Shepherd

FOUR

There was half an hour to go before the convoy was due to leave. Reluctantly, Shepherd had handed over the keys to his rig to some half-wit boy who drove it into a walled compound just beyond the diner. The steel gates had slammed behind it as he watched it go. Foley, shaking his head, let out a snort of derision.

"Don't worry; they'll be giving it you back soon enough."

"I'm sure they will," said Shepherd, kicking the dirt at his boot.

"The briefing will be starting soon. We should head on over to HQ."

They crossed the now quiet lot, all activity having come to a halt once Shepherd had arrived. He guessed that all this show was for the benefit of the convoy and now, with less than thirty minutes until it left for Canada, the curtains could finally come down.

"Foley," he said. "What did they use to get you?"

"What do you mean, man?"

"You know. What leverage did they-"

"The wife. Who else? When I came back from Boston with their K-rations they pulled me into some big fancy office and offered me a deal."

"A deal?"

"Drive the rig north and my wife and daughter will be given a place in one of the camps, you know, the ones they're throwing up at Yellowstone since Chicago got nuked. Last place to hold out against the madness, they say. To buy a spot for someone will set you back a full million in hard cash. No way I could afford that myself so how could I refuse?"

"And you trust them? The people who made the deal I mean."

"Fuck-no!" he cried. "But I got no choice. Do I just leave them in Maine or take a chance that they're telling the truth? I picked them up and dropped them off before making my way here."

Foley eyed him carefully and Shepherd nodded. Then, letting out a sigh, he answered,

"Natalie."

"Seriously?" he replied. "That sweet piece of Yankee ass?"

"Do you mind?" he said, bristling.

"Sorry. She was kinda nice though. I thought you two had parted ways a while back?"

"We did."

Foley was grinning as the HQ building loomed ahead of them. Their last chance to talk before the whole circus got underway was only a few hundred yards from ending.

"I don't blame you, son," he said, patting Shepherd on the back just below the great scar on his shoulder. "If a woman sowed me back together on an operating table I'd want her too."

"It isn't like that," he managed to say though it sounded feeble. "The way we... I left things..."

"In our line of work 'ghosting' someone kinda comes with the territory."

"And what line of work is that?" he asked.

"The dirty kind, the kind that Uncle Sam loves us for and rewards us in much the same way a hooker gets rewarded for giving good head."

Shepherd snorted out a laugh and cursed Foley for a dirty old man. The trucker just grinned and as the door opened for them, he turned and offered him his hand.

"Be seeing you, Shep," he said with a depth of affection that moved the otherwise cold man. Shepherd shook it and nodded.

"Be seeing you too, Foley. Maybe when..." The words faltered on his lips.

"Yeah. Me too, buddy."

They parted inside the great open space of the hangar where a semi-circle of folding chairs had been thrown together in front of a whiteboard. Everyone was already sat with their overnight bags at their feet and some even had those polystyrene coffee cups in their hands. Shepherd looked around, saw the urn and poured himself one before taking the chair that had his name on it, written with a Sharpie pen on a piece of white paper - F. SHEPHERD.