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by Joan Upton Hall
When I pedaled my rusty bike to a stop in front of Hal’s Store, everything looked — almost normal. But who was I to say what was normal, a former CPA from Houston trying to gain entrance into the bubba-hood at Hal’s. I dismounted, scratching my beard and loosening my gimme cap while I took in the situation.
Zeb Brown’s pickup with its wrinkled fender blocked the circular driveway so everyone else would have to back out. Doc McCauly’s showroom-condition black Edsel sat in its flat-beaten tracks in the Bermuda grass alongside. The smell of burnt coffee wafted through the screen door.
Today was different though. Two shiny touring bicycles were pulled up beside the doorway, a blue Cannondale and a navy blue Bianchi. Both carried Cat-eye computers on the handlebars. Whoever was inside didn’t mind paying for the best.
My bike looked like a mule tethered with thoroughbreds, but I’d played that scene before when I lived in Houston and spent an hour every evening on my ten-speed, trying to melt away fat accumulated sitting at a desk. Afterward, I’d crank out an obligatory five pages a day that qualified me as a “writer.” Then a year ago, I’d decided to take the advice, “Go West, young man,” a few generations past what Horace Greeley had in mind, and a whole lot closer. I accepted my grandmother’s legacy, a three-room cabin and farm just outside Tinkerville, Texas, so I could write full time.
I heard strangers’ voices inside the store before I creaked the screen door open and entered.
Zeb, Doc, and Hal sat in their usual places at a worn, Formica table. The players exchanged winks over their coffee mugs as their dominoes clacked together. Doc, his fingers laced over his paunch, didn’t greet me with his usual, “Howdy, Upton, been working hard?” to the sniggers of the other good ol’ boys. They never could buy my claim that writing was work. I’ll admit their jibes irked me, but I could swallow my pride for a chance to pick up story ideas, and I liked the guys despite their ridicule.
Today’s grins came from a different source than me. A young man and woman, their backs to us, peered into the condensation-fogged glass of Hal’s refrigerator. Hal watched over his wire-rimmed spectacles and Zeb craned his turkey-wattle neck to eye the couple from head to toe.
They wore thigh-length, black Lycra spandex bicycle shorts, turtle-shaped Giro helmets, and fluorescent shirts, hers hot pink and his lime green. With fingerless, mesh gloves, they held mirrored sunglasses. No dilettante riders, both were tanned and muscular.
“What’ll it be, honey?” the young man asked.
“Perrier if they have any.”
Hal lined up his dominoes, saying, “I’ve got beer, Pepsi, Coke, and Orange Crush, cold. Coffee’s hot.” He bobbed his head toward the counter where a coffee maker sat. Through the murky glass pot, I could see maybe two cups of coffee remaining, anthracite black and almost that solid.
The girl shuddered. “Could I have water?”
“Water’s in the hose outside.” Hal bobbed his head toward the door.
“How about Orange Crush, honey? Only fifteen more miles to go,” the young man said.
“Hey, wait.” Hal got up and hustled toward them. At least it was hustling for Hal. “I think I do have three or four of those kinda drinks you people like.” He reached behind the Cokes and retrieved two Gatorades. He held them out like trophies, baring his broken teeth in a triumphant grin.
Restraining a laugh, the youngster thanked Hal and took the two bottles. The girl aimed her face toward the snack rack although I knew no true bike rider would find anything acceptable there among the Ding Dongs and Laffy Taffy.
“We don’t get many strangers here,” I said.
“Just taking back roads for the scenery.” The girl smiled at me, giving my heart an extra thump or two.
“Where you headed?” Zeb studied his domino hand.
“My parents have a place between Hutto and Georgetown,” the young man said. “We’re students at Texas A&M. Rode down for the weekend.”
The dominoes silenced.
“Why, that must be a hunnert miles!” Zeb said.
I probably looked as shocked as the others. In fact, the kids probably thought I was one of them in my faded jeans and Willy Nelson teeshirt. They couldn’t know I was only a quaint impostor, amusement fodder for the natives. Just like they were.
“We’re meeting my sister and her husband at my parents’ house. They’re down from Dallas,” the young man said. “We can’t come very often.”
“I don’t reckon so.” Zeb’s eyes bulged like a snake-swallowed frog.
“Uh, it’s not that—”
“That’s okay, son.” Hal almost ran to the counter where the youngster set down the two Gatorades to rummage through his fanny pack.
“Want anything else, honey?” he asked his girlfriend.
“I guess not. We’ll eat there.”
“How much for the drinks?” the young man asked.
“On the house.” Hal lifted a plastic dome from a tray. “And have a doughnut too.”
They both declined, but with napkins Hal picked up a doughnut in each hand and pushed it into their hands. Keeping his gaze down, he sniffed, and I thought I saw a drop of moisture catching the light at the corner of his eye.
The couple nibbled the greasy treats between gulps of green liquid. Then they refastened their chin straps, donned their glasses and duck-walked out in their cleated shoes which tapped on the board floor.
“Thanks for the snack. Really nice of you,” the young man called to Hal.
“Yeah, thanks.” The girl placed the uneaten portion of her napkin-wrapped doughnut into the pouch at her back and zipped it shut. “I’ll save mine for later.”
They rolled their bikes out and mounted. Engaging their toes into the clipless pedals, they sped out of sight.
I rode over to Hal’s Store nearly every morning about ten or eleven o’clock to pick up a paper and jaw with the domino players. That three-mile stretch from my cabin was enough for me. The topic of the bicyclers came up more than once.
“Wasn’t that something, those poor kids riding over a hunnert miles to see the boy’s mama and daddy.”
“Meeting his married sister from Dallas too, wasn’t it?”
“Yep, there’s gotta be some good in kids that’ll put theirselves out thataway, even if they are kinda peculiar.”
I thought about telling them that selling those bikes could have paid a big chunk on a car, but I didn’t. I too felt touched by their efforts, despite their odd financial priorities.
“Peculiar’s right,” Hal said. “Did you ever see britches like that? Didn’t even have a fly.”
“I seen ‘em all right, like women’s girdles except black,” Zeb said. “Looked good on the girl though.”
They guffawed.
“But on that boy...” Doc snorted. “Shoot! I’d have to be dead before you’d catch me in those girdle britches.”
During the moment of ensuing silence, I pictured trying to push a water balloon through a straw. Then all of us but Doc laughed till we could hardly breathe.
A few days later, just when I got to Hal’s, another young man on a shiny, twelve-speed Trek bicycle was pulling away. Gatorade in hand, he was headed the opposite direction from the way the couple had left us. The domino players stood outside waving to him. The only other time I’d ever seen them interrupt their game to go outside was the day Zeb’s grandson brought a trailer to show off his grand champion boar.
“Thanks again!” the guy called over his shoulder. Like the A&M kids, his quadriceps and calves were well-defined from considerable riding.
When I parked my bike, I could tell the old boys were agitated.
“You ain’t gonna believe this, Upton,” Zeb said, “but that kid said he was from Dallas.”
“Dallas? That’s two-hundred miles from here,” I said.
“And you ain’t heard the half of it,” Doc said. “He told us he’s going to visit his Texas Aggie brother-in-law.”
“Wait a minute, didn’t that college boy say...”
“That’s right. Had a married sister in Dallas.”
“But this would be out of his way,” I said.
“That’s just it. This one said he’d been over at his parents-in-law’s house between Hutto and Georgetown.”
Only the cicada’s whine broke the silence for a moment. Then Zeb added, “Did y’all notice the poor kid’s raggedy, cut-off jeans?”
The next day was what folks around here call the Lord’s Day, but I knew Hal would open his store the same as always, so I rode over. We started reminiscing about the bicyclers.
The screen door screeched open and bumped shut. There stood a man in bicycle gear. Through the screen door I could see a bike. Rainbow stripes and the white letters, “Peugeot,” stood out against its metallic green.
“Got anything cold to drink?” He pulled off his wrap-around sunglasses and his helmet with air holes across the top. His tousled hair was gray. Like most of the hard-working farmers around here, he looked brown and fit, but none of the farmers I knew rode bikes like that or wore “girdle britches.”
Stunned, Hal got up from the table, fetched his last bottle of Gatorade, and handed it to the guy. “On the house,” he said. This time he made no attempt to conceal the moisture pooling in his eyes.
“That’s nice of you, but you don’t have to.” The gray-haired guy pulled a wallet from a pocket in the back of his shirt, or was it the front and he had it on backward?
Hal’s face looked haunted, and he waved aside the offered dollar. “Where you from?”
“I’ve got a place between Hutto and Georgetown. I’m going to see my son at Texas A&M.”
Zeb bumped the table. Dominoes clattered to the floor. He asked, “Your boy and his girlfriend ever ride bicycles down here?”
“Matter of fact, they did a couple of weeks ago.” The gray-haired man downed his Gatorade, oblivious to the drop-jawed stares he caused.
“Guess I better be on my way. Appreciate the drink.” He shook Hal’s limp hand, mounted his Peugeot, and raced away.
We were too moved to talk about it. I rode home.
Just before I rounded a curve to get to my turn-in lane, I heard laughter. I pulled aside and moved closer, concealed behind cedars. Two vehicles were pulled over in the wide space, blocking my driveway.
The gray-haired guy was securing his bike to a rack on his Volvo. The blond youngster we had seen the day before helped him. The other vehicle was a snappy looking Dodge pickup. In its bike rack, stood a blue Cannondale and a navy blue Bianchi. Two people got out of the pickup.
Those A&M kids!
“I just wish I could have Camcorded it.” The blond guy laughed.
“Y’all are so mean,” the girl said, but she laughed too.
“We didn’t lie to them,” the first young man said. “Can we help it if they filled in what they wanted to?”
I never told the old boys at Hal’s what I saw. I’ve come to realize I never will be able to claim bubba-hood in the great resumé of life. I’ll never do more than straddle the fence, but I don’t mind anymore. Those bicyclers will give the boys something to talk about for years. Their way.
They’ll never be the wiser unless they read this story, and I don’t have much to worry about on that score.