Richmond and (slash)Son(slash) daughter

Richmond and Son Daughter

     Nathan Richmond laid on the horn of the family car. After a few seconds it became short bursts. They were just as loud as the long blast. Nathan took a quick glance at his family as he continued down that extremely busy highway.

     Karen sat next to him in the front seat while his three children sat in the back. Patrick, the eldest there at sixteen, had his eyes closed listening to something on his cellphone. Steven, fourteen, was playing some kind of game on his cellphone. Neither boy seem affected by the honking.

     Carrie, the youngest at ten, did re-act to it though. She had her hands over her ears. “Daddy, stop doing that.” Carrie sat between her two brothers. All of them had nice clothing on as though they were headed for a wedding.

     “Listen to your daughter. All you are really doing is making the other drivers mad. Every time you honk your horn they do it right back at you.”

     “You know how I feel when a driver cuts in front of me. It’s even worse when they barely get past me when they do it like that trucker just did to us.”

     “I don’t like it either, but there’s nothing we can do about it. The traffic is really bad today.”

     Nathan looked at the other cars beside him. Then the ones behind them via the rear view mirror. After a few seconds he went back to looking out the front window. “Every car in the state must be using this highway today.”

     For about ten minutes, according to the clock on the radio, no one said anything. Finally, Nathan did. “Did you see that? That car just entered our lane without signaling. If I did that I would have every cop in the state wanting to give me a ticket.”

     “I saw it. So what. They aren’t even close to us.”

     “They aren’t that far away either. I can understand them wanting to get past that delivery truck, but now they are in our lane – and they are slowing down.”

     “You make it sound like we own this lane. You need to calm down. The traffic is really slow today too. There’s nothing we can do about that either.”

     Another fifteen minutes passed before anything else happened. Nathan suddenly veered their car to the left. They entered the shoulder area for several seconds. Their tires gridding on the jagged line until Nathan got their car back on the road.

     “Did you see that? That car just tried to push us off the road.”

     “No, it didn’t. It just started changing lanes before they realized we were so close to them.”

     “They have been weaving within their lane for the last five miles that I know of. Beside, there’s no way they didn’t see us coming by them – unless they are blind.”

     “You need to pull over. I’m taking over the driving. If I don’t we will never get to our destination. Either we are going to get into an accident – or worse.”

     At first it didn’t look like Nathan was going to agree to do that. Then he started pulling over onto the wider shoulder on the right side of that six lane highway. After a few minutes of maneuvering over Karen was behind the wheel of the family car.

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     According to the clock three hours had passed since Karen took over driving. The traffic was just as bad, but not as bad as it was a few hours ago.

     Karen glanced down at her speed every couple of seconds. Nathan had to lean over a little in order to see it. “You need to go faster or we aren’t going to get there in time.”

     “I’m going about five miles over the speed limit. If I go any faster than that I will get a ticket. Do you want us to waste time because of a ticket?”

     “You can go faster than that. Everyone else who is passing you are.”

     “They can do that. I can’t. I’m taking a chance by going five miles over the limit.”
Another twenty minutes of silence. Then suddenly Karen slammed on their brakes. That sent the whole family forward a little. The children pitched forward while Karen and Nathan headed for the front windshield. It’s a good thing they had their seat belts on.

     After making sure everyone was okay Karen continued on. For the next fifteen minutes nothing happened. Then Nathan noticed they were slowing down. “What’s going on?”

     “It looks like we are about to join a traffic jam.” Karen pointed at the traffic in front of them.

     “Oh, great. Now we are never going to get to our eldest daughter’s graduation.”

     “Speaking of Janice, why are you changing your company name to ‘Richmond and Son’ when it’s your daughter who is joining it? You do have two sons you know.”

     “Neither one of them wants to join me in my career. Patrick wants to be a doctor and Steven is going to be a superstar at football.”

     Karen glanced at Nathan for only a second. “Most fathers would be proud to have a doctor in the family.”

     “I do. I’m just not sure how we are going to pay for it. We are still paying for Janice to become an architect. Besides, have you ever heard of a company called ‘and daughter’ because I haven’t.”

     “That’s why you should do it then. Because it has never been done before.”

     Nathan thought about that for a minute. “Maybe you’re right about that.”

     Karen eased her way into the traffic jam. “We are going to get to the graduation, but I’m not sure we are going to get there in time for the ceremony itself.”