enroute west from pocatello my gm is parked on a siding somewhere on the outskirts of nampa from dawn to dusk. just cooking, next to some country road, and a whole block of houses on either side. theres an unmarked black SUV running up and down the dirt road between. up, 5minutes, down, 5 minutes, up.. i hear shouts here and there and boxcars being opened up.
and im laying low low, cause god knows how long before we air. but at one point sit up to take a drink of water and immediately hear a ‘yoooo, heyy’ from some ways off. damn it. i lay back down and stay that way.
i had my last beer early that morning and wasnt feeling so hot now. the shakes coming on little by little and my mind feels like mush. its not long before some latinos come walking back alongside, some low voiced espaniol. they sit down somewhere nearby. theres some woman, in a backyard.. next to me. and she must be a looker for all the dirty talk i overhear.
i lay there for hours, the sun disappears somewhere ahead of us and the mosquitoes pour out in a frenzy. luckily theyre not alaskan size or anything, relatively painless. but so many are they i am quietly wiping my face, the only thing uncovered, every few minutes with as much of them smeared on my hand as there is beads of sweat. so quiet im trying not to move — im not entirely sure how far off the two from earlier have gone to and there is still no telling how much longer we may sit for clearance. no more activity from what i can hear, but what sounds like a colony of ducks, or frogs, emitting a placid ‘fag’ by the hundreds. the moon yellow as they come.
later into the night, after hours of getting swarmed, shifting and reshifting quietly in the dark, the air comes bleeding back finally. and i hear somebody walk up and get into the grainer just behind mine.. shit. im in a cadillac grain, and they picked the V right off.. reaffirming that my presence is known. and as we creak forward towards nampa my mind races, as there is always the spectre of gang initiations but also of plain old theft, looming over certain situations. and one has to always keep all possibilities in consideration, good with the bad.. because it occurs to me then that after nampa there will be nothing but high desert hills, clear till morning, and should the train stop on signals at any point which it will.. ill be wide open to anyone with a weapon and purpose. against which — my glock still in holding at the sheriffs office back in portland — i am myself more or less defenseless. so i start thinking hurriedly over my options, and find very few.
stopped in nampa a few minutes for the crew change, i hold my breath, listening for movement. not a sound.
we air back up and roll forward again. mind racing again, i conclude that the worst case scenario, should it come to that, will likely involve these two pulling the air. because while there will be plenty of time and space ahead for the eventual side-out, they would more than likely prefer to not wait up all night for it. and although they could conceivably climb up and over without a stoppage, itd be too easy to lose anything on me of value in the darkness with a struggle or else with blood all over everything. all seemed like a bit too much effort for that demographic, spent on a random grain passenger.. no they would know enough at least how to pull the air and force the train to a stop. or this was how i figured it, mentally preparing myself for the worst. because things did not look all right.. for some cholo pendejos to climb on directly behind me out of bfn. not a normal thing.
so i come up with a game plan. i figure whatever the case, whatever the reason, there will eventually be a stop and ill want to be ready for anything by that point. without wasting another minute, then, i start parceling up my shit by category. thats shit im keeping on me, shit ill come back to later, and shit im willing to part with and will leave on the porch where i laid. in other words important papers, phone charger, and my canteen.. sleeping bag.. and guitar, which i stash first off into the v-hole behind the rigging of the grainer opposite, noting the cars ID for a future call-in to UP’s tracey. next I run my sleeping bag over to the front of my own car to stash it behind its rigging, and to check and see if the wheelwells on this car have the extra space and little crossbeam over the wheel where ive hidden on other occasions to take a shit deep inside the departure yards.. hanging off the side, crouched on the lowest stirrup craning my head over with a flashlight in my mouth, 60mph through the moonlit prairies, i dont see it and promptly climb back over to the rear. nothing left but to wait and pray to god its not my time yet, i lay back down, check the time and try to relax.
roughly 5 minutes later the train goes into emergency.
the airs been pulled.. SHIT.. SHIT, SHIT, SHIT. in a heartbeat im up the back of their grainer and running over the top to the far end to wait and listen there above them, before there can be any silence by which the movement is audible. 6-10 seconds and the train comes screeching to a halt the very moment i make it to the prone position. silence. gazing up into the night sky, gasping silently i hear somebody across the highway, some random house just beyond the treeline somewhere, say ‘you craaazy asshole’. well.. i better be. i damn well better be, else its worse than that.
minutes roll by and a handful of lone latenight motorists with them down a lonely highway. crickets. could they be asleep? could it only be just one of them? i give it up and roll on my belly to look down over the edge of the grate. nothing.. not a damn thing down there on the porch.
i remember then the fresh asphault drive newly paved along the mains back at the crew change.
theyd gotten off in nampa
brakeman comes wandering back cursing the mosquitoes, looking for a broken hose and I, laying there on my back staring blankly up into the night having just narrowly escaped certain death, cortizol levels simmering back down to baseline, cant tell if im feeling lucky or just plain mad.. nor whether i should ever bring it up to anyone. ever.
you crazy asshole