My wife's father was a very successful banker. In his heart, however, he was a long haul trucker. She grew up listening to C. W. McCall's Convoy and watching Burt Reynold's Smokey and the Bandit. The family even watched the offshoots such as Kristofferson and Ali McGraw's Convoy and the continuation of the Bandit series, that would have been difficult for anyone but a true enthusiast to endure. Their family vacations were usually road trips, sticking to major highways, it was guaranteed that they would have a C.B. mounted under the dash. As he retired, moving from Seattle down to the Miami area, he chose to drive his own moving truck.
My lovely wife Cathy volunteered us to help with the move. I was not as thrilled as she was, but was more than willing to do what I could to help a wonderful family that was very accepting of me. It also did not hurt that Donna, Cathy's mom, was very attractive. I also owed him a great deal in that he had helped us out financially and with amazing contacts when we were just starting our trucking business. In reality we did very little, they had hired a crew to pack their household goods and load the truck. It was actually a lovely two days of hanging out with the family reminiscing.
The reminiscing included long recountings of family vacations, Cathy in the back seat pumping her fist to get the trucks to honk their horns. It also led to Cathy again volunteering our service. We were to travel along with them, ala Bandit style, meeting them at their new house to observe the unpacking. My father in-law, Ted's, corvette being our ride helped to improve my outlook on this venture.
As I had a couple of things to arrange at the company before I could take off, there was a small alteration of plans. We would leave a couple of days after Ted and Donna. Actually this was little more than a pride thing, as I had hired well and the company ran fine without me. As driving the car would be faster and less tiring, we estimated that we would likely catch up somewhere in Texas on I10. As they were climbing into the truck, Donna handed Cathy her final assignment. We were responsible for a box that Donna had packed herself, not trusting the packers with "personal" items, which we were to deliver to their new residence.
In addition to having the box promptly handed to me, I also had the task of distracting Donna and Ted while Cathy affixed two bumper stickers to their trucks rear bumper. One identified their call signs as Papa Bear and Foxy Mama along with the C.B. channel which they tended to monitor. Apparently this was a reference to past road trips and the handles they had been anointed them with. I was able to appreciate the one she placed on the driver's side of the rear bumper for passing cars much more: "If You Are Happy And You Know It Flash Your Tits".
Slipping behind the wheel of the red convertible corvette, I felt much better about the trip. As I had seen very little of the country, I looked forward to the drive down the Pacific coast and across the South to the Atlantic coast. With the top down and wind blowing through our hair, Cathy and I even discussed renting a car and returning home via the Atlantic coast and across the Northern border. It also helped that Cathy was looking very sexy. With her floppy hat and sun dress blowing, she looked carefree and happy. It might even help me with my business; it feels a bit odd at times being the President of a major freightliner company with my travel experience being limited to flying to a meeting here or there and directly home.
However, I get ahead of myself as to how we made it to that point. Hardly out of our gated community, I realized that I had not packed my mother in-laws box. As we discussed this and the need to flip around, we realized that we had not even taken it home from Ted and Donna's house. Their old house was on the way to the highway, thus it would not even be a delay for us, as long as someone else had not found it. Our concern grew as we drove. With relief we saw the box beside the driveway.
Jumping out and gathering the box, I noticed it was tipped on its side. Picking it up, I also noticed the top flaps were no longer folded as neatly and tightly together as when Donna handed it over to us. Placing the box between Cathy and I, we backed out continuing our trip. On the highway and approaching cruising speeds, I confessed my concerns about the possibility that someone else had opened the box before we recovered it. As Cathy had no idea what its contents were, she tried calling her mother. Cathy planned to open the box giving her mother a run-down of the contents. However the call went unanswered.