I wasn't lost, but the longer I followed the directions given me by the Guide-Rite navigational system of the big Boditexx site-work truck I was driving, the more I got the feeling that I was being led into a time warp, alternate reality, or maybe a green and genteel Hell.
At first I made a point of counting the times I saw the Confederate flag proudly displayed on cars, and given a place of honor on flagpoles. But when that number passed a hundred I gave up. In fact, after about the two hundredth Southern Cross I started watching for COLORED ONLY signs. Up for nostalgic purposes only, of course. The Civil Rights movement of the 1950's and 60's had been over for around eighty years. I told myself that these people must know that. It was in all the papers.
Seeing plenty of faces as black as mine and seemingly at ease in this Rebel Hell did a little to help ease a sort of anxiety I really wasn't used to feeling. But not a lot. All the non-ornamental gunracks I saw may have had something to do with it.
I'd always been of the opinion that the South was actually on another planet than the one where I lived, and I'd never really wanted to leave the city of Detroit on planet Earth to visit it. As head honcho of Boditexx's Morphology section I shouldn't have been going out on an installation anyway. I had a well-trained crew for that. But company loyalty, especially to a struggling outfit like ours, can be a bad monkey to have on your back. Riding second ape was pure fiscal need.
The process which had condemned me to this trip below the Mason-Dixon line had begun when our CEO Kurt Yeo turned up in my section the week before. Visits weren't unusual. The fact that he came wearing a nervous, apologetic smile, and bearing two fresh Konas and a big plate of his wife's famous ginger cookies let me know it wasn't a social call.
Wanting some privacy if I was going to be told I had to play hatchet-man, or was myself about to get the axe, I settled us into the brainstorming pit, a quiet, sunken-floored corner of my workroom with big cushy chairs and couches. The fabric was stain resistant. Blood should wash off.
"Okay, Kurt," I said once I had a coffee and a cookie. "Consider me softened up. What's the bad news?"
He took a deep breath, let it out. Tucked his long, glossy black hair behind his ears and off his thin face. Took another deep breath, then said in a rush, "We need you to go out on an installation, Jeff. Personally work with a special customer."
At least I wasn't fired. But as unwanted news this came in a close second. "I'm not sure that's a good idea," I answered honestly, trying go say no without actually using that two letter word. "You know how I am at customer relations."
Yeo grinned, relieved that I hadn't blown up. "Yeah, you suck at it. Believe me dishi, this isn't something I'd normally ask you to do." His smile faded, and he dropped his bombshell. "Here's the thing. We just got a tentative order for a hundred Model A bods."
I nearly spilled my coffee. "A hundred?"
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