A note from Rosemary: I have to admit, this only took me about 45 minutes to write. I was trying to think of something that I could write that I know quite a bit about. Naturally, the answer was trucking, but how to make it funny? This was the result.

A Comedy of Errors

A short story by Rosemary

August 2020

Doug North and his wife, Carol, were truckers. For many years, Doug had pulled flatbed all over the country, while Carol stayed home with the kids. Now that the kids were out of the house, Carol traveled with Doug.

On this particular day, they were in a backwater town, somewhere in the middle of northern Idaho, having just loaded up some treated fence posts. Doug was throwing a strap over the load when out on the two-lane highway, a car blew a tire.

It was a comedy of errors after that. Doug jerked his head around while the strap was flying over the load. Carol was on the other side of the trailer and moved in as soon as the strap settled. The 'J' hook had a bit of a sharp spot that neither had noticed, and that caught the back of Doug's jeans, just to the right of the centerline.

“What the hey?” Doug wondered at the sound from the highway.

Unfortunately, Carol thought he shouted, “Okay.”

She jerked the strap to make sure there was no slack in it.

The sound emitted by the driver was reminiscent of a bull crossed with a Doberman. Now, I'm not sure what that would sound like, but I'm pretty sure it would sound like Doug did at that moment.

“What’s wrong?” Carol called, hurrying around the trailer.

The back end of Doug's pants and underwear were sliced, as was a bit of his skin. There was blood leaking from his hind end, and there was a look of wonder and fury on his face.

“Why did you choose that moment to pull?” he asked, his voice just slightly below the decibel level of a jet getting ready for takeoff.

“You said, 'Okay'!" She returned.

“No, I didn't!"

“I heard you!”

“No! I said, 'What the hey'!"

By this time, she opened the side-box door and was looking for a rag with a semblance of cleanliness.

“The first aid kit is right behind my seat,” Doug said as he carefully moved up to where she was frantically looking.

She opened the driver’s door and found the white and red box, pulled it out and opened it. “There’s nothing long enough,” she told him, examining the size of all the gauze pads in the kit, and taking a measurement of the gash in her husband’s hiney.

Suddenly she thought of something. She climbed into the cab and started fishing through things in the sleeper. It wasn't long before she came out with a fresh pair of boxers for Doug and a pad from her stuff.

“Here,” she said.

“What!?" he asked, looking at the items.

“Well, you will need something to pad things as you drive, and this will also soak up any blood.”

“My seat should cushion my butt,” he told her.

“Yes, I know. Air ride seats are comfortable, but a truck isn’t.”

“We have air ride all the way around!” he argued.

“And you have air in your head, you idiot!" She pulled the paper off the pad and stuck it in the shorts. "Now, drop your pants and drawers!"

Slowly, he did, glowering. His pants and shorts were destroyed, and his backside wasn't much better. Carol took some gauze and water and cleaned the blood off of his backside. He stepped into the shorts and pulled them up, grimacing as he did.

“Now, where's some pants?" she asked him.

“These were my last,” he growled.

She just stared.

“We were heading to a Walmart with this load anyway, so I was just gonna get some there.”

“We’re going to a Walmart in Iowa. You were going to wait until we got there to get some more?

“Well, when I slipped on that gravel, I ripped the inseam on one pair. Then I spilled fuel on another and…."

“For crying out loud. Now what?”

“There’s a Walmart in Sandpoint. We can get some pants there.”

“You mean, I'll get some. What are you going to wear in?"

"Like I'd be out of place in a Walmart!"

“You know, this is pretty deep, Doug. We should get it looked at.”

“And tell the doctor what?”

“What happened.”

“Oh, for crying out loud. We're due in Iowa in seventy-two hours!"

“Do you want an infected ass?” she asked, starting to lose patience. She climbed back into the cab and came back with a skirt. “Put this on.”

Doug looked like he was going to faint. He looked at the skirt, then at his wife. "You've got to be kidding."

“Doug, have you got a better idea?”

He was embarrassed enough standing there in his tighty whities, but wearing a skirt would just about finish him off. Everyone had left the mill, but there was still traffic from the highway to contend with. Plus, the driver of the car changing his tire. By this point, he was simply standing beside his car, staring at Doug and Carol.

“At least, get me some pants?”

She laughed. "Do you really think you'd fit in my pants? They'd be shorts on you, and the ass would hurt like crazy." She was five foot two, and he was six-four.

“How am I supposed to put this on, then?” He asked.

“It unzips at the back, you idiot.” She took the skirt and pulled down the zipper. “It has belt loops, so we’ll hold it closed by your belt, and I can safety pin the zipper up as far as we can get it.”

“At least it’s denim,” he said as he pulled it on.

She cut a piece out of his ruined jeans and covered the white triangle at the top of his buttocks, then safety pinned the zipper in place.

“Ouch!” he exclaimed. “Wasn’t slicing my butt enough? Now you’re trying to sew a skirt onto me?”

“Hold still then!”

“Yeah," he muttered.

Soon, they finished tying down the load without further incident, and Doug carefully climbed into the cab. He lowered the pressure on his seat so it would give a bit more and fired up the big Cummins. He turned around the Freightliner and pulled out onto Highway 41.

Dropping off the hill into Oldtown, Idaho, he saw a sign saying 'No Compression Brakes.' "Hell with it," he muttered, as he switched on his Jake.

The Freightliner rattled down the hill, and they went through town. He turned right and crossed a bridge, only to come to a jump scale. An open jump scale.

“You’ve got to be kidding me!” he roared. “Can anything else go wrong?”

Really, he shouldn’t have asked. As he rolled through the portable scales, the DOT officer waved him over to the side. Doug rolled down the window, and the DOT man stepped up so he could speak on the same level.

“We’re just doing routine inspections today, and….”

He stopped as he saw Doug’s skirt.

“Sir, I’m kinda new at this job. Would you excuse me for a moment?”

Silently, Doug nodded. In the jump seat, Carol was struggling to keep a straight face.

A moment later, the DOT man came back with his superior.

“Sir, would you mind stepping out of your truck, please?"

“As a matter of fact, yes.”

The senior man stepped up and saw that his partner was, in fact, correct. "You know, we don't get many crossdressers in this neck of the woods."

“I’m sure you don’t,” replied Doug.

“Can I see your license and logbook?”

Without a word, Doug reached for his wallet and extracted his CDL. Next, he reached into the pocket on the driver's door that held his log. He handed them to the officer.

The Dot guy looked at the license, then skimmed through the log. “Loaded at the pole yard in Blanchard?”

“Yes, Sir.”

He handed back the log and was about to step down to run the license when he stopped. "Mind explaining the skirt?"

At this, Carol couldn’t help it. She burst out laughing, and Doug glared at her. A moment later, he lost it too.

Laughing, he turned to the officer. "Your partner may as well hear this too. It's good for a laugh, but painful as hell."

Then he explained the situation to both officers as they stood on the steps of his Freightliner. When he finished, tears were rolling down the superior's face, he was laughing so hard.

The younger man’s whole body was shaking with laughter as well.

“Doug,” the DOT man said, as he handed back the CDL. “This has been one hell of a day, dealing with loggers coming though here, running over ninety thousand pounds, each one. You’ve just made my day. You two have a great trip. By the way, this was off duty.”

Both men stepped down, and Doug fired up his engine again. He took a moment to draw a line up to mark in ½ hour "off duty," rather than "on duty, not driving" as it should have been.

As they pulled out of the jump scale and headed east, Doug commented to Carol. “Maybe I should wear a skirt more often. It gets a person out of inspections.”

Once more, she lost it.