Cross Country With Dad and Bill

Was on a trip with Bill and Dad in the west (have traveled there in my dreams before, the states are about 1/4 their size, and the mountains are scaled down — still awesome, but climbable by laymen).

We were heading home to Missouri in a tour bus. With half a continent between us and “Grace and my little girls,” Dad was impatient — as was I — and he told the driver he would be willing to help with the driving.

It was exciting passing swiftly through oddly-European hamlets (which I’ve also visited often in my dreams — part Europe, part Augusta, Missouri) on narrow highways at high speed. But the speed began to seem too great, especially when it was Dad’s turn at the wheel. I was getting very uncomfortable, the way Mom used to in the car on the tipsy-turvy country roads of the Ozarks — it was a new anxiety for me, and I couldn’t shake it, couldn’t fall asleep like everyone else.

Dad drove faster and faster. It began to rain heavily. I stood and told Dad he should slow down, and only then was I sure that something was wrong. Dad said something to the effect that he had too much living left to do, that he couldn’t be wasting time just crossing the country. I was aware of the contradiction between this desire for a long life and his pell-mell, truly frightening pace into a blur of rain. I told the driver that my father was “crazed,” but still no one but me seemed very concerned. Taking this life-or-death matter into my own hands, I forced the gearshift into a lower gear, causing the transmission to burst — out deaths now certain and soon, I felt sure. Cursing both me and the situation, Dad more or less hurled himself into some kind of wrestling match with the steering wheel and windshield as we hurtled forward into the gray rain, and then we could see his arms spinning in front of the bus — he was somehow caught in the accumulating rubble in front of the runaway bus and though already killed continued to be thrashed around like a pinwheel.

I assumed crash position — back flat against the wall — and looked around to be sure that Bill was preparing for the collision, too. Sure enough, he was. We were two clear-thinking, smart guys. Looking in again I saw that he was doing more than just looking after himself. He had already knocked out the escape panel and, with his arms reaching backwards, his back to the loose section of wall, he was holding the wall in position through all the jolts and tossing, with his great strength, fulfilling his natural role as protector.

I finally took it on myself to use the brake, which slowed us down, the bus stopping just before hitting a stone wall.

We all evacuated to safety.

But I had one more concern — to know if Dad were possibly still alive. I crossed the big parking lot towards the bus, where the crew had attached the backs of their heads to the first flat panel below the bus steps, allowing them to relax on the asphalt in lounge-chair position. Seeing me coming, the workers snapped like mousetraps, some managing by this means to fling themselves acrobatically into the bus as it rapidly departed, but others ending up dragged across the pavement and killed. They were alien beings of some sort, and were either responsible for the accident or had something even more sinister to hide.