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Impatiently, I swung in behind their vintage pick-up. Floppy grocery bags and a 12-pack of Moosehead Ale shared the wooden box with a rat's nest of fish net, bald tires and other sundries fit for the dump. Smoke poured from a dented muffler swinging loosely in its cradle of wire and rusty strapping.
What was with this guy, poking along, chatting up a storm with a woman I took to be the daughter of the woman on the bumper sticker?
He wasn't chatting--I could see that now. He Was yelling, mouth open for emphasis, lips hard-set. His shoulders were heaving the way shoulders do when you yell. He was pointing and nudging, flipping his hand around, shaking his head, hardly ever looking at the road, shouting at her and carrying on. He was very angry. She never looked at him.
I turned on my lights, hoping he'd see me and pull over, hoping he'd see me and pay attention to the road, hoping he'd stop yelling.
His attention did turn momentarily when the front tire of the truck left the pavement and rattled along the uneven shoulder, but soon he was back to ragging in her face.
She seemed small (perhaps she was scrunched down on the bench seat). I saw only the side of her face and her left shoulder. She wore a dark coat and scarf; her hair, also dark, was rounded smoothly in silhouette. He wore a black-and-red-checked jacket, too short in the sleeves, and he dug every now and again at the clump of unkempt hair beneath his blaze-orange cap.
The truck angled across the double yellow. He wasn't watching. A small car tooted brashly as it swerved to avoid them. The woman pursued the sound of its course over her shoulder and said something as he righted the steering and flashed his indicators for an upcoming left turn. I saw her lips moving. She was younger than I had imagined. Her eyes caught mine for an instant before he shoved her face forward, holding a threatening finger to her cheek, ranting all the while.
I had been drawn to this drama like a voyeur, but now I was fed up. No, I was angry! All this was closer to cruelty than I cared to go. I felt trapped, unable to assist. I turned my lights to high, as if that would help . . . .
About the time I did, I saw his arm swing across the cab and smash the woman full in the face, knocking her head against the tri-part window between us. (Snap!) Revulsion filled my riveted attention. I found myself light-headed, numb. I pressed my palm hard against the horn button, letting its annoying blare police this brutal assault and in some sense vent my own outrage.
I surprised myself. I wasn't helpless after all. I didn't let up on the horn. I wouldn't. I couldn't . . . .
His brake lights flashed. He wheeled around in an instant, his ruddy face filled with riot. He stared right into me; we were that close. The truck slowed to turn across traffic, sped through the intersection and slid to a stop at the far corner. I pulled over to stand vigil, never letting up on that strident horn. My arm was shaking, I had held it so long. It served as righteous salve to my stubborn anger.
The driver's door burst open with a force sufficient to nearly shut itself on the rebound. He elbowed it open a second time, stumbled out, turned slowly for a second as if to get his bearings, then stepped deliberately in my direction. He was unsteady. His motions were that of a drunk: ungainly and inefficient, almost comical in retrospect although certainly menacing at the time. Wildly slurring threats, he entered the line of traffic, heedless of several vehicles which swerved to miss him. He was burly but not tall, his upper bulk tapering to a spindly waist, which put me in mind of a drumstick with clothes. He moved with difficulty, leaning forward as if into a windstorm, his arms hanging loosely.
I released the horn and engaged the clutch at the same time. He stopped in his tracks and looked with consternation as I drove away. We "connected" in that quick moment, exchanging silent declamations face~-to-face. I can still feel it.
As I can feel the impact of the next sight seen in the corner of my eye: Their truck was moving! The old truck was moving away from the intersection where he stood shaking his fist into my mirror. Who would have believed it? She had summoned courage and taken charge. I cheered aloud and raised a salute for small victories against despair . . . until the greater consequences of her world's reality began to sink in.
I thought about that nameless woman all day long, and prayed for her well into a restless night.
Art White is a freelance writer and a retired pastor in Clementsvale, N.S.
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