Roads
By Jim Getz
The Kid was desperate for a job and didn’t know which way to turn. Just a summer job; that’s all he needed. He knew what he wanted to achieve but had no idea how to get there, a destination without a route.
He was driving aimlessly though the flat fields of central Illinois, corn and soybeans, soybeans and corn. The straight, asphalt highway was a ruler laid down amongst them, bisecting nature. There were few other vehicles out and about. When his hand-me-down clunker came to a rest at a stop sign, he bowed his head onto the steering wheel.
Turn right. It wasn’t a voice. It was less than a command but more than a suggestion. A recommendation. A direction. The Kid looked around. There wasn’t even a breeze through the crops on an already oppressively warm, humid day.
He hadn’t driven but half a minute when he saw the sign: County Highway Department, two miles, with an arrow pointing straight ahead.
What the hell, the Kid thought. Why not? He accelerated, just a bit.
The entrance to the county highway garage was still unpaved, just crunchy gravel, and the Kid’s car skidded a bit as he parked outside. The sign in the public door read, “Job Applicants Accepted.”
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The Short-Timer sat at his desk, protesting: “Really, Maria — all this fuss is not necessary. I don’t need a retirement party.”
The assistant to the Short-Timer — the retiring department engineer — remained unmoved, with a smile. “It’s after work, at five, in the garage,” she said. “You’ll be there. Everyone here is sad to see you go — or happy they don’t have to put up with your shit anymore in six more hours.”
The Short-Timer managed a half-smile. “Okay, okay. I know when I’m licked. You can leave the door open.”
Forty-eight years, he thought, and the one that the Old Man had said would show up — like he’d shown up in ’75 at the old highway garage on Stonington Road, long-haired and clueless — hadn’t appeared. I built the roads that led you here, the crazy Old Man had said.
When the Old Man had started in ’32, anything that was paved in asphalt, concrete, macadam or brick was called a “hard road.” There weren’t many hard roads, as times were tough. But by ’75, Stonington Road was one, and so were the two others that had led the Short-Timer from the railroad tracks to the old garage.
But the Short-Timer knew the roads were just the access routes. It had been that eerie feeling — turn left — that had led him. He could have gone another way. But he didn’t. Then, after a summer or a year, he could’ve lit out in any number of directions, any type of engineering or construction. But he hadn’t.
Maria popped her head back in his office door. “Got one for ya,” she said.
The Kid walked in, hesitant at first, then more confident. “What kind of jobs ya got for me?”
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“Have a seat,” the Short-Timer said. Had he been this way to the Old Man?
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The Short-Timer asked the routine job interview questions, got the routine job interview answers.
“Yeah, I’ve got plans,” The Kid said. “Wanna be a city planner. Or highway designer, incorporating the new environmental designs, like wildlife crossings, on interstates. Would like to make some real money. Just need something like this for the summer, until I can.”
I get it, Kid, I really do, the Short-Timer mused.
“Well, I’ve made a pretty good life with the crew here,” he ventured. “In fact, I — well, I and others — built the roads that led you here today. Or … maybe something else led you here today … like, maybe … a nudge?”
Their eyes met. Silence shrouded the office, except for the ancient air conditioner and unseen sounds of party preparations filtering through the garage wall. Time felt compressed, as though it were squeezing through the keyhole in the door.
“Just for the summer,” The Kid said, hushed.
“The summer,” the Short-Timer replied.
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The Powers That Be said six months earlier to stop building roads, even the magnetic levitation kind that Roland had become expert in. The Jetsons’ flying cars were becoming a reality in ’65. Rolando — they still called him The Kid — wasn’t needed anymore. None of them were.
As the County Highway Department party prepared to close the garage for good, The Kid looked back on that day in ’23 with sentiment that surprised even him. He was glad he had taken the direction he had.
A gentle rap came at the office door, breaking him out of his nostalgia.
“Mr. Lorendo?” He looked up to see an eager young woman’s head sticking inside. “I’m Julie Wang. We spoke over the Holo. I’m with Roads to Trails?”
He motioned in her inside, realizing he and the county had built many of these future trails.
“Have a seat,” he said. He already knew what question he was going to ask.
— NOVEMBER 2023
