?”

“You heard me, you fuckin’ potato-eatin’ fag.”

Sean veered into the slow lane. He was dying to hit Bill more than once. AK had seen his friend lose his temper. It had never been a pretty sight and he said, “I’ll handle this.”

“You’ll handle what, Jew Boy? What? You’re not a Jew? I can spot a yid as soon I see their fuckin’ hooked nose, so I’m not surprised you love this music, because queers and niggers play this fuckin’ music and you’re just a sand nigger.”

The words fag and nigger dripped with a long-seeded hatred.

“That’s it.” Sean stomped on the brakes and the station wagon shimmied to a stop in the breakdown lane a hundred yards short of the Charles River Bridge. Bill leaned forward and forcibly demanded,

“Why you stoppin’ here?”

Sean revved the big V8 and said, “Jack Kerouac wrote in ON THE ROAD that the biggest challenge for a hitchhiker was proving to the driver that he didn’t make a mistake picking him up and you have proven that I made a mistake picking up you. Now get out of the car.”

“Get out of the car?”

“He means it.” AK was of the same mind about Bill.

“This isn’t the fuckin’ end of the road.”

“It is for you and us. I don’t like queer bashers or racists.”

“I fuckin’ knew it the second I got in the car.”

“Knew what?”

“That you two were fuckin’ queers.” Bill opened the door and sneered, “Girlie, your boyfriends are fudge packers.”

“Even if I was, I wouldn’t fuck you with an elephant’s dick.”

“You fuckin’ fag.” Bill grabbed for Sean.

He blocked the drifter from encircling his neck and AK leaped out of the car to grab Jim’s leather jacket.

The pianist mightn’t have been a fighter, but he manhandled the roustabout out of the car and flung Bill across the breakdown lane. The vagrant tumbled down the embankment and AK chucked his bag after him. The toss hit Bill’s shoulder and he completed his descent down the gully.

“Go.” AK jumped in the front.

Pam shut the back door and Sean’s right foot hit the gas. The Torino accelerated from a standing stop.

“Nothing’s broken.” Pam leaned over to examine AK’s knuckles.

“I’m not much of a fighter.”

“Unlike some people we know.”

“I didn’t do anything.”

“No, you just stopped for a crazy ax-murderer. I hope you learned your lesson. He had his hands all over me.”

“Sorry.” Sean turned his head.

Pam’s eyes stared into his.

“Let’s pretend it didn’t happen.” She tilted her head. Blonde hair covered one side of her face and the nursing student pushed back the strands. “No more hitchhikers. This isn’t ON THE ROAD. And one more thing. Could we keep the verbal use of ‘fuck’ to a minimum?”

“Your wish is my command.” Sean gripped the wheel and AK raised the volume of the radio playing James Brown’s PAYBACK PART 2. The Godfather of Soul had a wicked rhythm section. Pam was right about hitchhikers, but then women were always right and men were always wrong.

They crossed the Charles River and Sean slowed to pick up a ticket at the tollbooth. He thanked the attendant and laid a light foot on the gas.

“Now we’re on our way.”

The traffic on the Interstate rolled at 60. The Torino had a full tank of High Test and easily passed a procession of slower cars.

Five days from now would be his 22th birthday.

Sean stepped on the accelerator. The needle on the speedometer hit 100 and at this speed the Golden State wasn’t fifty hours away, but only thirty hours. He eased up on the pedal. The station wagon joined the pace of the traffic. A State trooper car lurked in the bushes. Jake had given them seven days to cross the country, which came to 20 MPH.

The speed of a horse, but this was the 20th Century and Sean looked over to AK. His friend smiled at him.

“Are you okay?” Sean asked Pam.

“Fine.”

Sean was too, because they were on the road and the road was heading west all the way to the Pacific.

LUCKY IN LOVE by Peter Nolan Smith

The dawn sun burned misty shadows off the mountains and a stark brightness seared through my eyelids, as I rose from my sleeping bag to drink in the austere surroundings.

Flatness stretched forever.

A hissing wind pelleted my face with ancient brine.

The salt lay five feet deep this far from the lake.

A quick swig of water from my canteen washed the dust from my mouth.

This was the second time that I had woken in the Bonneville Salt Flats. The dried-up lake had been a hard mattress on both occasions. I stretched my arms and legs without loosening their stiffness.

Today was my twenty-second birthday. I walked to the Ford Torino.

To the South cars and trucks sped east and west on a mirage of mirrors.

The station wagon was parked several miles from I-80. In the back AK and Pam were lying inches from each other, but it was obvious to see that they hadn’t touched each other throughout the night. I could have let the two of them sleep another hour, but there was a shower room at the truck stop in Wendover and I intended to be there within the next thirty minutes. Utah was a godly state and I felt like bathing in Nevada.

I opened the driver’s door and AK sat up with a jack knife in hand.

“Oh, it’s you,” the pianist sighed, sinking back into his sleeping bag.

“Who were you expecting? The Manson family.” Remnants of Charlie’s followers roamed the western deserts. It was a bad sign that whatever they did out here never made the news

“Or worse.” AK sat up.

His eyes blinked in the increasing glare. “So this is it?”

“The fastest place on Earth.”

Rocket cars and super-charged motorcycles ran a measured mile farther to the North. Every one was seeking the land speed record. Gary Gabelich’s Blue Flame had hit 630 in 1970.

“I’ve seen this place on TV. I didn’t think it would be so desolate.” “It’s prehistoric.” The Salt Flats were uninhabitable for man or beast.

“Didn’t you sleep here with Marilyn last year?” AK crawled into the front seat and handed me the keys.

“Who’s Marilyn?” Pam remained lying on the folded down seats. Her sleep tousled blonde hair reminded me of young Brigitte Bardot in AND GOD CREATED WOMEN.

“She’s how AK and I know each other.” I didn’t want to tell this story to Pam. Her roommate in college was my ex-girlfriend Jackie’.

“Last summer he was hitchhiking from Berkeley with a friend.” AK had heard two versions of this story.

“The two of them were stuck on Telegraph Avenue for hours.”

“There were about thirty hippies heading east and few cars stopping for us.” Three of the longhairs had been stuck there for over a day.

“You were in a hurry.” He repeated the story the same way that I had told it to him, but I needed to take over for my own good.

“I had to be at school and Nick was headed to Tulsa to pick up his BMW. He had crashed his car, while rubbernecking at the State Fair’s roller coaster. A Ford Maverick pulled over driven by a woman. She was leaving her husband. He had become a transvestite dancer in the Cockettes.”

“Cockettes?” asked Pam. She came from a good family.

“That’s what Marilyn told me. Her six year-old daughter was in the back. She was headed to Boulder, but had room for one person. She wanted someone to share the driving. I asked Nick if he minded me leaving him.”

A better word was deserting.

“What'd he say?” Pam asked, then sipped water from my canteen.

“He told me to go and I went with Marilyn.” Boulder was almost halfway across the country and I was down to my last twenty dollars.

“That’s good friend.” Pam regarded me with tired eyes and asked, “And?”

“And we drove till we crashed here.”

“And then what happened?

AK was dying to tell Pam about my making love to Marilyn on the salt flats, while her daughter slept in the car crowded with all their possessions. Anything I said now would get back to Pam’s roommate. She had been my girlfriend in 1973. I cut the love scene from my tale.

“The next day she drove me to Cheyenne, saying that she might come see me in Boston.”

“And now comes the weird part.” AK had a slightly different angle on this story. “He and I lived next to each other in Boston. We didn’t know each other, but one day a Maverick pulls up in front of his house and this woman gets out of her car with her daughter. My girlfriend and I were surprised, since we had gone to college with Marilyn. Only she’s coming to see him, instead of us.”

“But once she sees you two, she decides to stay at your place.”

Marilyn and I never made love again.

“We had a bigger place.”

“After that you and I became friends.”

“Unlucky in love.” AK handed the canteen to Pam. “Lucky with friends.”

“Marilyn and I weren’t in love.”

“Was this after Jackie broke up with you?” The blonde wanted to get the facts straight.

“Jackie had left me earlier in the summer.” I shrugged the acceptance of my fate and asked, “You know what today is?”

“Let me guess. It’s your birthday.”

“You helped celebrate my last one in Buffalo.”

I had hitchhiked back and forth from Boston to Buffalo to see the doctor’s daughter. She was that cute.

“Jackie, you, and me drank tequila on the American side of Niagara Falls. Later that day we had played softball against her ex-boyfriend’s team in Delaware Park. You had knocked two balls over the railroad tracks. Her boyfriend had been playing centerfield.”

“That night Jackie had said that she felt sorry for Jerry. It didn’t take me long to find out how sorry.” Not making love for my birthday had been a bad omen.

“Maybe today you’ll have better luck.”

“Yes, maybe I will. You know I shared the same birthday as JFK and Bob Hope. It was also the day that the Turks stormed Constantinople.” History had been my college minor.

“Happy Birthday to you.” Pam sang the entire song. She had a good voice and AK backed her lead with a solid baritone.

“And you know what I’m going to do for my birthday.” “I can’t wait to hear.” Pam shivered in fake anticipation. “I’m going to drive this car as fast as it can go.”

“I’m not sure the owner would appreciate your putting his car to the test.” AK was the more cautious of us.

“Jake would love it.” The ex-Marine had boasted of the Torino’s Cam- Jet injection and 428 FE V8 back in Boston. “This is the Bonneville Speed Flats.”

“What the fastest you’ve driven?” Pam had exhibited a heavy foot on the gas throughout this trip. Her destination was a boyfriend. Ours was the beach. Neither was going anywhere without us, although the ocean was more faithful than a man.

“About 110 in my father’s Olds 88 on a straightaway in my hometown.” The road crews prided themselves in the condition of Route 28 from the parish church to the Blue Hills.

“This car should beat that.” AK drove a Pontiac Firebird. “It’s your birthday. Knock yourself out, but if anything goes wrong, you pay for the damages.”

“Nothing is going to go wrong.” I started the special edition V8 engine. “If you want to play it safe, you don’t have to come along for the ride.”

“He doesn’t, but I do.” Pam jumped into the front seat and strapped on the seat belt. “I want to see how fast I can get it to go too.”

AK’s reservations were overruled two to one and he folded up the rear seats, then clinched the seat tight.

“Roll up the windows.”

Speed was all about better aerodynamics.

I revved the Cobra-Jet engine and stepped on the gas with a young man’s mercilessness. The tires responded to the acceleration on the salt surface without any shimmy from the steering wheel. The speedometer in the second dashboard pot climbed to 60 within seven seconds. The needle hit 80 and my grip tightened on the wheel. At 110 we were traveling almost two miles per minute and I grit my teeth, as the speedometer passed 120. The saltpans shivered in the morning light and I pinned the needle at 125. The car had more goose in its go, but there was no way of telling how fast was its fast and I lifted my foot off the gas.

“That was fast?” AK was a convert to the religion of speed.

“I figure it topped out at 130.” We were rolling to a long stop and I lightly tapped on the brake.

“Now it’s my turn.” Pam was eager for her attempt and the three of us traded places.

125 seemed faster in the back seat and I think that she might have hit a top speed of 135. AK didn’t come close to her best, but drove the Torino with a broad smile on his face.

“I didn’t think it would be that much fun.”

“Some cars are built for speed,” Pam said with admiration for the V8’s power.

“I’ve always wanted a GTO. My friend had one and Moon would bet people $20 that they couldn’t grab the bill off the dashboard before he had shifted into fourth. He never lost.”

“They’re about $4500 new.” AK burst my balloon. “And a second-hand one costs $2000.”

“Maybe I’ll be lucky one day.” I owed $7000 in college loans. I had to start paying them at the end of the summer.

“You’ll be lucky as soon as we stop for breakfast. Bacon and eggs are on me.” AK turned on the radio.

A country station from Wendover was playing Ray Stevens’ THE STREAK. We shuddered at the topical hit’s banjo picking.

The radio received no other signal.

We were on the wrong side of nowhere.

“There’s a town with an air force base at the foot of those mountains. Wendover, Nevada. It will have someplace to eat and wash up.”

“I forgot you’ve been here before.” Pam was digging for facts about my night with Marilyn.

“Twice.” I wasn’t squealing on myself. “The motorhead with the Super Bee drove this route two years ago. I have no idea he was going.”

“Maybe 200 miles per hour.” AK still doubted this tale, since it was the truth.

“Lucky liked 300 better, but the speedometer only went to 125. Same as this car.”

“Shame we couldn’t go 300,” said AK and got a laugh out of Pam.

I was tired of being the butt of their jokes and sulked against the door, knowing none of us would ever drive 300.

Our arrival in Nevada was greeted by a shrieking fly-over of two jet fighters. I imagined them on patrol over Vietnam, but they wouldn’t be here, if we were still at war over there.

AK pulled into the truck stop for gas.

Pam wanted to wash the West out of her hair and grabbed her towel before walking into a building detached from the gas station.

and I filled up the tank and parked the car.

Two steps beyond the entrance was a bank of slot machines. Their lights caught my eye. Neither of us was expecting a miniature casino inside the truck stop and I turned to AK.

“Like I said I’m feeling lucky.”

“You ever gamble before?”

“No and it’s because my great-grandfather skipped out on his debts and no one saw him again. My great-grandmother and her two daughters were forced to seek refuge with her uncle in Augusta, Maine.

No one in my family explained the causes of his misfortune, but my father had once said ‘horses’.”

“They don’t call these machines one-handed bandits for nothing.” AK wore a frown of disapproval.

The money in our pockets had to last us the summer.

“Okay, four quarters and I’m quits.” A dollar wasn’t going to bust me.

I dropped the coin into the slot and pulled the arm. The cylinders spun to hit a row of cherries. Coins cascaded into the payout slot.

My jackpot paid for a half-tank of premium gas.

“Beginner’s luck.” I stuck the coins in my pocket and walked into the showers, while AK paid for gas. The shower room had no walls and I stripped off my jeans and tee-shirt.

“Hey, hippie boy, where you going?” A rangy man was soaping an enormous erection two shower to the left.

“San Francisco.” I dropped my eyes to the tiled floor. The only word men are supposed to say to each other in a bathroom was ‘huh’.

“I’m heading your way.” Tattoos sprawled across his rawhide skin.

“I got a car and a girlfriend.” The first was the truth and the second was a pure lie. I swiftly soaped my body.

“Too bad, I thought maybe you and I could have a good time in Frisco. It’s a wide open city. Try the Castro. It’s for men. Maybe I’ll see you there.” He took his time rinsing off the suds in hopes of my changing my mind.

“Yeah.” I grabbed my clothes and dressed without toweling dry.

The Summer of Love might have ended, but Sexual Revolution was spreading across America. Exiting from the shower room I warned AK of the bushwhacker.

“He’s looking for a friend.”

AK had been brought up in New York.

“If I can walk through the West Village without getting hit on, then how dangerous can this place be.”

“You’ll find out.”

I entered the diner and sat at the counter. I didn’t need a menu and the waitress wrote down my order for eggs over easy, bacon, and toast.

Thirty seconds later AK joined me in the dining room.

His face was a bright red after hearing the trucker’s sordid suggestions.

“I never heard anyone talk like that.”

“Can’t say that I didn’t warn you.” I had pored through hundreds of porno books in the Combat Zone and my research had covered every genre of perversion. “That trucker was interested in holding hands.”

“No, that’s for sure.”

Pam exited from her shower in a clean dress and wet hair. She had been with us for three days and

AK hadn’t worked up the nerve to put a move on her. Tomorrow we were dropping off the Torino in Lodi.

Time was running short for him.

Breakfast for the three of us came to less than $4. The truck stop offered cheap food to entice travelers to try their luck with the slots and I succumbed the lights and noise of the one-arm bandits.

“I’m going to try my luck again.” I reached into my pocket for change.

“No one wins on those machines.” AK stood away from the slots, as if they were contagious.

“It’s my birthday.” I dropped a quarter into the slot and pulled the arm. Within fifteen minutes I had accumulated another $5 of quarters. They had a nice heavy feel in my pocket.

“Very few people know when to walk away a winner.” AK led the way to the door and we passed the trucker, who was entertaining the buxom cashier. She laughed, as if he had told her a dirty joke.

When I reached the door, the trucker winked at me and I hurried to the station wagon.

“What’s wrong?” Pam asked at the car.

“Nothing, but let’s get out of here.”

Nevada was a replica of the moon. The tortured underbrush was scarred from the waterless weather.

Treeless mountains skirted the horizon. I-80 followed the trail of the Forty-Niners. The first town up the road was Oasis and the four lanes of asphalt shrunk to a two-laner divided by a yellow line.

We rejoined US 6, Jack Kerouac’s route across the country.

Without the road this community would have shriveled to its original double-digit population of the late 1800s. We drove past the gas stations, restaurants, and stores without braking for a light.

Oasis had none.

Outside town I-80 resumed its trek across Nevada. Jack Kerouac had ridden a bus across this wasteland. He had very little to say about it in ON THE ROAD.

Dirt roads vectored off the interstate into the distance. They looked like they had been here in 1947.

Two years ago I had traveling this highway in Lucky’s Super Bee and I asked AK the same question, which I had asked with friend Steve on this stretch of road.

“What do you think is out there?”

“Ranches, mines, and dirt.” AK studied the map. “There’s nothing out there, but more of this.

“That’s what I thought.”

The temperature climbed into the 90s and we shut the windows to turn on the AC. AK’s renewed his efforts to find a radio station, harvesting more static.

He lifted his hand over his shoulder.

Pam handed him Joni Mitchell’s BLUE.

The opening chords of the title song rolled like a mist off the Pacific into Monterey Bay. After hearing it for the tenth time in five days the three of us sang backing vocals for Joni. We almost were in tune.

Approaching Wells I slowed to 40 mph on US 6. Local cops were notorious for setting speed traps for out-of-state travelers. I checked the gas gauge. It read half-empty and I pulled into the first gas station to top off the tank, so that we could reach the California State Line in one go. AK pored over the map, as Pam talked to the pump attendant.

The tall teenager was a younger twin of the young cowboy back in Sterling, Colorado with whom she had spent the better part of an hour in a pick-up. Neither AK nor I had criticized her detour from being the faithful girlfriend of the medical intern. Pam was on summer vacation until Mendocino

Across the street was a long one-story log cabin with a neon sign blinking CASINO.

James Bond had played baccarat at Monte Carlo. Tuxedos and low-cut evening gowns had been required attire for the extras. Two men in jeans exited from Well’s casino. They blinked in the sunlight and shook hands, as if they had spent the night playing blackjack.

“I’ll be back in a second.” I walked away from the car drawn by the magnetism of a movie myth.

“Where you going?” AK knew the answer.

“To take a look.” A year ago I had passed through Las Vegas on the way to LA. Nick had warned me about the dangers of gambling. Now I wanted to see for myself.

“Don’t do anything stupid.” “I won’t.” My traveler’s checks were in my bag and I had $50 in my wallet.

I pushed open the glass door.

The interior decor was a homage to the town’s pioneer past. A cool breeze blasted from the casino’s ACs.

Cold offered a refuge from the desert .

I strolled past a gauntlet of slot machines to where a dozen green-felt tables arced across the red carpet in two semi-circles. Three men sat at the one farthest from the slots. Tall piles of chips rose before them. They were in a good mood. A motherly dealer in a cowboy hat shuffled a deck of cards with the speed of a Japanese cook slicing meat at Benihanas, then flicked the two cards to each man and herself.

“Feel like joining us in some blackjack.” Her voice sounded like she might have been the Lone Ranger’s aunt.

“It’s a friendly game.” A man in the suit pulled out a chair. “Us against the casino and we’re murdering her.”

“I’ve never played before.” My mother had only permitted Solitaire, Spades, and Rummy in her house.

“The rules and tactics are simple.” The oldest man at the table looked like my uncle and Uncle Jack had paid for college with his poker winnings from the Korean War. “Figure the down card of the dealer is a ten or face card. If she’s showing a six, then she’s probably holding a sixteen. The house has to take a card on sixteen. If she breaks 21, then you win.”

“Today’s my birthday.”

“Then your beginner’s luck is doubled by birthday luck. You can’t lose.”

I bought $20 of chips and placed a $2 chip on the table. She dealt me two tens. When it came my turn for a card, I held up my hand like Steve McQueen had done in THE CINCINNATI KID. I loved that movie.

“The hippie sticks.”

The dealer stayed with a nine and Jack. My 20 beat her 19. A chip came my way and the trio at the table congratulated my luck. They had also won their hands.

The next set of cards ran in my favor as did the following hand. I had a good head for numbers as would anyone who had majored in math during his first years in college. Soon I was on a roll.

Pam and AK stood behind me.

Within twenty minutes I was up $100.

Pam waggled the keys in her hand. The two of them wanted to be in San Francisco, not a dusty gambling town in the Great Basin.

“Sorry, it’s time to go.” I cashed in my chips and said good-bye to the three men and dealer.

“Not many people stop when they’re ahead.” The old man spoke, as if he never left the table until his last dollar was gone.

“Beginner’s luck can’t last forever.” I stashed the dollars into my wallet.

“You’re not a beginner anymore, birthday boy,” The dealer was angry at my departure. No one likes losing, because winning is better.

Outside I got in the car and said, “Funny, but I was feeling like I would never lose.”

“All gamblers think that way, until they’re busted.” AK sat in the back of the Torino. “The odds are always tipped in the casino’s favor.”

“And good luck has a funny way of turning bad.” Pam had been with her girlfriend the night that I had left their college dorm after drinking a bottle of tequila. The town police had arrested me five minutes after a high-speed chase in a VW. She was well aware of my luck, both good and bad.

“Give me another minute.” I stepped out of the car. “Not to play any more. I want to call my mother and let her know I’m okay. Remember it’s my birthday. I won’t be long.”

Three minutes to Boston cost $1.20. My mother picked up on the first ring. She sang ‘Happy Birthday’ twice and asked if I was having a good time.

“We’re almost in California.” Any mention of my winning streak was a jink.

As a good Catholic she regarded luck as a gift from God not to be wasted on sin, although I recalled a nun telling me that St. Christopher was also the patron saint of luck. He must have been very popular on Bingo nights.

I’ll call you from San Francisco. Love you and tell Dad I’m fine.” “We miss you.”

“And I miss you too.”

My father had criticized this trip as a senseless fling.

After university I had been expected to begin a real job. America was in a recession and I had been rejected by the banks in Boston. None of them had wanted to employ a longhaired economics major with a stutter .

I hung up thinking about them sitting in our suburban home. The South Shore was a long way from Nevada.

I put in some more quarters and rang Jackie’s house in Buffalo. Her mother answered the phone, “Who is it?”

I didn’t want to say my name and hung up the receiver. I returned to the Torino and sat in the passenger seat.

“Everything good?” AK had met my parents. They had thought that he was a good friend, but also a bad influence for my future.

“We can have birthday cake later.” AK’s parents probably felt the same way about me.

“I’m like chocolate.” Pam pulled out of the gas station and the attendant waved from the pump.

The next town on the map was Elko, which was slightly bigger than Wells judging from the larger print of its name.

Pam didn’t refused my request to test Lady Luck at another casino and thirty minutes later I pushed away from the table $220 richer. The weekly salary at a Boston bank was $20 less than and the blackjack dealers didn’t cared, if I had a stammer.

I repeated my wins in Winnemucca and Lovelock.

I counted the thickening wad of cash several times in the back seat and told Pam to put on Joni Mitchell, “She’s good luck.”

“How much you have now?” AK had avoided from the tables and flirted with the slots. He was down $10.

This wasn’t his day to shine. “Counting the money I left Boston with, almost $2500.”

“That much?”

“I’m on a roll.”

“That’s almost enough for a second-hand GTO.

“One more stop and I’m going to buy a new one.” Last year I had less than twenty dollars in my pocket, as I traveled east with Marilyn. Today was my lucky day.

“That’d be a good birthday present.” AK was happy for me.

“And who deserves it more than me.”

Shutting my eyes I heard the surf of the Pacific. The ocean was cold and the sun brushed my skin with gold. I was looking forward to being a beach bum with money.

A road sign was marked RENO 150 MILES.

Night softened to a velvet blue behind us, as we pulled into the Biggest Little City in the World.

“One more stop.”

Pam groaned at the wheel and AK said, “I don’t think this is a good idea.”

“It is, it is.” I handed AK my travelers’ checks and $1000. I had seen gambling movies. No one came out on top. “No matter what I say, don’t give me any money.”

“I’ll hold it.” Pam slipped the cash into her pocketbook. “I don’t trust either of you, but Joni Mitchell wishes you good luck. One more thing.

“What’s that?”

“If you’re going to play, then play to win.” Pam was a junior at a girl’s college outside Boston.

Her major was nursing. Her advice should have been more conservative.

“I’ll keep that in mind.” My fingers twitched to hold cards. This was a whole new me.

Reno blazed with neon rainbows above the street. The bright lights outshone the rising moon. I picked the Horseshoe Club as my next victim. I liked its 50s facade. Pam gave the Torino to a casino valet. I tipped him a dollar.

“Whatever you do, don’t let this man sell the car.” She warned the skinny valet.

“I’ll try my best.” He must have failed more than once. “A half-hour. Not a minute more.”

It was my birthday. Reno was at my mercy. I marched into the Horseshoe Casino.

Pam and AK detoured to an empty lounge, where he sat at an idle piano to play Joni Mitchell and

Pam smiled at him for the first time on the trip. I rubbed my hands together and approached the blackjack tables like Genghis Khan on a raid.

After fifteen minutes I was up to $900. The balding dealer in the red vest congratulated my play. I placed a $100 worth of chips on the table. My two cards were an ace and a ten. The dealer paid out $150.

A leggy redheaded waitress in a skimpy mini-dress asked, “Do you want a drink, sir.”

“Jack and Coke.”

“I’ll be right back.” She touched my shoulder and gave me a wink.

I tipped her $5 and I told her it was my birthday.

“Maybe if you’re lucky, we can celebrate it together once I get off work.” Her smile gleamed in the eternal night of the casino.

“That would be great.”

“My name’s Kim.”

I downed the first drink and pulled off a series on wins.

After each hand I counted the bills in my head. Kim kept the drinks coming one after the other.

She kissed me once on the ears.

I lost a few hands and tried to recoup these setbacks by wagering larger stakes. That strategy failed to curb the luck of the house. AK tried to pull me away from the table.

“I’ve only been here twenty minutes.”

“More like two hours.

“I know what I’m doing.”

Those were the last words that I remembered that evening.

The next morning acid sunlight blazed in my eye sockets and my head pounded like a drum crashing down a cliff. I sat up in my sleeping bag to discover that I was lying on the ground next to a rushing river.

Pine trees pierced the clear sky. The Sierras rose jagged above me. I was not in a penthouse suite with Kim.

My hands searched my pockets. There was not one dollar in any of them and my wallet was gone.

The Torino was parked twenty feet away from the river. Pam and AK were sitting at a picnic table.

Their faces told me a sad story. I didn’t need to hear the details just yet and stumbled to the edge of the rushing torrent to stick my head in the icy water.

The cascade rushing over the tumble of worn boulders had to be the Truckee River west of Reno.

I pushed back my wet long hair and checked my pockets again with the same result.

Walking to the picnic bench my body ached with each step.

For an instant I thought that someone had rolled me, but I had no bruises.

I wondered how many Jack and Coke’s I might have downed last night. The razors slashing my brain to shreds shouted more than ten and I shambled to my boots lying in the dirt. I picked them up and stuck my hand to the toes.

There wasn’t a penny in the boots.

AK and Pam were eating sandwiches.

She didn’t look very happy and I asked, “Did I lose all my money?”

“Yes.” AK confirmed the worst.

“What about the money I gave Pam?”

“Gone.”

“But I told you not to give it to me.”

“I never heard anyone beg like that. Not even a junkie in the emergency room.” Pam bit into her sandwich.

“So I’m broke?”

“Busted.”

“Shit.” I was 2700 miles from Boston. “At least I didn’t sell the car.”

“Yes, but you tried.”

“Idiot.”

Last night I had it all.

This morning I had nothing.

“Your birthday cake is in the car.” Pam nodded over her shoulder.

“Thanks.”

“It’s chocolate.”

"My favorite.” I turned slowly in a circle.

“What is it?”

“I’ve been here before.” I recognized the location.

“You lost all your money before.” Pam didn’t have a high opinion of me this morning.

“No, two years ago my friend and I were hitchhiking to San Francisco. A Riviera stopped for us. Two convicts just out of prison were inside. They were drunk and wanted me to drive. Steve didn’t think it was a good idea.”

“And was it?” Pam really wasn’t interested in this story or me, but figured it was better than listening to my moaning about blowing my vacation cash.

“It was until we reached Oakland.” The drive over the Sierras was been a dream for someone in love with fast cars. “They wanted to take over and my friend and we got out of the car. They left the gas station, then stopped and reversed like they had changed their mind, and smashed into the pump, which exploded on contact. They were too drunk to get out of the car, so Steve and I pulled them out. The station attendant put out the fire with an extinguisher.”

“Lucky you were there.” Pam finished her sandwich.

“Saving them meant nothing to me.” I wished that she had saved a bite for me. “Where’s that cake?”

“In the backseat.”

After devouring half the cake I packed my sleeping bag in the car and pulled on my boots.

My two travel companions mercifully refrained from rehashing my debacle, as we drove over the Sierras into California, but I called myself every name in the book.

Jack Kerouac had completed his cross-country trip by bus down the western slopes to the land of palm trees according to ON THE ROAD.

Like him I was in California and we reached Sacramento at noon.

AK and I dropped Pam at the bus station. She was catching the next departure to San Francisco.

Her boyfriend was waiting at the other end. We escorted her to the ticket counter. Both of us were sad to see her go and AK said, “You could always meet us in San Diego.”

“Thanks for the offer.” Pam had the telephone number of AK’s friend. “But I don’t think Harry would want to hang out with a couple of beach bums.”

“Beach bums?” AK was hurt by this opinion of him.

“I don’t mean anything bad by that, but you are spending your summer hanging out at a beach.” Pam had us dead to rights and she picked up her bags. “It was fun.”

“Most of it.” I could have done without last night.

“Don’t worry, I won’t tell Jackie anything about Reno.” Pam kissed my cheek.

This gesture was as comforting as her promise to keep my disaster a secret from my ex-girlfriend not that it would have made much of a difference, since Jackie was in love with someone else.

“It was real.” She kissed AK on the lips and ran to her gate. “That was a surprise good-bye.”

Pam didn’t turn around to wave good-bye.

“I only wish it was the beginning.” His grin lessened to a smile.

“It is in some ways.” The three of us were down to two and we went outside to the Torino. AK sat behind the wheel for the last time and I wondered how long it would take me to hitchhike back to Boston.

He turned the key in the ignition and reached under the front seat.

“Here.” AK handed me a paper bag.

“What’s this?” I opened it to find my wallet with my traveler’s checks and $1000. My next words came from Captain America in EASY RIDER.

“So I didn’t blow it?”

“You tried your damnedest. I didn’t give it to you this morning, because I thought you would go back to the casino.” He shifted the column tick into Drive.

“Thanks.” I was almost in tears. “I hope you learned your lesson.”

“Two to be exact. First, I’m no gambler and second drinking and gambling don’t mix.”

I was one day older than yesterday and that day had been an education in luck, although I was smart enough to not ask the meaning of the lesson, because $2000 was $2000 more than I started with this morning.

I sat back in the seat and we pulled out of the bus station.

It was May 30, 1974 and I was one day older than yesterday.

Lodi wasn’t very far from Sacramento and that town was the end of the first part of our trip.

AK and I were heading south after returning the station wagon to its owner.

I smiled to myself, because I was still lucky in something and was smart enough to not ask what after one night in Reno, because luck came in spurts.

Both good and bad.