The End of the Beginning

Motoring through Southern Virginia at speeds exceeding ninety miles per hour, my eyes grow heavy and my mind becomes dull. Now playing: Metallica’s “Blackened.” Kirk Hammett’s thrashing overpowers the piercing sound of high-velocity winds cutting through the partially open window. Ken plays the air drums with a Camel dangling from his lips, even stomping his feet to replicate Lars Ulrich’s ferocious double-pedal assault. When I pass the Danville exit I suggest we pull off the interstate and find a motel, but my colleague insists we reach the North Carolina border tonight. We’re behind schedule, he says. I implore him to drive the remainder of the way, but he claims it would be foolish given his intoxicated state. I tell him he’s full of shit.
“I could fall asleep at any moment,” I say.
“I’ve got my seatbelt on,” he says, flicking his cigarette on the highway and closing the window. “This beast has a five-star safety rating. Dual-stage frontal airbags and head curtain side-impact airbags come standard. I’ll take that risk.”
Minutes later, a booming snore resonates from my right and a creeping tickle dances through what remains of my septum. My muscles instinctively tighten and my body jolts forward as spittle showers the windshield and drizzles on the dash. A throbbing pain shoots up my neck and across my shoulders as if half of my soul – or whatever’s left of it - just escaped through my mouth. I jerk the wheel slightly so two wheels are driving over the rumble strips on the shoulder of the road, the line dots vibrating the sedan like it’s reading Braille, delivering an invasive message to Ken: Wake up!
“Fuck, man…stay on the road, stay on the road!” he says, wiping drool from his chin before mumbling something barely comprehensible that can only be translated as, “Crazy bizzo…I’ll eat your heart.”
I pull off the highway in Raleigh, or somewhere in the surrounding barracks, and I follow signs to a hotel just slightly out of reach of suburbia’s stinking jowls. It’s quiet in these parts, and why shouldn’t it be? Maybe it’s the lack of pollution in the cool Carolina air that makes the moon shine so eerily bright, or perhaps the glowing orb senses the presence of outsiders, standing guard over the Great Southern Trendkill to ensure that the two manimals approaching in the ecru deathcraft don’t spew their foul, chemical-induced bile across this virtually untainted terrain and disrupt an otherwise serene evening.
Walking to the hotel lobby, sensors detect our presence and the automatic doors grant us entry. We are immediately greeted by the most pleasant woman you could possibly tolerate – a Southern lass so sugary-sweet she must sweat lemonade, bleed fruit punch, and shit milk chocolate. The nametag pinned to her lapel says Brianne and, strangely, it seems as if she sincerely cares about how she could help us this evening.
“Are you a teeth model?” Ken asks.
“Excuse me?” she says.
“Smile again.”
She flashes a grin. “Like this?”
“No, bigger…Bigger!”
Ken verbally directs the positioning of her straight, pearly choppers. His index finger presses under her chin, adjusting the posture of her head like a department store photographer.
“Are those implants?” he asks.
“What?”
“Dental implants? You have them capped or anything?”
“No.” Awkward pause. “I have a Sonicare Advance Model QP-3 though.”
“What the hell is that?”
“A toothbrush. Well, a sonic electric toothbrush.”
“Sonic, eh? Does it fly?”
Ken tells her she can do commercials for Crest or Oral-B. She smiles and blushes a little, not knowing how to respond to a comment like that. I can tell she’s uncertain if he’s hitting on her and, to be honest, I am, too. Right now, she’s pondering whether this is a legitimately innocent compliment or some eccentric pickup line they use north of the Mason-Dixon Line.
“Don’t mind him,” I say. “No one’s smiled at him in weeks. It’s been a while since he’s seen teeth.”
Brianne secures a room for us on the second floor and hands us two plastic keycards. She directs us to a display of pamphlets begging guests to visit local attractions like Confederate soldiers’ gravesites and the historic drag-racing museum.
“I see your fine operation boasts an Olympic-size indoor swimming pool?” Ken says.
“Yes, sir, that’s correct.” Brianne says. “But it’s closed right now. There’s a lifeguard on duty until nine. Pool opens up again tomorrow at six.”
“Well, my friend here was a rescue diver in the Coast Guard. He’s certified and all that jazz; he’s even got some medals, so we’ll be fine.”
“Well…um―”
“See you in the morning, sugar.”