The Trouble Way (32 page)

“
I think it is my turn now.” And, he certainly did not object when she began to unbutton his shirt and when she pulled the tails from his jeans and snuggled close to him and let their exposed skin radiate heat against one another. “That feels wonderful, Honey.”

He leaned toward the arm of the couch and pulled her to where her chest was resting on his. His hands felt for the hooks of her bra and he unhooked one and felt the skin of her back. He loved the feel of her quickening breathing against him and he found the next hook and popped it open. He felt her entire naked back with both hands. He let his hands slip beneath her waistband and felt the skin of the small of her back and around the sides to her hips. Slowly, he raised his hands and felt for the shoulder straps and slid them over the round of her shoulders. He pushed her away from himself and let the bra drop loose from her breasts. She untangled one arm and then the other from the strap and let it drop to the floor. She lowered her chest to his and he shuddered when, at that moment, he realized it was the warmth of the body of the woman he loved pressed so tenderly against him.

“I love you Annmarie,” he said so quietly he wasn’t sure if he had even said it out loud.

“
I love you, too, Jake,” she whispered in her incredibly, sweet, soft, and oh, so, so, so, lovely voice.

Jake was not exactly sure how it happened, but he was lying on the couch and she was on top of him with her mouth over his, breathing with him. Her chest pressed against his and her pelvis pushed against him. She began to rock on him, keeping time with the slow rhythm of the music that Willie was singing. Jake could have spent the entire evening doing exactly as they were doing, her shoes removed or not. He would have been satisfied if she got up and left at that moment. It was enough.

But she did not get up and leave. And, she did not get dressed. She stayed, not all night, but long enough to show him how flat her bare stomach was and how strong her soccer-thighs were and that she had the control to be able to trigger her explosion at the precise moment of his.

The stars in the universe could not see fit to grant her solely to him, but they did see fit to grant him the amazing gift of her company, her talents, and, probably most of all, her extraordinarily soft, sexy voice ... sometimes.

It wasn’t that bullshit about wanting something he couldn’t have that he fell in love with Annmarie. Hell, he sure would have preferred the having. Being able to have her or not, he fell in love with her, it’s not that he had a choice. The first couple of times he saw her or heard her voice, he couldn’t control his increasing emotional attachment to her. Sometimes, after they had gone out a few times, in the passion of the moment, he would say, “I love you,” and she would say “I love you, Jake” back and he knew she truly meant it.

She hadn
’t changed her mind about wanting to see him and she hadn’t changed her mind about leaving her husband. It was like they had discussed during that first deli date when she laid out her position. She hadn’t wavered; she was in love with him but she was never going to get a divorce. In a way, he admired her stance. Who would want someone who was cheating and then marrying you? That would be out-and-out wrong. He sure as hell didn’t want that happening to him down the road. He believed her infatuation quickly transformed to love for him too, but that had zero impact on her resolve.

Surprisingly, given her circumstances, they spent an unbelievable amount of time together. Initially, her husband
’s education was the reason that took him into the wilderness for weeks at a time and, later, when he earned his degree, he landed a job that required him to do the same.

The moral dilemma they shared was never discussed. They just put it out of their minds when they were together. Annmarie didn
’t discuss the subject with him and whether she dwelled on it when she was alone was anybody’s guess; he guessed not.

He tried not to spend time thinking of it, except on occasion, usually if he had drunk a beer or four, or smoked some pot. The hardest times were when he was high, listening to Willie Nelson singing his damned sad songs of missing a faded love that his wanting to be the only one in her life became nearly overwhelming. But, having her was not foretold by any star, so he struggled not to obsess over it and love her in the moments he had with her. What else was there to do?

It was like when he got Janis pregnant and ran off to Weiser, Idaho and married her right after high school. He didn’t have a choice there either.

Janis, what a lunatic.
Jake-O – That’s what she liked to call you except when she was pissed, then it was Bastard – didn’t learn shit from that little episode, did ya?

One might argue he hadn
’t learned a goddamned thing from any of life’s experiences of the past ten years. Falling in love with Annmarie was, to his way of thinking, his only option.

There were many occasions when Annmarie was not available and Jake would haunt one of the cowboy bars in Missoula and meet other girls. Sometimes the girls were his co-workers, subordinates, the
“Do Not Fraternize,” girls. Jake didn’t give a darn about that particular rule either. Who the hell was Big Dick to tell him who he could associate with? Those girls felt the same.

Annmarie knew she was in no position to object but that did not seem to keep her from doing so. One time Annmarie commented,
“So, now I have competition, huh?” when Jake said he had dated one of the girls at the store. It made him feel like he had cheated on her. Annmarie, it appeared to Jake, seemed to have an altered view on matters of the heart. She could have opposing views on a subject and see no contradiction in holding both views. Often, Jake wondered how long he would be able to bear living in this situation, loving a girl who loved him but not exclusively.

Shit, if you want to know the truth, life is a goddamned sonofabitch
.

He didn
’t have a clue why he thought so but he believed Annmarie was much more intelligent than he – she held opposing views as equally true– but he accepted the position that she was right in what she was doing.

In the past, when he was in an untenable relationship, his employer, usually, inadvertently solved the problem by transferring him to a new, distant location. It happened in Seattle soon after he got Ann pregnant, he was transferred to Everett. In Everett, Debbie became pregnant and he was moved to Spokane, and again in Spokane when Deena ended up pregnant, Big Dick moved his non-committal ass to Missoula. Every one of those girls got an abortion without any input from him. He wasn
’t sure if he was happy they didn’t include him or if he was upset by the fact they didn’t consider him important enough to be involved in the decision.

Maybe it was the times he lived in. That there was a transfer soon following each event was merely coincidental. There was no communication with his employer about the pregnant girls, all employees of Big Richards. He hadn
’t talked to any one of those girls after he left. He didn’t try to contact them and they apparently didn’t want him in their lives either because they did not call him. Counting his ex-wife’s three or four – for the life of him, he couldn’t remember – miscarriages, he could have been the father of several kids, yet he had none.

Normally he stayed at one location for two years, sometimes two and a half years,
twice, it was eleven months, so he believed he had plenty of time to assess the situation and make up his mind as to what to do before his employer stepped in again and took the matter out of his hands.

Early
1980’s

He had had his fill of retail and when it happened and he was glad. The boss called and asked him to be at the store at seven am. He was out of there in less than a half hour, fired.

Within a week, he had relocated back to the northwest and was enrolled in a state sponsored truck driving school, and in six weeks was driving a semi for a small independent outfit out of Portland.

Jake was dispatched to pick up a load of empty beer kegs from the plant in the industrial section near the waterfront in Portland. His directions to the plant were sorely lacking and it took Jake nearly an hour and a stop at a tavern to ask one of the local barflies for direction to where the entrance to the plant was located.

The dispatcher also advised him that once he got into southern Wyoming, to take the cut-off at Laramie and head the back way into Denver. He’d bypass the weigh stations and avoid the payment for permits. Once he had unloaded the empty beer kegs at the Budweiser plant in Ft. Collins he was to call the dispatcher and get further instruction on what his next pickup would be. The directions on the cut-off turned out to be pretty dumb advice; he missed his delivery window by over an hour and the receiving manager put him at the end of the docket for unloading. He’d spent the entire day and most of the evening in the sleeper waiting to get called to unload. He’d arrived at ten a.m. and it was near ten p.m. when the last of the empty kegs was off-loaded and he was finally out of there.

Jake called the dispatcher and was given the assignment to pick up a load of potatoes from southern Colorado. He was instructed to head south ASAP and be ready to load first thing in the morning. He
’d been sleeping for most of the day, so he headed out and drove much of the night to the farm several hundred miles due south of Denver.

“
Anybody in there?” the foreman said as he knocked gently on the cab door.

“
Yeah, I’m here. Give me a minute,” Jake said, looked at his watch. He’d been asleep for about an hour. He rolled out of the bed in the sleeper behind the driver’s seat and got back in the saddle.

“
Sorry to wake you so early, but the shift starts at seven. Follow me,” the foreman said and got into his pickup and drove about five miles to the sheds where the potatoes were stored in large canvas sacks stacked on pallets.

Jake backed the semi up to the storage shed and opened the doors on the trailer.

“This isn’t a refer trailer,” the foreman said. “These potatoes have to be shipped in a refrigerated trailer.”

“
I don’t know anything about that. My dispatcher just told me to get here quick and get a load of potatoes,” Jake said.

“
Ok, you’re the boss,” the foreman said and directed a forklift driver to start loading the pallets into the trailer.

“
I wouldn’t do that if I were you, boss,” the foreman said pointing to the camera that Jake had focused on the potato loading operation.

“
Why’s that?” Jake said.

“
Most of these boys are from Mexico and probably wouldn’t want their picture taken,” the foreman said. “Nothing personal.”

“
Right,” Jake said and pocketed his camera and watched as the “illegals” loaded the fifty-three foot trailer and was about to close the doors and saw the foreman waving to him from the small office by the sheds.

“
I got some bad news for you, boss. We got to unload the potatoes.”

“
What’s up? You just got them loaded.”

“
The buyer won’t accept the potatoes unless they’re in a refer trailer. We talked to your dispatcher. He’ll call you.”

Another day wasted on sitting around. When he
’d applied for the job, he didn’t realize that a truck driver is only paid for the time he is actually on the road, driving. Loading and unloading and waiting for a load is not driving, your wheels are not turning, all non-paid time.

Just can
’t seem to get away from The Man
.

Even sleeping in the cab is not paid time even though you are captive and can
’t leave the truck unattended. He’d spent nearly twelve hours in Ft. Collins waiting to have the beer kegs unloaded. He’d spent hours waiting to get the potatoes loaded, and now he’d have to wait again for them to be off loaded and wait yet again for another assignment. When the call finally came from the dispatcher, he’d been sitting, watching potatoes grow in Southern Colorado for nearly six hours in an empty truck. At least the scenery was nice; beyond the miles of green potato fields were immense Colorado mountains.

“
Head back to Denver to the Pepsi plant and pick up a load to take to the distribution facility in Spokane,” the dispatcher said and gave him directions and the address.

Jake retraced his route south to Alamosa and drove the seventy miles east and connected with US-25, the north-south freeway through the middle of Colorado, and headed north for the two and a half hour drive back to Denver. When he arrived, the plant was closed and he pulled his rig into the parking lot of a tavern nearby where he shut it down.

The section of town was pretty seedy, so, besides locking the doors, he tied rubber ropes between the doors to delay anyone who might try to break in. The rubber ropes were used to tie down the tarps over some loads and they were all he had to secure the doors. Any intruder trying to open the door would be surprised by the spring action of the rope as the door would come slamming closed. As an added security measure, he made sure his 22-cal. revolver was within reach and then hopped into the sleeping compartment and slept till morning.

“
Hello, Annmarie?” Jake said. “Can you talk?”

“
Jake, where are you?” She asked.

“
I’m in Denver but I’ll be coming through Missoula sometime tomorrow on my way to Spokane with a load of Pepsi. Is there any chance I could see you?”

“
Of course I can see you. You-know-who is out in the wild, counting crows or bears or something. He’ll be gone for two months. Call me when you know exactly when you’ll be in town,” she said. “I’m so excited. I haven’t seen you in such a horribly long time.”

He had been transferred out of Montana a year after arriving but he kept in constant contact with Annmarie. He often drove the mountain pass from the Big Richards in Idaho to see her. He took his tent once and camped at the local campground so he could be near her for the weekend and damn near froze to death. It got down into the teens and he stuffed his pillows and extra jacket into the sleeping bag to keep warm.

“I sure could have used your warm butt to keep from freezing,” he told her the next day when they had breakfast. She hadn’t been able to spend the night because of her special circumstances; she was expecting a call and had to be home.

“
I’m so sorry honey, I wish I could have kept you warm all night instead of for just a few hours. But that was sure nice, wasn’t it?”

“
Yeah, that was sure nice. My favorite way to camp.”

On many occasions she traveled the same hundred plus miles over Lolo pass to visit him in the small town that stood on the banks of the confluence of the Clearwater and Snake Rivers Western Idaho.

Jake and Annmarie had spent the sweltering day along the Snake River at a city park on the Washington side of the river. After a picnic, they decided to take a swim. They weren’t paying close attention, standing chest deep in the river, groping each other beneath the surface, when a water skier had to do some fancy maneuvering; he could have seriously injured one or both of them.

“
Maybe we should find a safer place to play with each other,” Jake had said at the time. “That would have been hard to explain if one of us ended up in the hospital, especially if they pulled me from the drink with my trunks around my knees.”

In the afternoon, they rode their bikes single file on the narrow gravel path beside the Snake River until Annmarie stopped and hollered for Jake to stop.

He turned and pedaled back to where she was examining the tire looking for what caused the flat.

“
It’s one of those darn thorns,” she said wiggling the sharp three-pronged thorn from the punctured the tire. “Now what should we do?”

“
Well, we could walk the bikes back. It’s about ten miles. That would take several hours and it would be dark by the time we got back, or, I could ride back and get my car and come back and pick you and the bike up. That would be a lot quicker if you are alright staying here alone.”

“
I think it is pretty safe. There are lots of bike riders along the trail. I’m sure I’ll be alright,” she said. “Hurry back.” She kissed him and he got on his ten-speed and sprinted the ten miles or so to his apartment and put his bike inside. She was sitting alongside the river when he returned.

“
That didn’t take long,” she said when he pulled up beside her. “Several people stopped and asked if I needed help.”

“
I really tried to hurry,” he said, pulled her to her feet and loaded the bike onto the bike rack, got in and drove back to the apartment.

“
Let’s make a picnic snack. I have something to show you,” Jake said.

Annmarie sliced some ham, cut squares of cheese, and he got a package of crackers and a bottle of Merlot from the cupboard put them into a small Styrofoam cooler. He grabbed his full-size sleeping bag from the bedroom closet and they loaded up the VW for the drive. He headed north out of town turning onto the winding hillside road. When he was halfway up the five-mile grade, he pulled off on the shoulder and stopped.

“Grab the cooler and I’ll get the sleeping bag. This way.” He took Annmarie’s hand and they walked hand-in-hand about a hundred yards down the rocky hillside and into a field where he tossed open the sleeping bag. They set out the cheese, crackers, ham, and settled onto the sleeping bag to watch the evening come. They snacked on the treats as they watched the sunset and the lights of the town as they began to glow in the distance. The tall grass on their hillside retreat above the town swayed in the soft breeze blowing off the river below.

They could see the headlights of cars as they occasionally passed in the distance above them on the winding road.

“This is beautiful. How did you discover it? It is nice and secluded,” she said and gave his thigh a squeeze.”

“
I guess it is sort of a thing with me. I have always liked to drive around and explore where I am in the world. Sometimes I come across something I’d like to share and keep it in mind. I’ve done it since I got a license when was in high school. It’s what got me into trouble, actually. It’s how I ended up on a logging road in my Chevy by the dam with Janis. But I’m sure you don’t want to hear about her.”

“
Well, Jake, this is certainly romantic,” she said and watched as he opened the Merlot. “Thank you for bringing me here.” She took the wine glasses from the cooler.

“
Hold them out for me, sweetie?” He filled the wine glasses and replaced the cork and set the bottle back in the cooler.

“
Here’s to us, Honey,” she said and sipped their wine.

“
Come closer,” Jake said and she scooted closer and they watched the steam and smoke rise from the stacks of the lumber mills along the river.

They sat silently as the stars began to appear in the clear sky. When the full moon appeared over the top of the mountain, he slipped his arm around her shoulder and she turned toward him and raised her lips to meet his.

“I will always think of you when I see the full moon,” he said.

“
I love you, Jake.”

“
I love you too.”

He nudged her and she lay back and he began to unbuttoned her top. She pulled his head down and she kissed him again.

Except for the sound of the cars passing occasionally on the winding road above, the night was still. He could see Annmarie’s white skin in the moonlight and he removed her bra and kissed her breasts. They were both soon naked on the open sleeping bag. The night was warm and they lay looking up at the moon and stars. She rolled him to his back and got astride.

“
This is so beautiful,” she said and sank with a gasp. “That feels so wonderful. Oh, honey, I love you. I want this night to last forever.”

She rocked in the moonlight and they listened to the sound of the whistles of the lumber mill on the far side of the Clearwater River and the semi-trucks shifting down as they ground their way up the long hill in the distance. When they reached the apex of the hill, their engines gave a gasp and shifted to a higher gear.

Annmarie reached her peak and he listened as she caught her breath, and shifted herself into an easier, more relaxed gear.