for $3
The Special: Spark—you ought to have
Poor Junior had solely misplaced the word “plugs” from “spark,” but in that sweet sentence there began appearing some kind of mysterious confession on that rickety white sign that hung out there alone in the sky.
Super sale on all used tires
Fair and round as
beguild eyes sapp’d
w luv
No one said a thing at first. Not even Clutch, our boss. Maybe he thought it was kind of a sweet thing, Junior having a crush on some lady. Maybe he thought ol’ Junior deserved love just as much as anyone. So our gentle-hearted patron just read the sign like everybody else, whispering to himself who he thought the object of Junior’s cryptic missives surely was.
But no one had a clue. Those messages were as confusing and hard to discern as any love signal I’d ever been sent.
Special—headlite bulbs
Alite thru th dark et nite
to tarry safely pure
Nearly everyone that entered the gas station would come up to me or Junior and shake their heads with a certain amount of curiosity and frustration.
“Sure is a peculiar sign out there.” Some old man wearing big blue overalls and a red baseball hat frowned. “What’s that last part mean?”
“Don’t have a clue myself.” I smiled. “Junior here is the one that arranges the signs.”
Junior just shrugged his big shoulders and finished sweeping up the floor.
“What the hell does that sign out there mean?” the old man mumbled, shaking his head hard.
“It’s awful hard to see at night.” Junior frowned, sweeping under the rack of candy and gum. “It’s a lot easier when you have working lights.”
“What kind of nonsense is that?” the old man asked.
I just shrugged my shoulders and rang him up for a soda pop and twelve dollars of gas. It didn’t bother me that I didn’t understand. I could see Junior was a quiet kind of man, a man who liked to keep the sweetest, most private things to himself. He liked to keep most of his life locked away tight in that big barrel chest and only let it shine out through his eyes once in a while.
Soon enough, those messages out on that sign began attracting a lot of curious kinds of customers. Soon enough, whenever I’d look out those front windows there would almost always be someone driving by in their pickup or car slowing down enough to read the message fast, then they’d always shake their heads to themselves when they’d realize they couldn’t make any sense of it. People would drive by every Saturday afternoon when Junior would change the sign and try to sound the messages out as he made them, reaching up all alone on that ladder with his box full of black plastic letters.
Milk—1.12 a gal
cool n pale
as a vestal breth
from petal’d lips
By then, Junior and I began having separate shifts. He’d work the morning, from six until two, then I’d come in at two and work until ten. I kind of enjoyed working late at first. I could sleep in until nearly afternoon, lie in my bed most of the morning, smoking or reading or dreaming, or take a walk around town down to the Boneyard River, or buy myself new shoes or clothes, and still have time to eat lunch and then go off to work. But then it slowly began to get to me. Sitting in that gas station all alone. Nothing but the music of crickets chirping outside to keep me company. Nothing but the darkness of night moving quietly by my side. I spent most of my time looking out, up into the sky through those gray front windows, all covered in creepy-crawling insects, scratching at the white light inside. I’d sit there at the Gas-N-Go all alone, singing some honky-tonk songs to myself, somethin maybe by Carl Perkins or the King, straining my voice under those dull blue fluorescent lights, staring out through the big, dirty-gray windows, watching people fill up their lonely tanks with gasoline and leave their money with me and disappear back into the dark from where they came. These homely, milky-faced housewives with
The Special: Spark—you ought to have
Poor Junior had solely misplaced the word “plugs” from “spark,” but in that sweet sentence there began appearing some kind of mysterious confession on that rickety white sign that hung out there alone in the sky.
Super sale on all used tires
Fair and round as
beguild eyes sapp’d
w luv
No one said a thing at first. Not even Clutch, our boss. Maybe he thought it was kind of a sweet thing, Junior having a crush on some lady. Maybe he thought ol’ Junior deserved love just as much as anyone. So our gentle-hearted patron just read the sign like everybody else, whispering to himself who he thought the object of Junior’s cryptic missives surely was.
But no one had a clue. Those messages were as confusing and hard to discern as any love signal I’d ever been sent.
Special—headlite bulbs
Alite thru th dark et nite
to tarry safely pure
Nearly everyone that entered the gas station would come up to me or Junior and shake their heads with a certain amount of curiosity and frustration.
“Sure is a peculiar sign out there.” Some old man wearing big blue overalls and a red baseball hat frowned. “What’s that last part mean?”
“Don’t have a clue myself.” I smiled. “Junior here is the one that arranges the signs.”
Junior just shrugged his big shoulders and finished sweeping up the floor.
“What the hell does that sign out there mean?” the old man mumbled, shaking his head hard.
“It’s awful hard to see at night.” Junior frowned, sweeping under the rack of candy and gum. “It’s a lot easier when you have working lights.”
“What kind of nonsense is that?” the old man asked.
I just shrugged my shoulders and rang him up for a soda pop and twelve dollars of gas. It didn’t bother me that I didn’t understand. I could see Junior was a quiet kind of man, a man who liked to keep the sweetest, most private things to himself. He liked to keep most of his life locked away tight in that big barrel chest and only let it shine out through his eyes once in a while.
Soon enough, those messages out on that sign began attracting a lot of curious kinds of customers. Soon enough, whenever I’d look out those front windows there would almost always be someone driving by in their pickup or car slowing down enough to read the message fast, then they’d always shake their heads to themselves when they’d realize they couldn’t make any sense of it. People would drive by every Saturday afternoon when Junior would change the sign and try to sound the messages out as he made them, reaching up all alone on that ladder with his box full of black plastic letters.
Milk—1.12 a gal
cool n pale
as a vestal breth
from petal’d lips
By then, Junior and I began having separate shifts. He’d work the morning, from six until two, then I’d come in at two and work until ten. I kind of enjoyed working late at first. I could sleep in until nearly afternoon, lie in my bed most of the morning, smoking or reading or dreaming, or take a walk around town down to the Boneyard River, or buy myself new shoes or clothes, and still have time to eat lunch and then go off to work. But then it slowly began to get to me. Sitting in that gas station all alone. Nothing but the music of crickets chirping outside to keep me company. Nothing but the darkness of night moving quietly by my side. I spent most of my time looking out, up into the sky through those gray front windows, all covered in creepy-crawling insects, scratching at the white light inside. I’d sit there at the Gas-N-Go all alone, singing some honky-tonk songs to myself, somethin maybe by Carl Perkins or the King, straining my voice under those dull blue fluorescent lights, staring out through the big, dirty-gray windows, watching people fill up their lonely tanks with gasoline and leave their money with me and disappear back into the dark from where they came. These homely, milky-faced housewives with
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