Valero

[Flack]

We're twelve hours into our road trip and both of us are getting punchy. Everything my wife says is either funny or annoying. Every podcast sounds the same. We have been playing "guess the flavor of Jelly Belly" for what seems like days. The grape, root beer, and licorice-flavored ones are impossible to get wrong. I have given my wife white ones -- I think they're marshmallow-flavored -- three times in a row and lied to her about what flavor they are for no reason.

The panhandle of Texas is full of nothing; there's wind, and dirt, sagebrush, four hundred Dollar General stores, and the Big Texan, the place that will give you a 72oz steak for free if you can finish the whole meal, baked potato and all. As we drive past I begin to tell my wife about the time a friend of a friend completed the challenge. My wife stops me and says I tell that the same story every time we drive past the Big Texan. She asks for another Jelly Belly, but accidentally says Jelly Fellow, which is the funniest thing either of us have ever heard in our entire lives. Funnier than any movie, any comedian, any joke. It's so funny that I forget about my feelings being hurt. I only stop laughing when I realize the word "jelly" now sounds funny. Has it always sounded that way? Jelly. Jellllllly. Worried that reality is shifting I reach into the bag of Jelly Fellows -- we call them that now, forever -- and it's empty. I tell my wife the game is over. All the Jelly Fellows have left. After a minute of silence, she asks me to finish the story about the friend of a friend who ate the giant steak. She asks me if he was allowed to put jelly on the roll. Jelly. Jelllllllllly.

Up ahead is a Valero gas station. Selling gas in the panhandle of Texas is like selling breathable air on the moon. There is no price I wouldn't pay to not run out of gas here, in I-40's windy asshole. The land is so flat that you can see the Valero from miles away. You have time to dream about what might be inside. It is a three course meal in the middle of the desert. It is the American flag, firmly planted on the moon; a testament that tells the world this uninhabitable stretch of Texas was conquered by man -- that somebody went as far away from humanity as possible and against the odds, fighting nature and god, he built a fucking Valero.

V marks the spot.

The parking lot contains two pickups that are still drivable and the carcass of a third that didn't make it. Like women whose monthly cycles have synched, my wife and I are on identical missions without words being exchanged; pee, then buy food, then get gas.

The Valero is larger on the inside than it is on the outside. To the right are drinks and snacks. To the left is a store's worth of items between us and the restrooms. Dead ahead is a deli counter with various foods, all wrapped in aluminum foil. There's a short woman behind the counter who looks sixty, her middle-eastern face toughened by the Texas sun. Behind her is her mother. On our side of the counter is a Texan with a cowboy hat on his head and a gun hanging from his belt. I think he is the sheriff of Valero, protecting these frail women from all the sagebrush.

"Welcome to Valero," the woman says. As I walk toward the restroom I hear the woman continue her conversation with the sheriff, but her voice is not getting quieter and I soon realize she is talking to me, not the sheriff, and following me. "We have gasoline, we have burritos, we have cold drinks, we have blankets, we have bubble gum, we have hats..." I can still hear her talking through the door as I enter the restroom. Inside a square space about the size of an RV's bathroom are two urinals, one on the north wall and one on the east. Even with my limited understanding of physics, these two urinals can not be used at the same time by anyone not named Chang and Eng. Then again, here in the panhandle of Texas, all rules are off.

Outside the restroom are items the woman must have bought on clearance. There are light kits for trailers -- at least two hundred of them. If every trailer that ever needed a light kit stopped at this Valero, they still would not run out. Nex to the light kits are at least sixty pairs of identical blue-handled pliers.

I wait for my wife outside the bathroom door, partially because I'm afraid for her and partially because I 'm afraid of the woman behind the counter. I can't make out what the lady and the sheriff are talking about until I hear the word "genocide." Eventually my wife emerges and the two of us make our way to the front counter. Hearing the sheriff speak I realize he is not Texan; he's Dutch, or maybe German. He and the woman are comparing stories of genocide. "Eventually everything gets taken from everyone," the woman says before the two of them swing their heads around as if they were Muppets to stare at us.

"You will have a tasty burrito," the woman says and I am too tired and afraid to disagree. In front of the coolers, my wife cannot find a Diet Coke. "What are you looking for?" the woman yells. "Diet Coke," my wife responds. "No Diet Coke, only Diet Pepsi." The fact that this Valero, built in the land of nothing, has running water and electricity is a modern miracle -- and yet, we are too far from civilization for the Diet Coke man. We are in a part of the world where Coca-Cola trucks dare not go.

The lady asks us if we want our hot sauce for the burritos on the side. The burritos are already made and wrapped in foil. The sauce is in tiny plastic cups with lids. I am struggling to imagine any other way of getting the hot sauce than having it on the side. My brain is breaking down. I'm afraid if I ask a question the Dutch sheriff will shoot me. I wonder which of the old women made the burritos, and when. There are 75 burritos ready to be sold. We are the only people here. We may be the only two people who have ever been here. We may not be allowed to leave. We are in a new reality, a world where Diet Coke does not exist and pliers are currency.

In front of the register is a paper cup with Pennywise from It drawn on it. I can't tell if it's a tip cup or just a cup. "You like that?" the woman asks. "My niece drew it. She drew it in fifteen minutes. Never had a lesson." My wife asks the woman if the blankets for sale are hand made and she says firmly, "no." I am trying to imagine a world where art lessons are an option but Diet Coke is not.

With burritos and Diet Pepsis in hand, we head out to the gas pump. The wind is blowing so hard I can see how the pump is assembled. Every panel wobbles in the wind. Every bolt is being tested to its limit. I insert my credit card and immediately enter the wrong zip code because we have two credit cards with two different zip codes. The pump rejects my card, now and forever. I yell at my wife to come back out of the car and bring her card and when I turn around I find the woman from behind the counter has materialized at the pump like a tricky leprechaun making sure I wasn't fucking with her gold. As she begins explaining to me what a zip code is I get inside the car and shut the door. Then I lock it. She's still yelling at me through the window when my wife saves me. Over the howling wind I can hear them talking about the pump. Then, burritos. Then, genocide.

The price of gas here is $1 higher than anywhere else we've seen on this trip and it is money well spent. The wind's sharp, cold fingers tug at us, trying to hold us here. The gas is pumped, my wife is back in the car, and we are back on the interstate. The setting sun reflects on the Valero behind us, which remains visible for so long that I'm convinced it's following us. Please, god, let us escape. I bite into my chicken burrito and discover a sharp bone, a stinging reminder we are not free from the woman's grasp. We may never be.

I pour the green hot sauce down into the oversized burrito. The sauce tastes funny; if it's poison, I welcome it. It may be the only way out of this place.

In the floorboard lies the empty bag of Jelly Bellies. "Jelly Fellows," I say aloud. Neither of us laugh.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

Thank you for this glimpse into the Twilight Zone. Also, that's a solid job by the gal that sprinted out when the pump had an issue. Someone could have driven away with one of the pumps when I worked a summer at a convenience store and I wouldn't have done anything.

"Welcome to Valero," the woman says. As I walk toward the restroom I hear the woman continue her conversation with the sheriff, but her voice is not getting quieter and I soon realize she is talking to me, not the sheriff, and following me. "We have gasoline, we have burritos, we have cold drinks, we have blankets, we have bubble gum, we have hats..." I can still hear her talking through the door as I enter the restroom. Inside a square space about the size of an RV's bathroom are two urinals, one on the north wall and one on the east. Even with my limited understanding of physics, these two urinals can not be used at the same time by anyone not named Chang and Eng.

I think the original Wasteland created better memories in my mind than the game actually had, but this would fit right in as a room description. Man. I wouldn't put two arcade games like that in the corner of a room, but some madman thought it would be a great way to piss. "We have perpendicular pissers." Ok, that has to be in Cyberganked.

[AArdvark]

This sounds right out of a Stephen King Gunslinger novel. The eerie feeling where everything is familiar yet different enough to become unsettling and semi-nightmarish.

It would be totally weird if you had to backtrack a half hour later and there was nothing but an empty concrete slab from an abandoned gas station from the Fifties

THE
LARGE MARGE SENT ME
AARDVARK

[Jizaboz]

While I've never been in a Valero, I can identify with going in gas stations in the middle of nowhere and wondering wtf is going on! It really is an eerie feeling.. especially when the vibe of poverty is in the air. This was a cool story.

It would be totally weird if you had to backtrack a half hour later and there was nothing but an empty concrete slab from an abandoned gas station from the Fifties

Bro "ghost stories" I've heard where something like that happens still creeps me tf out for some reason lol

[Da King]

I can't wait to read the next chapter.

I also want to know why more Jelly Fellows were not purchased at the Valero.

[Casual Observer]

Great story Flack. The Valero near my home is named "Fast Eddies" and often hosts an open air Fentenol market. Sometimes bullets fly across Highway 99 and hit El Taco Boom.