The hitch

A Story by Shaun Fisher

Just a raw unedited story about hitching from San Francisco to LA

I woke up naked and hung over in my friend’s basement flat deep in San Francisco’s suburban underbelly with a vague idea of the days significance. I could barely see, my brain was muddied and my mouth pungent. My first instinct was to shower, so I stumbled awkwardly to the bathroom to have some time to think. As I walked through the hallway a friend’s wolf puppy named ‘Arrefem’ jumped up on me in crazed excitement, I immediately shrugged her off, the morning sun reflecting off her snow-white fur was too much for my dreary haze. As I stared upon the porous showerhead attempting to count the 100’s of weeping holes that cried all over my naked body I thought disconnectedly about the days plan. I worked from back to front, figuring it would be easier to begin with the tasks that were furthest away from my sickened reality. I started at my flight it being the only concrete event in the next 2 days, which left at 11pm the following day from LAX. Between now and then I hoped to hitchhike the mere 7 hours from San Francisco, spend a night in Santa Monica and to have a day in LA to find the lost angels in the city of night, seemed easy enough. Upon exiting the shower I was met with a horrible omen of s**t, piss, smells, mess and a dog that stared up at me obliviously, tongue out, tail wagging. I now realized what she was trying to communicate to me before my shower. On my hands and knees I gagged and cursed as I smeared the mess around with an empty pizza box. Zelda crashed through the door just as I finished the clean-up full of energy and high hopes. This was going to be her introductory hitching trip and she was f*****g pumped. I hastily packed my bag and slopped together some PBJ sandwiches whilst she fixed her hangover in the mirror and us and the dog headed out to the street to catch the BART train to our starting point. The adventure was about to begin.

We arrived at the side of the road in stylish wonderment deep in the clouds which laid in obeisance to the ubiquitous mechanical shadow of man in a black and white land where four leaf clovers waited patiently in secretive obsolescence observing our credulous optimism with naught but a foreboding snigger. 3 wolfs in the busy jungle stood in a stampede of wind and metal sharing through the glaring elemental entity not communication through words but smiles. Life became timeless, a spasm of reality, the sun rose and fell, things evolved into the simple. The winds of the freeway freed us from frivolous fences into the fecundate freedom of future fruition. How beautiful it was... Alas the end must come, as does the rain when the sun is the brightest and ripples when reflections become clear. The clouds brooded overhead and upon reaching a decision crashed down in red and blue lightening, shredding and burning any hope in sight. The laws faceless imp ignored our existence and amiable questions as he repeatedly slammed the unwavering rule book in our faces... where has the mystery gone? How the true nature of man has long been frozen over.

Thus the timeline shrank back down to 0 and infinity stretched along the road to meet the horizon and shake his hand whilst leaving us lonely and estranged. All too soon we met a strange creature driving a minivan, she spoke in tongues and had her heart set on the Chinese grocery store in which she moved halfway across town to be closer to... Excited by the prospect of nailing the virgin ride and wriggling in her comfortable hymen we boarded the ship and humoured the beast. 5 minutes and a whole tub of creamy confusion later we arrived outside the golden stick-bird and resumed the thumb dance. Here our prayers were answered in no time under a watch face by a peculiar believer who had a fetish for furry fidos which kept us on our toes through the next 30 minutes of disconnected chatting and odd and awkward age games with it all somehow ending in 2 treasury paper gifts and a card for pies and tarts.

Like 3 furtive molluscs we buried underneath a shell and made camp. Here we stayed, taking turns to expose ourselves to the naked world to beg visitors for any kilometre they could share. Alas, either directions were too different or vehicles too full, or attitudes too warped and convoluted, our optimism soon became baron and maudlin. We continued to wait and hope until the sun began to hide its petals from the world and the shadows fell like honey from a table.

From here we drank with a Fijian Mexican with a slack jaw and a greasy fist. Beers and stories were shared like vomit from a fly and crazy crackers full of ripples and colour were greedily consumed for motivation. When hope became short and short became long we were lifted from our hands and knees by a war advocating redneck hippy in a wispy ponytail and a leather jacket which barely concealed his enormous heart. 10 miles more were reached. And light became grey. Here we stood in the middle of a long road that reached from horizon to horizon so straight and stoic I nearly cried as I marvelled. Soon we were recovered by a truck and a man who repeated esoteric TV anecdotes with so much enthusiasm that it nearly became less weird than funny, always saying 'just one more thing'.

Another 30 minutes gave us a total of 2 hours of rides in 9 hours of journey. Here we tried but darkness soon enveloped us and we lost hope and began scoping a ditch. A slight wave of anxiety flooded over me as I realized that my airport deadline was chasing us with haste. Times, dates, numbers and calculations swamped me and just as I was reaching the nadir of my introspection Zelda suggested our grease tanks be animalized and filled in and out. This served as the perfect distraction. Satisfied and back on the side of the road we swapped Christmas stories and with our butts on the ground and thumbs in the air we realized that sleep was on our heels. So here we crashed under two beautiful trees on a colourful Mexican blanket which was spread over a dry patch of dirt and grass a mere 20 metres from the unfaithful stretch of road that lead us here, that we hoped would take us away.

We awoke to the ambience of the road and wandered over to the Chevron. Here we shared a coffee and our dreams. I tried to think of a plan B as things looked dim but drew only a blank. However whilst I was picking dirt and sticks out of Zelda’s matted hair we were approached by a young lady who wanted to know the dogs name. We spoke for a little and discovered that she was on her way to Anaheim. This meaning nothing to me and seeing that Zelda showed no reaction upon this disclosure I was happy to let her walk away and resumed my futile plans for a failsafe. As she reached her car I asked Zelda 'where is Anaheim anyway?' she said ‘near LA’ and simultaneous to her response an explosion of recognition ruptured her sleep ridden consciousness and we both ran to the car. After the usual formality of our ride asking if we were planning on killing them and us denying that that was our intention we were graciously accepted the whole way through frat stories, high mountains and sketchy driving right to Zelda’s front door where we spent a peaceful afternoon catching up with her parents before my long flight back home.