Road Trip (Otherwise Untitled)
#35 of Short Stories
Road trip, involving a cartoon badger.
~ The cockatiel bobbed his head to the music on the radio even as the static in the signal continued its slow rumble. It wouldn't be long before there wasn't any music left on this particular frequency as he and his passenger rolled down the interstate late into the night.
~ With a playful coo in his voice, he whispered, "Hey, Candice. Think we should stop for gas at that truck stop that has a badger on the sign?" Candice snored loudly. The bird chuckled quietly to himself. Candice hated cartoon badgers, ever since that one week at summer camp, and at two in the morning he couldn't resist the temptation to present her with one tens of feet tall if the depiction in the billboard was to be trusted.
~ Mile marker after mile marker, the tunes gradually faded into the dull hum of static. James resorted to scanning the airwaves again, letting out annoyed clacks from his beak each time the dial landed on more country music. "Back where we started...", whispered to the sleeping wolverine as the radio found itself passing over the frequency of the earlier station. The cockatiel resorted to the AM band, punching over to scan for even a talk station.
~ "At least it won't be a high school ball game, at this hour...", James assured himself. The radio settled on some sort of interview while the bird took note of the mile markers. It wouldn't be long before the truck stop was upon them, and the cockatiel hummed along happily to the bumper music that played amongst the guest's claims of building some sort of time machine out of old transformers, cable he'd found in a dumpster, and some sort of garden hose that was up to any sort of task. "Next exit.", James calmly informed his passenger while constributing a yawn of his own to the company of snores.
~ Pulling into the station and to the pumps, Candice roused from her slumber. As she got her bearings and reckoned their location, she only got as far as, "Huh?... Ohhh... Is that... Ffffu", before James' howling cackle drowned out her profane declarations. It wouldn't be until he was pumping the gas that she would be sufficiently awake to join in the laughter. James bought the drinks, by way of apology.