So Long, Chester Wheeler(26)

“Fine,” she said. “Fine. Look. He’s in a wheelchair, right?”

“I can’t argue with that.”

“So he can only go someplace if you wheel him there, right?”

“I suppose.”

“So take him straight to the passenger door. Don’t wheel him behind the thing.”

“Interesting,” I said. “You think I can get away with that the whole trip?”

“Who knows? But he wants to go. So he’ll shut up about it. If he gives you a hard time about anything, just threaten to turn this ugly boat around. Now I’ll put these on for you. You go inside and rest up and pack up for your big trip.”

I walked into my house and threw the Winnebago keys on the hall table.

Then I more or less walked straight into the shower, peeling off clothes as I went along.

I stood under the scalding hot water for ages, trying to let my stress melt or wash away. I was resting up from my traumatic drive home from Marshall’s, not for what lay ahead.

I was trying not to think about what lay ahead.





Chapter Eight:




* * *





What Lay Ahead

I was packing clothing and other such belongings into the horrible Winnebago when the FedEx truck showed up. All the kitchen and bathroom supplies lived in the rig between trips, and required no packing.

I stepped out to meet the delivery guy with my heart falling down around my ankles. I knew what the package was, who it was from, what was in it. It was literally the only thing standing between us and going.

Which meant now I actually had to go.

I signed quickly for the package and carried it into the house, tearing it open as I walked.

I found exactly what I expected to find. A credit card with Ellie’s name on it, and a cheap cell phone for Chester.

Chester was sitting in his wheelchair, watching his soap operas on TV. I know. He didn’t seem like the type, right? But Chester loved his daytime dramas.

His eyes came up to the package.

“Is that it?”

“Yeah,” I said, sounding disappointed. “That’s it.”

“Let’s go, then.”

“Maybe in the morning.”

He muted the TV with the remote and raised his voice into sonic boom territory.

“No, not tomorrow, Lewis! Now! We need to go now!”

“It’s afternoon already.”

“It’s one in the afternoon. We could drive eight or nine hours before we have to stop and sleep.”

“What’s the big hurry, Chester? I honestly don’t get it.”

“Then you’re incredibly stupid,” he said.

“Stupid is when you talk that way to someone who’s doing you a favor, and who could change his mind and not do it. Now adjust your attitude and explain it to me.”

“I wouldn’t think I had to.”

“But you do.”

He fell silent for a long time. He had his hands on the wheels of his chair, his elbows out, as if he were about to take off to someplace. As if he could wheel himself to the Southwest on his own power.

“The hurry . . . ,” he began. His voice was entirely different. I had thrown him into that vanishingly rare humility mode. “. . . is that . . . I have no idea how much time I’ve got.”

Then I felt bad because I hadn’t known without forcing him to say it. It was so foreign to me, the idea that tomorrow was not a given. I couldn’t make it stick in my head.

“Okay,” I said. “Fine. Let me just double-check my packing list and then we’ll go.”



Unpleasant surprise number one for the trip: Chester wanted to chat.

It was funny, because around the house he had pretty much ignored me. Okay, “funny” is the wrong word. Considering his choice of subject matter it was damn near tragic.

To make matters worse, he hit me with the questions before we were on the expressway, while I was sweating bullets trying to navigate the land yacht through traffic.

“Here’s the thing I never got about being queer,” he said.

I instinctively put my foot on the brake and stopped right in the middle of a traffic lane. The guy behind me leaned on his horn.

“You have got to be kidding me, Chester,” I said.

“Wrong word?”

“Wrong topic entirely.”

I started up again just as the horn honker swung around me and blared his horn again for good measure. It was a nice wide street with two traffic lanes in each direction. I hadn’t really been holding him back. Just one of those people who liked to express himself, I figured. A Chester type.

“Is that a word I’m not supposed to use, or what?”

“I would avoid it,” I said, trying to balance driving and being irritated by him at the same time. “I mean . . . I don’t have to avoid it. But you should.”

“See?” he said. “That’s just as prejudiced. You’re just as prejudiced.”

“How do you figure?”

“Because you get to do something and I don’t.”

“It’s not prejudice,” I said. I saw the expressway up ahead and breathed a sigh of relief. “It’s that when you use it, it’s an insult. When we use it, it’s a reclaimed word.”