Rumble strips weren’t made for walking. Yet he back-peddled on the divots with mustard-colored All-Stars. Auburn dread locks twizzled under a dark blue knitted cap. The backpack listed off one shoulder with a sleeping bag rolled on top like a large croissant. It was as if National Geographic was filming a twenty-something’s Sherpa free ascent up Mount Everest. With a drug-rug hoodie and denims hanging over his long legs, he made eye-contact. A thumb shot straight up as if to say “I’m okay,” instead of a slight tilt in a desired direction.

It was spring of 2003, and hitchhiking went by the wayside a while ago. My wing-tipped leather shoe let up on the accelerator as I passed. I pulled over. He grabbed the brown grocery bag beside him and hoofed it toward my Lexus. I turned off my audio book, tossed my briefcase in the back seat, and popped the trunk.

The cool breeze brushed my hair as I walked around to the rear of the car. He had a couple of days of stubble, and when his hand extended toward mine, I reciprocated without hesitation. Eye contact was a brief afterthought.

“I’m Kent.”

“Jimmy. Hey, thanks. I’ve been getting a lot of odd looks, and honks.”

“No worries, I didn’t think hitch hikers existed anymore. The state police would have given you a ride eventually.” I pointed to the trunk for his belongings. “Hop in the front seat.”

“Cool.” Jimmy peeled off the hoodie as he walked toward the front of the car. We climbed in as a semi blew by. Jimmy set the paper bag on the floor and buckled up. 

“As they say, Jimmy, where you headed?”

After a one syllable laugh, his finger extended toward the windshield. “Anywhere in that direction.” 

“Good thing my car is facing that way.” I glimpsed his green eyes, identical twin dimples, and a pea-sized mole on his upper left cheek. He looked fresh out of puberty and only his long-weathered dreads aged him. An old girlfriend in college had dreadlocks and explained the long process of gardening her hair which ended up looking like a bunch of untended weeds. “To or from, Jimmy?”

“Huh?”

“Are you heading to or running from somewhere?”

“Yeah,” he said flatly.

“Right. Good one.” I tapped my thumb on the steering wheel. “Pick one just for fun.”

Jimmy adjusted his seat and looked on.  “Okay, but first tell me why a ‘suit’ like you would pick up a guy like me?”

Why would you get into a suit’s car?  I loosened my paisley tie as if prying off a choke hold. “I don’t know. Either it was the dreads reminding me of an old friend or the high-end jeans you are wearing. You paid extra for those holes, right?”

Jimmy rubbed his hand across one of the barren places just above the knee. “Got them at a thrift shop.” The young man looked straight ahead and bobbed a nod. “Pick one, eh? Where to or where from? Hmm.”

“Yes, it’s a place to start, or I could turn on talk radio.”

Jimmy recoiled. “I suppose where from is all right because I have no idea where I’m going.”

“I’m going as far as Cedar Rapids. It’s closer to ‘no idea’.”

Jimmy’s shoulders settled a bit. “You remind me of my aunt.”

My eyebrows stretched.

“She juked words, messed with them, you know. Conversations for her were like playing racquetball. She found more angles to swat at words.” He shook his head lightly with a smirk.

“Funny, words are what bring in the dinero for me. I am always in dissection mode.”

“Dissection mode?”

“Yes, slice and dice, turn a phrase, you know, like Gus from the movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding. Have you seen it?”

“Oh yeah…Um…’Give me a word, any word, and I will tell you the Greek origin of that word.’”

“And there you go.”  This just might be better than talk radio. “I’m a columnist for a paper in Ann Arbor. Only 500 words a week, so I need to be cutting edge or I’m back to managing a restaurant. I supplement with some freelance work and a rare speaking engagement.”

“What’s the name of your column?”

“Spit It Out.”

“Ha. Right. For real?”

“Have you ever taken a bite of something expecting a certain flavor? When I was a camp counselor, the first time in the dining hall they set out bowls of vanilla pudding. They were evenly spaced down the center of each table. I loved pudding, so when no one was looking I stole a big spoonful and…” I pursed my lips.

“And…”

“It was mayonnaise.”

“Geez, what’d ya do?”

“Spit it out.”

Jimmy held his hands out face up and shrugged. “Of course. Duh.”

“It wasn’t even the fake mayo of my youth. I could’ve swallowed that, no problem.”

Jimmy adjusted the cap holding back his dreads. “Wow, Spit It Out. Seriously?”

“Seriously.” I draped a wrist over the wheel. “Where you from?”

“Marshall, Michigan.”

“Quaint.”

“Yeah, quaint and boring and small and touristy and— “

“A place from which to leave.”

“For sure.” Jimmy sighed and looked out and down. I caught a glimpse of a tattoo on his upper left shoulder straddling his neck.