Chapter 9 – Road Trip


June 23rd 2011

1:30pm

Marty only had to mention Doc's Brown name for Jennifer to understand everything she needed to know about her husband taking an unplanned journey. It certainly wasn't the first time, but she'd always assumed such journeys would stop once the time machine was dismantled, or at the very least after Doc Brown's death. But somehow, the lack of both a time machine and a Dr. Brown didn't seem to put an end to the instances when Marty got entangled in a dilemma having to do with the Browns.

He'd burst through the front door at home, made a beeline to the cabinet where they kept important documents, and began riffling through the file folders inside. "I gotta find the date that we closed on this house," was all the more information she got when she questioned him. A moment later, he yanked one file folder from the cabinet triumphantly, licked his fingertip and started flipping through the stack of papers neither one of them had paid much attention to since the day they received them at the mortgage broker's office. He made an "ah-ha!" noise as his finger thumped on a date below his signature on one page. "June 29th!" he cried, shaking the paper in his fist as though it were a winning lottery ticket. "We closed on this house on June 29th! That means Doc and I were in New Jersey on June 27th!"

"Good to know," she said, leaning on the countertop. "But why does it matter?"

"Because the only chance we have to catch Doc Brown is two days before the day and the month when we signed the closing papers," Marty answered enigmatically, absorbed in throwing all the papers back into the folder and stuffing it messily back into the cabinet. He began to bound up the stairs before he stopped and realized his wife was still waiting for an answer.

"I've got to take a little trip with Jules and Verne, but Jen, I promise I'll explain everything when I get back," he dutifully pledged, inching his way up the stairs while trying to sound as sincere as possible. She arched an eyebrow but waved him away; anything having to do with the Brown family usually meant that she wouldn't see Marty for a few days, and that when she did, he'd have a hell of a story to tell her.

Not five minutes later, Marty jogged down the steps quickly (secretly proud that as a forty-three year old he was still as fleet-footed as he had been twenty-five years ago), kissed a somewhat resigned Jennifer on the cheek, and bolted to his car. A few minutes later as he pulled in the Brown's back driveway, he caught sight of an irate-looking Verne throwing duffel bags and a dozen of what looked like cracked, old brown suitcases into the back of his car, all the while yelling at someone, who Marty realized in an instant was Jules, looking equally as irate and standing near the front of the car.

"- this is California!" Verne was shouting as Marty jumped out of his car. "How the hell do you get anywhere without a car? The old homestead isn't exactly in the center of town."

"The way you get anything else in California, Verne. I pay."

Incredulous, Verne turned to his brother with a dubious expression. "You mean to tell me that for all these years you've been paying someone to drive you around?"

"It isn't often necessary," Jules answered somewhat defensively. He picked a piece of non-existent lint off his cuff fastidiously and frowned. "With the advent of the internet, I am able to supply myself with most of my material needs easily simply by ordering them. It is quite rare that I require something which I cannot obtain online or that I cannot fabricate myself."

Verne shook his head. "You used to drive. I remember you driving. You drove like a little old blind lady, but still, you drove."

Marty ran a quick hand through his hair as he came to two important realizations: One, that Jules' official status as a potential security threat apparently continued unabated and two, they'd be making the transcontinental trip stuffed into Verne's SUV. "Can we at least wait until we're out of Hill Valley before you guys start?" he said in an exasperated voice.

"Marty!" Verne swiveled around to face him with an eager look. "Did you find the date you and Dad were in New Jersey?"

"Yeah, right here - June 27th," Marty said, showing them his palm where he'd scribbled the date.

"June 27th? It's June 23rd and we've already lost most of today! That only gives us three days to drive across the country!" Verne exclaimed, veins again standing out against his forehead, much to Jules' consternation.

"Right. So I suggest we start out right away," Marty said sensibly as he threw his own small bag into the back of the car and slammed the hatch.

"The tank's almost empty, and I'm not gonna be the one paying for the first fill up," Verne declared as he climbed into the driver's seat.

Jules brought himself up to his full height and groaned. "I suggest we depart immediately, gentleman, and agree upon a fuel distribution budget on the way."

"First sensible thing you've said all day," Verne remarked as Marty threw himself into the backseat and Jules rode shotgun. "Now, we've only got three days to get there, so no stopping unless absolutely necessary, right? If we stop for too long, we aren't going to make it."

"Yet again, your observational skills astound me," Jules countered sarcastically, buckling his seatbelt as Verne fired up the engine.

"Really! Then tell me why you needed all those suitcases which seemed to weigh about a thousand pounds each, because that seems to elude me!"

"Because some of us prefer to wear clean undergarments everyday!" the older brother shot back. "I still remember that atrocious little 'tip' you imparted to me before leaving for college. Despite your protests Verne, turning your underwear inside out to avoid doing laundry - "

"I maintain that that is a survival skill - "

"It's repulsive is what it is! Made all the worse for the fact that our room always seemed to be littered with your underwear - "

"Maybe I was too busy with having a life to pick them up!"

"Please! As I recall, you seemed to spend most of your adolescence listening to music that would make a gas station toilet vomit in disgust and trying to hide lewd magazines under your mattress. I still occasionally find those things hiding in the most unpredictable of places - I could make a fortune from the vintage collection of pornographic magazines hiding in all four corners of the house!"

"Just because I was a normal teenager - "

"Normal? I refuse to believe that the definition of 'normal' has degraded so far as to include a teenager whose favorite hobby was seeing how much peanut butter would fit in his mouth as qualifying for normal."

"Jules, you wouldn't know normal if it pulled down your pants and slapped your ass with a wet towel. Normal! This from the guy who once asked for a particle accelerator for Christmas!"

"Enough!" Marty shouted. "Look, we've got a long way to go, right? Turn on some tunes and let's just all shut up for a while."

Quiet reigned for close to twenty minutes with the only sounds being the radio and the roar of the semis as they passed on the crowded highway. Before long, however, Verne's stomach reminded him that he'd never gotten to eat that sandwich Marty brought before their collective near-death experience.

"I'm starvin'," he declared. "Anyone else hungry?"

His question was met with silence for close to a minute before Marty admitted, "I guess we've got a long night ahead of us. Might be a good idea."

"Now you're talking!" Verne said as he immediately swerved into the exit lane, eliciting honking from other cars, and practically hit all of the traffic cones running along the side of the exit ramp as they descended into the small town of Stilesville.

"And you claim I drive like a sightless individual," Jules muttered, hanging onto the dashboard as they bumped along.

"Hey, a Smiley's!" Verne said happily as a fast-food joint appeared on their right. He pulled into the parking lot. "I take my kids to Smiley's in Center City sometimes. They've got those hideous plastic playgrounds kids love so much. Good fries, though."

"Artificially colored processed sustenance. My favorite," Jules said with a yawn as they pulled into a parking spot.

"Lighten up, Jules," said Marty with a shrug. "Even your dad didn't mind a greasy burger now and then."

The blonde teenaged cashier gave the three of them a bright grin that bordered on manic and chirped, "Welcome to Smiley's! What can I make for you?"

"I don't trust anyone that cheerful," Jules whispered to Verne. "If evolutionary behavioral psychology has taught us nothing else - "

"Don't get scholarly with me," Verne hissed back. "Just order something."

"Fine," Jules whispered dejectedly. He straightened up and declared, "I'll have a pustulous sack of oval-shaped grease covered with a piece of square-shaped processed whey and oil on a practically calcified composite of wood pulp extract containing more salt than my prehistoric ancestors ate in a lifetime."

"He'll have a cheeseburger," Verne said pointedly to the teenage cashier at the counter.

While Marty and Verne ordered their food and waited at the counter, Jules ventured out into the dining area. Frantic-looking cartoon characters holding glorified illustrations of Smiley's burgers plastered the walls and fake ferns hung apathetically from the ceiling. Napkins littered the floor where children ran amok, oblivious to other customers trying to make their way down the aisles towards plastic booths that appeared permanently sticky. Jules began to feel anxious and his palms began to sweat; he was unsure how exactly he would force food down his throat in such an environment. Not only did he not do well in environments crowded with loud people, but his inner germaphobe was practically shrieking in terror at the thought of the number of bacterial microbes roaming among him. He had almost decided to make his apologies to Marty and Verne and wait for them in the car when he felt a tug on his belt loop.

"Hi Uncle Jules!" a familiar voice exclaimed happily.

Jules looked down to find a fresh-faced kid with blond hair looking back up at him while sipping sloppily from a soda. "A - Alex?" he stammered in a confused tone. "What are you doing here?"

Alex, the five year old middle son of Verne, gave him a gap-toothed grin. "We's mouse hunting!" he cried.

Not entirely sure that such a thing was impossible given the state of the restaurant, Jules nevertheless crouched down to Alex's eye level (careful not to touch his knee on the floor) and asked, "Where is your mother?"

"She's over there!" Alex pointed to the back of the restaurant, where Margo, Verne's soon-to-be ex-wife, did indeed sit at a table with she and Verne's two other children, Jake and Sunny. Before he could refuse, Alex was pulling Jules by the hand over towards the table and chattering loudly about a toy truck he'd gotten in his kid's meal, and how he was planning on testing its mechanical soundness by throwing it repeatedly down the stairs when they got home.

" - an' if it don't break, then I know where Daddy keeps his hammer. Momma, look! Uncle Jules!" Alex squawked triumphantly, now holding Jules by his shirt as if presenting him to an awe-struck audience.

Margo Brown, a small brunette with large green eyes, turned and a look of confusion crossed her face as Jules squirmed uncomfortably. "Jules, what - "

"Margo, I feel it's only fair to warn you - "

" - what are you doing here? I didn't - "

" - that I'm here with Verne, and that - "

" - realize - Verne? Why are you - "

" - it's a complicated arrangement of catalysts that have necessitated this journey - "

"Alex!" Verne called from behind Jules, hurrying forward to his son and swooping him up. His eyes then landed on the rest of his family, who looked back at him with an equally shocked expression. "What're you you all doing in Stilesville?" he asked in a much weaker voice than he would have liked.

"Momma's looking at houses," Alex stated matter-of-factly as he buried himself in Verne's shoulder. "When you comin' home, Daddy?"

Verne's heart sank. "I - uh, I don't know yet, kiddo," he answered honestly. "But you guys are a sight for sore eyes, that's for sure."

"Got a truck!" Alex proclaimed as he held a small plastic truck up for his father to see. "Momma got us fun meal!"

The little toy, the kind sold by the millions with kids meals, shimmered in the fluorescent lighting. A daub of ketchup crowned its front wheels. "That's a cool truck," Verne managed with a slight grimace, a strange feeling in the pit of his stomach riling up inside of him as he realized he'd give anything in the world for things to go back the way they were before; long Saturdays, just like this one, spent playing with the kids and spoiling them with small pleasures like a cheap plastic toy at the bottom of a kids meal box. He ran a hand through his son's hair before swallowing and mustering up the courage to give a questioning look to Margo. "Margo? Is this true? You're looking at houses in Stilesville?" He made a slightly exasperated sound. "I thought we both agreed to stay in Center City!"

"I'm only looking," Margo explained with a shrug and a sympathetic look at Verne; it didn't look like he'd slept in days. "Look, we'd still be pretty close if you were in Center City and I was in Stilesville. Not even a half an hour apart. My sister lives in Stilesville, and I want to be close to her."

"And I want to be close to my kids!" Verne burst. A few customers gave him disapproving glances and he quieted down. "She may be the aunt, but I am the father. I outrank her!" he whispered fiercely.

By that time, Jules had found Marty sitting quietly in a booth across the restaurant from Verne and his family, his legs stretched out ahead of him as he sat with his back to the wall and rolling a toothpick in his mouth. Marty held up a bag with the Smiley's logo plastered on the side. "Thought it best to get dinner to go," he said.

"Yes," Jules said sagely, sticking his hands in his pockets. "This encounter may subdue even Verne's prodigious appetite."

Verne and Margo exchanged fierce, quiet words for close to five minutes before Verne kissed each of his children, and then made a motion towards the door directed at Jules and Marty as he walked swiftly back out towards the car. Verne threw himself into the backseat of the car and called out the window in a shaky voice, "Marty! Your turn to drive!"

A moment later, Marty obliged and slid into the driver seat with Jules sitting in the passenger's seat next to him.

"Are we not dining with your family, Verne?" Jules asked.

"What do you think, Jules?" Verne demanded flatly. "There's nothing more goddamned uncomfortable in this world than being in a place where you're not exactly welcome, but the person is too polite to tell you to go away, right? It's like when you get invited to a party only because you're a friend of a friend of the host's. Or when you're road tripping and you stay with someone you've never met, but is the friend of your co-worker's cousin or something. They don't really want you there, but they're too nice to say 'no' and they don't want to upset their friend. That's how it is with me and Margo right now. That's how it's been for months. Whether it's our house or a fast food joint in the middle of nowhere, she doesn't want me there - but she loves the kids enough to not tell me to go away, even though I know that's what she'd like to do. So, Jules, no, we won't be dining with my family. After everything else that has happened this week, I just can't stand feeling like I'm only being tolerated for a false sense of harmony." He sighed. "And anyway, nothing like the open road to ease a broken heart, right?"

"I believe you're thinking of effervescents and bed rest," Jules piped up helpfully from the front.

"Jules, shut up, man."