A little after noon, June commented she was hungry, surprising her husband. He’d been happy to see her eating better than normal once their trip had begun, but this confession elated him. She’d lost so much weight, especially after the chemotherapies. She’d also lost so much of her hair, she chose to wear a wig when she was out in public.

            “Get out the map and let’s see how far we are from the next town,” he told her. After finding sporadic, if any cell phone coverage in several spots during their trip, they’d purchased two state highway maps from the convenience store the last time they’d stopped for gas.

            June tried to unfold the multi-folded paper but gave up after a brief wrestling match. Sighing, Jeff pulled over at the next semi-straight stretch of road and extricated his wife from the paper’s clutches.

            “Sorry,” she half-whispered in apology.

            “No problem. Let’s see… We’re on sixty-one right now, right? Ummm… It doesn’t look like there’s a town anywhere near here until we get to Titusville.”

            “How far is that?”

            “Probably another thirty-five or forty minutes. Can you wait that long?”

            His wife took a deep breath, letting it out slowly as she contemplated. “And then we’d have to find a place to eat, then there’s the waiting while they fix it…” She trailed off.

            “What about those snacks you bought at the gas station?”

            “I didn’t buy that much, and I’ve already eaten them.”

            “We could look for a nearby hamburger joint, if you’re needing something now,” he suggested. He knew she still suffered from the effects of her treatments, plus her medications often played havoc with her system. Like a diabetic, if she needed something to eat, she needed it immediately.

            As they meandered through the beautiful scenery, Jeff ran through his mental nooks and crannies, trying to remember if he had a spare candy bar stashed somewhere. Because he was only partially concentrating on the road and his driving, he nearly passed the place until June’s shout and finger pointing surprised him back to attention.

            Backing slowly along the gravel parking area, they stopped to stare at the building and then at the sign. If the place had ever seen a drop of paint in its lifetime, it had to have been decades ago. It was as gray as wet cement. Showing every crack and droop, the building sagged its jowls like an old lady too tired to raise her head. The front steps angled off into the dirt. Windows dangled half-open. Even the front doors dragged on their hinges. There had to be at least a two-inch gap between the frame and the jamb. Amazingly, however, the place looked clean. There wasn’t a scrap of trash to be seen, not even in the parking lot.

            Somewhere at the rear of the building, smoke curled up beyond the roof and into the sky. Hanging from the eaves was a hand-painted sign on a chipped and warped board.

UNCLE BUFORD’S WORLD FAMOUS BAR-B-Q

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