Lakeside reflection
Chloe looked at the pink haired girl sitting by the water of Klamath Lake and staring at the scenery as she smoked silently. They had stopped for a small break, a way to enjoy the sight rather than just passing by.
Chloe always liked driving the US97 through Klamath Falls, especially because of the portion of the road running along the lake that lay north of the town. It was not as pretty as those she had seen in Washington such as Crescent Lake; but the wide area with the mountains looking so far away made it seem like the end of the world, a place where everything is wild, where no problems can find you.
And it was on the way, so might as well let the girl enjoy it. It was not Crater Lake, of course, but then again, they could not have driven into the park with their truck. Still, by looking at the girl's thoughtful expression, Chloe felt like she had made the right choice by letting her take a break there. Especially after the previous days.
Chloe pursed her lips as she sipped from her coke, remembering the events. The frantic wake up three nights before had been bad. And the rest of the night too damn short. In fact, Chloe had to give up on starting at the time she had originally planned.
After she had managed to calm her passenger, bringing her back from whatever nightmare she had been lost into, it had taken her over an hour before the wails and cries finally softened, and the hands tightly gripping her shirt finally loosened enough so she could reach the cabin night light. This, in retrospect, was not that great of an idea. The soft red ambiance light had only added a darker atmosphere to the event, which the usual cabin white light might not have.
Two things had been obvious, though: Max's panic attack had really played a loop on her, leaving her face raw with anguish and pain, and there was no way the girl would sleep on the top bunk for the rest of the night as the frantic stabbing had killed the poor brand new mattress. The first one, Chloe could not really do much about aside from trying to comfort and show her support to the girl. The second would have to wait for them to stop at a bigger Truck Stop with a larger store. That or their return to HQ.
Geez, Victoria will kill me!
In the end, she had killed two birds with that stone and shared her bunk with the pinkette. It had saved one of them from sleeping on a mattress with a large hole in it and allowed Max to find comfort in her presence. It was a tight fit, and not only because the bunk was originally planned for one person, but also because the broken girl had seemed to see her as some big teddy bear to hug for comfort.
Yep. Victoria will definitively kill me!
They had gotten up with the sun, hit the road after a quick coffee and take out waffles and made the delivery in Surprise, in the suburbs of Phoenix by the end of the morning. A quick lunch later they were driving up to Flagstaff in order to load some rolls of fabric for a cloth factory in Portland.
They had managed to drive up to a truck stop in the outskirt of Las Vegas for the night, where Chloe had found a replacement for the assaulted mattress. That night again, the pink haired girl had joined Chloe in her bunk after another bad nightmare had woken them both up, and had pressed herself tightly to the punk driver, seeking warmth and comfort to sleep.
They had gotten up around 6am this time and drove up through Nevada, made a bit of Californian roads, stopping for the night again around Madeline, CA before they crossed the Oregon border just south of Klamath Falls. They had just driven a bit further up until they reached a quiet parking area by the lake for lunch.
All along, Max had barely spoken at all. She had spent her days sitting while looking at the roads and the landscapes, and most of the nights – after more nightmares – huddled along Chloe like a kid pressing itself against its mother for protection.
Chloe had hesitated all along to ask the girl what had happened, as she felt doing so would make the girl run. At the same time, it confused her a lot to see the girl who had been so stubborn in her keeping people away, in her refusing of any help, in her threatening of bodily harm if anyone touched her, turn suddenly so silent, fragile and desperate to feel her presence to the point she would hold on to her like a koala holds to its tree.
After looking at her watch, Chloe stood from the picnic table with a sigh and walked to join up with Max.
Max stared at the lake, watching the soft waves created on the surface by the lush winds. For some reason it helped her settle down as she thought about the events of the trip. She had been shocked to hear that her torturer had escaped. So scared, she had forgotten he had been found dead, finally having gotten what he deserved, and had nightmare of her time in that dreadful institution.
And it brought more questions… Did her parents know what she would be going through? Had they sent her there on purpose to suffer like she had? Or had they no idea of the reality behind that realignment school?
Max had no idea what the response to those questions would be. And she wasn't that eager to go and ask her father.
Another question was whether she was safe to reappear after missing for so many years. She knew she did not have much choice about it. Not after she had requested a certified copy of her birth certificate and gotten a new ID from the Oregon's DMV. If anyone wanted to know if she was still alive, she had lit up a pretty big beacon. But she doubted anyone cared.
I could always run away and get to the opposite side of the country.
She shrugged to herself, redirecting her thoughts to more direct matters. Like how she felt about the road trip. She had to admit being on the road had been interesting. She saw various sceneries, alternating between desert, fields and forestry, even from the highways. The company had been fine. Although, things had become awkward pretty fast.
And that brought the second question she had to consider in the very, very near future. What should I do about my driver? What should I tell her? Or can I just keep as if nothing had happened and ignore the fact I'm –
"Mind if I join you for a minute?" Chloe's voice interrupted her thoughts as the bluenette came to sit beside her, not waiting for the answer.
"It's a free country." Max simply responded, tensing up a bit as she sensed the dreaded questions coming.
"Want to talk about it?" The bluenette asked while staring at the lake as well.
Max took a moment to think about the idea. For some reason, now that she found herself facing the question, she was surprised to see it was not the idea of sharing what she had gone through that bothered her. It was more the idea of remembering it.
"I… I dunno" She finally responded. "I'm not sure if I am ready."
The punkish driver shrugged beside her and stood. "Fair enough. Just know I'm here if you feel like talking about it." She patted her jeans clean. "Anyway, we got to hit the road again if we want to get home today."
Max looked up and stood up with a sigh. "Okay…"
"Hey, don't sigh! I know the view is great here but trust me there are better ones. And you can always come back around here later if you want." The girl turned to walk backward as she talked. "Or are you that eager to spend another night in tight quarters with me?"
The grin on the bluenette's face sent Max's heart into slight flutters and she could not help but look away, walking toward the parked rig. As she popped the door open, she could hear the driver laughing at her embarrassment.
She climbed into the cab, mumbling at the girl. "Yeah don't expect anything from that." She then shifted into the back to search into her bag while Chloe started the truck. Picking up a book given to her a few days before by the bluenette, she returned to the passenger seat and buckled her seatbelt.
They were underway for maybe half an hour when Chloe asked with a nod toward the book. "Thinking about getting your Commercial Driver License?"
Max raised her eyes from the page she was perusing. "Not sure yet… Just… looking into it… seeing if it might interest me."
Chloe shrugged as she checked her mirrors in an automatic sweep. "Fair enough I guess. Although don't expect the manual to tell you how it is." She smirked. "It's just rules and regulations in there, nothing about the work itself."
"Yeah, I thought so." Max responded absently. "Still, I guess it'll at least tell me if I wanna bother learning and following them."
"Well, it's not really complicated. Just got to count your hours carefully. Besides, this thing will do it for you." She explained patting the tablet fixed on the overhead board. "And tell everyone about it, too." She added with a grunt.
"I guess you don't like it."
"I don't like having a damned computer watching me doing my job. I never went over hours once, I don't need a fucking computer to tell me how long I've been driving." She swept her eyes across the mirrors. "Anyway, the hardest part about following regulations is to refuse being bullied into breaking them by your boss or the customer. As I told you, on that part at least, Bitchtoria is a fair boss. She won't pressure you into breaking regs. So, it'd be entirely at your discretion."
Max shrugged. "Yeah well, I'm not the kind to be bullied. Not anymore at least."
Chloe scoffed. "I'd say so, considering how you made your last boss accept your resignation!"
The bluenette pressed a button on her wheel and the truck began to slow a bit, a loud roar rumbling from the engine as the Jacob brake was engaged. Max looked up and saw another truck in front of them slowing down and preparing to take the next right.
"Anyway as I said, the regulations aren't the hard part of the job. The driving itself isn't that hard once you get used to it. Aside from crappy bosses, the hardest part is to get a good handle of your size and weight… And maybe not to fall asleep at the wheel during a long drive."
She slow down more, downshifting carefully, to let the truck in front of them take its turn. Then she stepped on the gas again, slowly accelerating back to their cruise speed. "Anyway, with handling size and weight comes the loading and unloading and all the stuff around the driving. It's muscle work, so you might find it physical."
Max pursed her lips. " Hmmm… I'll think about it then."
The drive to Portland took another seven hours. They drove over US 97 and Oregon 58 until Eugene before taking the I-5 North to their destination. This time, Max and Chloe weren't locked up into a waiting room. It allowed Max the chance to observe the process.
The weather being fair, she stepped out of the truck with Chloe as the bluenette went to open the loading doors of the trailer. She remained outside, watching the driver back the truck to the docks then waited for Chloe to join up to her with the shipping documentations.
The whole unloading took an hour in all. Max watched how things proceeded while Chloe kept an even more careful eye. "Because, these dockers don't care about the trailer and if you don't watch them, they tend to break things." She had explained at Max's questions.
Once the unloading was over, they drove back toward Arcadia Bay, reaching the Chase Freight Ltd's facilities an hour and a half later.
"Wanna help disconnect the trailer?" Chloe asked after backing up the trailer to its parking spot and pulling the parking brake fobs. "Would give you an idea of the job."
Max pondered a moment, then shrugged. "Why not… Beats doing nothing."
The bluenette handed her a pair of work gloves and waved her out. "Come join me on my side."
Max exited the truck carefully and put on the gloves as she walked around the tractor truck's front. "Okay. What now?"
Chloe smiled and walked to the side of the trailer. "First, we check that the ground under the legs is solid and stable." She said as she stomped the tarmac ground. "We would not want the trailer to sink while it's parked… It's a pain in the ass to raise it back up." She then pointed at the crank lever. "Second is, you crank the legs down. Give it a try."
Max shook her head. "Sure, give me the hard job!" She walked and took the lever in her hands starting to row it. "It's… easier than I thought."
Chloe smirked as she watched the legs of the trailer move down. "Yeah, I thought so myself when I started." She waved a hand dismissively. "Of course, when it's not properly greased or maintained… it can be a pain in the ass."
"And does it happen often?" Max asked, huffing a bit as she kept rowing the lever.
"Not here. Frank is taking good care of our trucks!" She smiled. "You're almost done."
"Good thing." Max grunted." I'm not sure it's something you should be doing with busted ribs!"
Chloe winced at the reminder. "Oops… sorry, I forgot about that. Let me finish it."
Max shook her head. "No… it's fine, I'm done already."
Chloe took a look, checking the position of the trailer and the extension of the legs. "Yeah… it should be enough." She moved toward the back the trailer "Next we got to secure the trailer's parking break and put the wedge behind the wheels so it doesn't start to move on its own."
As she spoke, she reached to join actions to the words, securing the trailer's parking. "Then we have to climb on the tractor to go unhook the cables and air hose." She said inviting Max to join her on the tail of the tractor between the cab and the trailer.
"Okay." Chloe paused. "First we unplug the electrical cable." She said while pointing at a big black plug, before pulling off. "And we hook it up on the rack head down."
"Why head down?"
"To prevent water to get into it." Chloe smiled. "No use creating shorts." She patted one of the two hoses. "Those are the air supply hands. The red one is called the emergency line. The air it supplies will unlock the brakes on the trailer's wheels. If it's cut, the brakes apply to stop the trailer."
Chloe patted the other one. "The blue one is the service line. It's linked with the air controlled by your brake pedal so when you brake, the trailer brakes also slow the trailer. Avoids it trying to drive in front of you."
"I see." Max responded, although her tone is unsure.
"Yeah. Don't worry, you'll get the hang of it." She reached for the red hose. "We first unhook the emergency line, another way to secure the trailer. To unhook the hands, you have to raise it like this." As she spoke, she lifted fixture turning it up ninety degrees, letting a soft hiss of air as the remaining pressure was released. "Then, we hook it into the dummy on the rack to prevent dirt to get into the hose." She kept explaining as she demonstrated. "Now, why don't you try on the service line?"
"Okaayy…" Max responded reaching for the blue connector and moving it as she had seen the other girl do. It was hard at the beginning, the clamps making it a tight fit. Then it suddenly moved, turning and popping free with a slight hiss. She then reached to hook it to the dummy hand on the rack. "What now?"
"Now?" Chloe responded with a smile. "We get to unhitch this bitch!"
The girls climbed down from the gantry and Max watched as Chloe leaned under the trailer, reaching between the tractor's rear wheels and the bottom of the trailer's box. "There's a handle there. You see it?"
Max nodded and the girl continued. "You need to reach and grab it. You will see there is a second handle inside. You need to squeeze the inner handle together with the main one to disengage the safety, then you need to pull all of it."
As Chloe pulled back giving way, Max leaned while trying to grab the mechanism as she had been told. She had to push on her toes, half climbing on the large wheels in order to reach it – making her curse her pocket size – but she finally grabbed both handles, squeezing them in her fist before pulling hard.
The truck was new and the mechanism well lubricated. Still, being designed not to let the trailer's kingpin go while the combine was moving, the lock did not give way without an effort. Yet, after a soft grunt from her part, the lever came with a metallic 'clank' as the fifth wheel's locking mechanism opened.
She pulled back, standing up to face the smiling bluenette and grunted. "Okay… What now?"
"Now? We get back into the truck and slowly drive away."
After climbing back into the cabin, Chloe started up the engine again and carefully drove the tractor from under the parked trailer. "You got to be slow on that part, and make sure the trailer stays where it is. You never know."
She drove a few yards before stopping. "Say… you wanna try driving it to the parking?" She offered as she pulled on the parking brake fob. "Just a few spins at a slow speed, to see if you enjoy the feel of driving a bad boy like this!"
Max hesitated. She had not driven anything in years, and the last thing she had driven had been a small car. "I dunno… I've never driven something that big before."
"Don't worry!" Chloe dismissed with a wave of her hand as she stood up and shifted toward the sleeper. "I'll be there to guide you, and you'd only be moving slowly and forward. I'll be the one backing it up in the spot, okay?"
Max bit her lip before switching seat with a sigh. "Okay… but you're the one taking the blame if I break anything."
"Yeah, yeah. Just sit down and follow my lead." Chloe retorted wryly as she remained standing behind the seat.
Max studied the controls a moment and moved the seat a bit forward before looking up. "Okay… I never drove manual shifting. How do I do this?"
The blunette smirked. "Okay. So, left foot on the left most pedal. You press it fully." As she spoke Max followed the guidance, pressing on the pedal to the floor. "Then you take the shifter and move it into first. Just push it forward."
Max moved the stick forward with a frown. It did not move as easily as she thought but did slide into position.
"Now you softly press on the gas pedal with your right foot and slowly release the left pedal." Chloe said as she reached to push the parking brake fob.
Max tried to do as told and released the pedal slowly, but she did not do it slow enough and after lurching forward the engine stalled. "Shit!"
Chloe laughed softly. "Don't worry about it! Newbies always do this! Just press the pedal down again and turn the key to start the engine. Then try again."