It is three a.m. and I have been driving thirteen, fourteen, maybe fifteen hours. I have passed through West Virginia and then, Kentucky, which was the last time I stopped to eat. But now in the middle of the night there are no signs for restaurants or gas stations so I decide to get off the main highway and continue along on a backroad into Indiana.
It is a pitch black night on this lonely road so I stop, get out to relieve myself and take a sip of bottled energizer to help me stay alert. I keep driving and now I am in the middle of Indiana. I decide to turn on the car radio where that I figure the music will help me stay awake as long as it is loud and noisy. To my surprise the radio pulls in Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony.
My New York snobbishness tells me that I did not know they played Beethoven in Indiana. I would have figured country music, Hank Williams, Willie Nelson or Dolly Parton. But no, it is Beethoven on this Indiana station.
It is dark country in Indiana at 3 a.m., not like New York which stays alive twenty-four hours, lights make it seem like day time, especially in Times Square. But out here the night is black with no road lights so I have to stay alert. I would not want to hit a deer or a bear or even a coyote.
I slow down for a minute, take another shot from the bottle of energizer liquid, swallowing a long gulp.
The thing about these Indiana hills is that they are blacker than the night. They are just dark hulks. There are houses but they are spaced far apart and no lights are on at this hour. There are no towns, no gas stations no truck stops or diners. It is so dark even the moon sleeps and stars do not twinkle. You would think out here in nowhereland the stars would command the skies. A full moon would light the world.
It is kind of scary being all alone on a dark country road so I pump up the volume and slow down a bit to conserve gas but keep driving as Beethoven’s storm rages then calms and ends. The announcer is about to name the orchestra and conductor, but a rock station from somewhere takes over and a different announcer says, “That was Twisted Sister” as a faint morning light takes me head long through rough farm land.
Zvi A. Sesling, Brookline, MA Poet Laureate (2017-2020), has published numerous poems and flash fiction. He edits 10 By 10 Flash Fiction Stories. His flash fiction books are40 Stories (with Paul Beckman), Secret Behind the Gate and Wheels. Sesling lives in Brookline, MA with his wife
Susan J. Dechter.
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