Drinking & Driving Leads to Jail

Drinking

9 p.m. – George and Carlos started drinking after work, seated underneath a pecan tree behind the tire warehouse. The night supervisor let down the metal doors, attached the padlocks, and keyed in the code. Manuel backed his truck up there, unloaded two cases of Budweiser, and the drinking began, sitting at the picnic tables, reliving the business of the day and the plans for the weekend.

From the start, George had a bleak stare, guzzling more than the other two. In less than twenty minutes, he finished the last of Manuel’s brew, tossing the empty bottles in the back of his truck.

“Fourteen pounds gets you twenty-five big ones,” he says.

Manuel and Carlos look at each other; George makes no sense.

He twists off another cap and tosses it towards the empty box. “Run the border,” George offers, taking dibs on the first one of the men, who has the guts to steal a piece of the night.

Drinking and Driving

11 p.m. – Eyes widen with a firm grip on the steering wheel, George floors the gas pedal headed towards the coast he says, with Carlos’ head bobbing to the Conjunto music, wailing through the speakers of an old rusted Ford pickup. The pickup rips through the night, along dusty roads, headed through densely lit country towns where the going rate for entertainment is the Lotto signs blinking in the gas station windows.

George promises Carlos a ride home, but he’s become distracted by the brown bottles clanging in the back of the truck, and a chance to blow off some steam.

Carlos knows George is concocting a scheme to do something terrible.

By midnight – a stream of red lights flies up behind George’s truck. Simultaneously, their hearts stop as the cruisers whisk passed; Carlos’ heart swells towards the state troopers, then returns to normalcy once he feels safe.

For miles, they ride in silence; George throws back another bottle, hidden in the glove compartment, then two like water. His plaid blue shirt is soaked with perspiration and the oil stains of a day’s work.

“That was close,” laughs George, leaning outside the window. The air bathes his face. He can almost hear the night bugs whistling an uncertain melody.

“Do you hear that?”

“What?”

“The music man,” he says in a thick Spanish accent. “The night is welcoming us, baile, baile,” he screams, taking his worn hands off the steering wheel. He claps, rapidly; snapping his fingers, dancing in his seat, holding onto a note stuck in his head.

Carlos grabs for the steering wheel as the truck rocks, veers from one lane to the other. “Man, what’s your problem! Are you trying to kill me?”

“I want you to live man, live like our people, be free.” He slouches forward, taking the steering over, resting his chin there. He squints to see the road ahead. “Do ever feel alone man, really alone?”

Carlos stares at himself in the side mirror, murmuring ‘brothers for life.” The oath they took in the barrio as children. He knows he can’t let George out of his sight, when he’s like this. He drinks more when he misses home – the open range, a house built by his hands, and crops as far as eyes can see.

“Do you?” George asks again.

“Like now,” Carlos answers, abruptly, frustrated with his brother’s choices to return to a past life and time.

“Take me home, man! I got a life! Mouths to feed, rent to pay, an old lady that loves me, I can’t afford to go to jail!”

“Are you going? Am I? Don’t sweat it, here.” He hands the bottle to Carlos, who knocks it out of his hand.

Beer sloshes on the vinyl seats onto the floor. George slams on the brakes. “Pendejo”

“Oh, I’m a pendejo?” Carlos lunges at him, struggling to get a hold of the keys.

But George is stronger, rapid punches to his side with an empty beer bottle, threatens Carlos to keep his mouth shut and not say a thing. “Damn you man,” shouts George, tossing the beer bottle out of the truck.

“Damn me, damn you…you fucker!” Carlos shoves George away. No longer will he fight his brother’s battle. This one is his, and George knows it.

Upset, George fumbles with the dials on the dashboard, and turns the truck’s headlights off. Reeving the engine, he blindly guns the overheated truck into the onyx night.

In the distance, a surge of troopers with sirens blazing, barrels down the road towards him.

Griping the dashboard, Carlos closes his eyes, and prays for a miracle.

The pickup stops a few feet from the gate.

Carlos opens the door, jumps out, rolling in the road. He dusts off his pants, and torn shirt. Gravel burns singe his back and lower thigh. He hobbles across the street to safety.

Angry, George makes donuts in the middle of the road. His back tires spin, a cake of burning rubber scents the air, drawing the attention of four troopers pacing in front of the gate with their guns drawn.

Carlos reaches for the visitor’s door, weighing his options: inside safety, one count of drunkenness; outside, death.

A hail of bullets lights the night to silence George’s truck.

Carlos forgives his brother. Tucks in his shirt, wipes the sweat from his brow, and steps inside.