Dale, Boone and I were gathered at a small round table in the continental breakfast area, tossing down synthesized juice and carbs. Dale looked pretty hammered, and I was trying to get an explanation as to how we arrived at the motel several hours ahead of them.
"It started when Boone lost his phone after we stopped to switch cars", Dale explained.
"I was following Dale in the Gremlin and I was driving the Duster again, when we went over a set of railroad tracks and I saw something black fly off the roof of his car. Several miles later I decided I better try to call him and figure out if it was anything important, and as Billy and I rummaged through the Duster looking for my phone, that's when it hit me that I left it on the Gremlin!"
Dale nodded in agreement as he swallowed another bite, "So, at that point, he's following Darren and I, but he can't call us to pull over, so we were another five miles down the road before we stopped."
Boone furthered the story as Dale forked another section of his double stacked waffle, "We talked Darren and Shari into returning to look for the phone, while we stopped in the next town and had supper at KFC."
"KFC?" I looked between the two of them, incredulous, "That's the best you could do?"
"Billy's choice", Boone explained, "He was pretty adamant as soon as he saw the sign, so we just went with it".
"Where did you guys stop and eat, that was so much better than KFC", Dale asked with a knowing smile.
"We didn't, Rachael got us Arby's to go, but you knew that already. Dad must've said something", I discerned.
Dale laughed, "Yeah, he said she was moody, driving off course, wouldn't stop...he didn't sound too happy with her, when we were talking in the room."
"She really got under his skin yesterday", I explained, "I thought I might have to make Dad ride with me for a while, but we made it."
"We have to thank her for the homing beacon she left on that allowed us to find the motel though", Boone laughed.
"What do you mean?"
Dale stuck his hand up to cut Boone off, "So we took the exit like you said, then we turned right at the first street, but there are three motels and four restaurants around here, with all the parking lots intertwined, so we pulled beside each other to figure out which one we were supposed to be in."
It was a race to see who would get to the punch line apparently, and Boone took the lead at this point.
"So I told Dale that it looked like a Drag Week car sitting in the far lot with it's head lights on!"
"We drive over to investigate, and it's the Belvedere...headlights on, driver's door open about a foot, just sitting there!" Dale finished with a flourish.
"Wonderful", I exhaled, "That had to be a good two hours after we arrived!"
"Probably two and a half, because we had more issues after the second checkpoint", Dale continued.