Meatloaf and Mayhem at Priscilla’s Roadside Diner

 — two —

Moonlight and dry, Route 88 was running fine at 45 miles per hour towards Shalom with not car to be seen for miles. Even better, there was some Aerosmith playing over his truck radio. Monday nights a ten, WROC would play a whole album of fine classic rock without interruption. Kinley always liked Permanent Vacation, most anything from Aerosmith’s revival in the early Nineties. Dude Look Like a Lady played on when he spotted a hulking dark figure ahead, lumbering along 88’s shoulder.

Kinley slowed his gray F-150. The man was tall and broad shouldered, his backpack, a canvas green think looked like a cross between a soldier’s duffel and a hiker’s mountain pack. It also was large and, as he neared the man, it seemed to be covered with symbols, black and ambiguous. As he passed, he saw that the man walked with a staff, not a walking stick, but a long piece of ash or oak wood, nearly as high as he was tall. In the light of his low beams, it also seemed to have some kind of markings, maybelines of characters going down the length.

Kinley gazed through the passenger window for a closer look and the man turned to him, locking eyes. His were blue, cold, and piercing, and they fixed on Kinley. Distracted by his stare, he momentarily swerved right, tires making an awkward squeal, and the vehicle turning into the shoulder ahead of the man. Lefting the truck to the lane tore his eyes from the man’s stare. He looked in the rear view mirror to see that the man had stopped as if watching with interest while Kinley swerved and then corrected himself. He stood motionless as Kinley continued, slowly.

“Probably scared him,” he said to the windshield, and he stopped. Looking again, the figure still stood, then switched the staff from right hand to the other and back. Kinley wondered if it wasn’t some angry gesture to go with what the man was thinking, like “Thanks a lot jerkweed for nearly hitting me.”

Kinley looked over his shoulder. Nobody behind him. He put the truck in reverse and started backing up. He eyed the rearview for directon. The man still didn’t move. When he came to his side, Kinley said through the open passenger window, “Hey, brother, sorry about that. Hope I didn’t scare you.”

He said nothing. He didn’t seem to be looking into the cab, just waiting.

“Just wanted to make sure you’re alright. You know, walking alone at night in the dark.”

Again silence.

“Alright then.”

“You drive for a living?” The man spoke.

Startled, Kinley said, “What?”

“Your profession? Are you a professional driver?” His voice was calm, but direct.

“No. I’m a warehouse manager for the Cargill depot over in Barrington.”

“That’s good, because you could get somebody killed the way you drive.”

“Hey, like, I’m sorry. You just looked like you were having some trouble getting along.”

“I wasn’t until you came by.”

Kinley needed to turn this conversation another way, so he said, “Listen, fella, can I give you ride? I’m heading into Shalom, going to get a bite to eat at Priscilla’s diner. How about I get you some dinner for the trouble? She makes an awesome meatloaf.”

“Will I die?”

“What? From the meatloaf?”

“No, from your driving?”

“Of course not. I mean, I hope not, it’s only five miles up ahead.”

“Lot can happen in five miles,” the man said looking up the road, then at Kinley. “But I am hungry. Haven’t had a good meal in days.”

“The meatloaf’s too die for.”

“That’s an interesting choice words,” he said leaning into the window. Then looking at the empty pick up bed, added. “Throw my gear in the back?”

“Sure. Yeah, absolutely.”

Kinley watched as the man pealed off the backpack. It seemed immense and heavy to him, but the man tossed it with ease into the truck. It hit the bed hard with a thump of weight and rattle of metal bracing against metal. The staff followed, but the stranger placed it gently on the acrylic bed-liner like it was prized heirloom. He got into the truck.

He reached out his hand to the stranger. “Kinley.”

The man looked at the extended hand with some hesitation, but accepted anyway.

“Rimmon.” His hand felt rough and cold, and not from the cool June night air. But like he was old with poor blood circulation. Kinley thought, Or bloodless.

Then he noticed the odor, some combination of perspiration from several days, maybe weeks, without bathing, and clothing soiled by road dirt, weather, and mildew. The door windows were open, but Kinley opened the sliding window behind him. Rimmon noticed, saying, “Sorry about the smell. Been out here awhile.”

“The night air will be good for both of us,” said Kinley, thinking Carl, over at Winston’s Auto Body, would need a day to fumigate his cab after this night.

“That’s a polite way of putting it,” Rimmon said looking directly at his driver.

Kinley got a good look at his face. Rugged features. Scrawl of a beard, with some gray. A deep scar, nearly blood red, above his left eye. But his eyes didn’t look as severe now. Demanding maybe, purposeful even, like a man set upon a task, but not intimidating as before.

“So where are you headed?” Kinley asked, gear in drive, and accelerating down 88.

“Thought you said we were going into Shalom, to some diner? Priscilla’s was it?”

“Yeah. But I meant you. Where were you heading to?”

“Shalom, will do for now,” Rimmon nodded, his face set to look to the road ahead. He added, “You know it means “peace” in Hebrew.”

“Yeah. I did.”

“Is it?”

“Is it what.”

“Peaceful?”

Kinley looked at Rimmon and shrugged, “Yeah. I guess so. Sure, mostly. It’s a quiet town. But there isn’t much to do around here as it is.”

“Sounds perfect.”

… Looked like he’d been on the road for some time. You see how worn his boots are? Thought I’d be a good Samaritan and help him along. Get him something to eat, place to sleep for a night. And you’re right. He’s more than a few days past bath night. I’m going to take him over to Shelley’s Boarding House for the night, if he’s got the room.”

“Good for you Kinley and your charity. We need more folks like you.” Bernice’s compliment stopped quickly when she saw Ms. Mosley rise from her booth, walking towards Rimmon. “Oh shit! There she goes.”

Mosley came from his right, holding her patent leather purse with the faux gold horseshoe snap close to her chest. Rimmon was eating his apple pie, which Alice quickly deposited before him and didn’t wait around for anything else. Mosley moved in her usual manner, with stealth and ready to snap at here intended victim. Normally she would stand as close as possible. Mosley had no problem violating somebody’s personal space. She actually thought it her duty to do so when she was correcting or admonishing him or her. Not so this time.

Mosley stood three feet away, raised her head, and sniffed the air, saying. “Young man, you smell like a gutter.”

Rimmon did said nothing, just took another bite of his pie, then a sip of his coffee.

“Did you hear me? You smell like an open sewer on a hot summer day.” She sniffed again. “You should leave. Get a bath. You smell horrible.”

Rimmon, with fork still in hand, turned on the swivel stool with an unexpected quickness as though the food had given him an instant surge of energy. This startled Mosely and she stepped back on her heels, clamping down on the handles of her purse. His eyes took dead aim on hers. They seemed black as darkest coal in the deepest night.

Rimmon sniffed as well, twice, and said to her, “And you smell like the inside of a funeral parlor. Too much lilac and lily.”

Ms. Mosley gasped. Her breath caught in her throat, she couldn’t speak.

“Are all the women in this town this rude?” Rimmon said.

Then he heard Bernice say, “ Ms. Mosley, why don’t have a seat, leave the poor man alone, and I’ll get you some more Oolong. Maybe some of that apple rhubarb pie you like so much.” She was now across from her, but to Rimmon’s back.

She said nothing, still gripped by the his coal eyes. He wouldn’t break his stare.

Kinley approached immediately, now next to Bernice again. “Geez, Judith, why do have to be such a busy body. You’re a damn pest. Leave the man alone.”

Judith Mosley remained nearly motionless, except for the quiver that was beginning to move through her arms to the fingers at her purse. Perspiration began to bead at the her hairline. Then her breath returned and some boldness. She said, “Well. I never. Young man …”

“She a friend of yours, Kinley?” Interrupted Rimmon, pointing his fork at her, but not looking to him.

“No. Not really,” he said. “I mean I know her. Everybody knows Ms. Mosely. Biggest pain in the ass in town. Always in everybody’s business.” He looked at Mosely. “Please Judith. Just go sit down. Alright.”

Rimmon asked again, “So she’s not your friend.”

Kinley looked at Bernice for some discernment. She only shrugged.

“No.”

“Then you won’t mind this.”

Renfo rose in haste from the stool and stabbed Ms. Mosley four times in neck. The force and speed of his first two strikes ripped a staggered hole in her trachea. As her hands fell and her purse dropped to the floor, Rimmon grabbed the woman by her gray bun. Twisting her neck back and two more thrusts, he opened her left carotid artery. Judith Mosely fell backwards, hands to her neck, as the blood began spurting to the air. Rimmon sat down to his dessert.

In the silence of disbelief, everyone heard Ms. Mosely’s head crack against the linoleum.

“Holy shit!” said Kinley.

Bernice looked at the woman bleeding out and gasped. Her eyes rolling back in her head, she collapsed to the floor. Kinley was barely able to keep her head from bouncing off the hard floor like Ms. Mosley.

Alice only stared at Rimmon, who put the bloody fork down and away from his unfinished apple pie, then said to her: “I’ll be needing a new fork, please.”

Alice screamed, loudly in staccato bursts, which got the attention of the others, all at the opposite end of the diner, who didn’t see the demise of Ms. Mosely. The teenagers, a girl with curly blond hair and a boy with a pasty face and bad acne, barely noticed. Ear buds installed in both, they gave each other blank looks and returned to texting on their phones. The truckers raised their heads, goose-necking to see what was happening. Priscilla and her cook, Alf, a lean black man in his Fifties, came to the service window behind Alice.

Kinley was rising off the floor from Bernice when Rimmon, displeased with Alice’s racket, said, “Just get me a damn fork, woman.”

Which only made her scream more, except the staccato yelps were turning more towards gasps for air as she began to hyperventilate.

Rimmon rose, pulling a standard ACP from inside his duster.

Which only Alice screamed louder.

“What the hell?” Kinley said. It was only thing he could think to say or do.

Rimmon fired twice, putting one in the girl’s mouth, the other in her forehead. Blood and bone exploded from the back of her head spraying both Alf and Priscilla and the vintage green MultiMixer milkshake maker to their left.

Kinley thought the gunfire sounded like the cracks of lightning from a hot August night thunderstorm. The kind of lightning that drops straight from the night sky to the plain of a corn field. He put his hands to his ears as he fell backwards. He stumbled over Bernice to the booth behind. He had enough sense to take his hands from his head to grab the booth back and table to stop his fall. It was also enough time to see most of Alice’s face disappear and her blood to splatter across Priscilla and Alf.

“Mary mother of Christ. What are you doing you?” he said.

“Just wanted another fork,” Rimmon said.

“A fork. A damn fork.”

“She wore too much make up, too.”

“Too much what?” Kinley’s ears were still ringing from the gun shots. Now he was trying to rap his mind around the man’s logic. It wasn’t working

“She was rude, too. Like the old lady.”

“Cripes. So you killed them?”

Rimmon didn’t answer. He was watching Priscilla digging into her apron. Her cell phone appeared. “No. No calls. Throw it out here.” She did and it fell into the blood surrounding Alice’s head. “You got one, too, dark man,” he said to Alf.

“No, sir. Not on me. In my coat.”

Rimmon waved his gun in a left to right, counter clockwise manner, ordering, “Both of you come out here.”

The teenagers were now attentive. With the truckers, they tried to bolt to the diner’s front door, possibly get past the bodies of the unconscious Bernice and the dead Mosely on the floor. It wouldn’t work. Rimmon pulled a second pistol, a revolver, from the back pocket of his soiled overalls, and said, “Back. Sit down.” They returned to their sits with their hands raised.

Priscilla and Alf appeared and he said, “You go sit with them, too.”

“Where do want me to sit,” asked Kinley.

“Shut up and stay put.”

“You.” Rimmon nodded with the revolver. “With the Peterbilt cap. You got a name?”

The man, short with an old Garth Brooks t-shirt, and a trucker’s belly, seemed confused, saying, “You mean me?”

“Are you stupid? Nobody else has a Peterbilt hat in here,” Rimmon said. “Of course, I’m talking to you. So what’s your name?”

“Ralph. Ralph Randolph.”

“Who do you drive for Ralph Randolph?”

His eyes blinked nervously, looking around the diner. “Who do I drive for?”

“Do you always answer a question with a question? What are you fucking Socrates the philosopher or something.”

The man stuttered, but voiced, “Socrates? What? I mean Morrisey Trucking. Out of Pittsburgh. ”

“So what is it? Socrates Trucking or Morrisey Trucking?”

Kinley looked to the group. Their eyes were also dancing, casting wondering looks at each other as Rimmon continued his dialogue.

“What?” The trucker said.

“You answer with a question one more time, I’m going to come over there put a bullet in little miss blonde prom queen. Maybe her head, most definitely her thigh.” Nearly everyone gasped, and the girl went deathly pale and began to shiver and cry.

Then the silence returned.

Kinley thought he had been transported to some Tarrantino movie, that one with the crazy black guy and the actor from Saturday Night Fever. What was his name? I didn’t come to him. And he thought he should stay quiet, but spoke anyway. “Come on, Rimmon. She’s just a kid. What do want from the guy?”

“Didn’t I tell you to shut up.”

“Yeah.”

“So shut the hell up.”

“Morrisey Trucking.”

Rimmon smiled at Ralph, and said, “See. Now how difficult was that?” There was almost levity in his voice. “Alright Ralph Randolph from Morrisey Trucking, I want you to collect all the cell phones from the people and put them in your hat. Can you do that without asking a question.”

“Yeah sure.” Ralph stood and removed his hat, with caution.

“And everybody. Put your hands down. You’re making me nervous.” Rimmon put one gun away, the revolver, to the bib of his overalls.

Ralph put both his personal and work cell phone in the hat. He put the hat before the other trucker, who dropped a Samsung Galaxy into the sweat stained cap. Randolph looked at the phone and then back to his fellow trucker, and said quietly, with a cautious eye to Rimmon, “Put in your truck phone, Gary. He wants them all.”

Gary’s back was to the killer and he said, “We need to call the police. I’m keeping the phone. It’s our only hope with this crazy shithead.”

The two teenagers were waving their phones and Ralph extended his hat past Gary to accept them. He said to Gary, “You’re going to get us killed, you stupid redneck.”

To which Gary said, “Or I might save our asses.”

“Got the phones, mister,” Ralph said.

Rimmon walked forward stopping at the first booth with the first occupants, the teenagers. He leaned into girl. She flinched, her eyes swelled with tears. Smelling the sweetness of her hair conditioner he said, “ Don’t worry, darling. I wasn’t going to shoot you.”