An excerpt from, Savoring the Chaos‍

‍White Socks ‍

My phone rang at 2:50 a.m.

Not buzzed. Not vibrating politely on the nightstand. Rang. Loud enough to snap me out of sleep and straight into that split second where your brain runs through every possible catastrophe before you even sit up.

Hospital. Fire. Jail. Or worse, the gendarmes.

I answered it with a sound that wasn’t a word.

“Oi mate,” the voice said. Cheerful. Alert. Entirely unconcerned with the hour. “I’m out front.”

Out front of what, exactly, was not immediately clear.

Then it hit me. Mike.

The Englishman. The solution. The problem. The guy I’d hired off a website that looked like it hadn’t been updated since George W. Bush’s first term. The man who, according to his messages earlier that day, was somewhere between England and Burgundy with a van, a trailer, and my fate.

I swung my legs out of bed and shuffled toward the stairs, still holding the phone away from my face like it might explode.

“You’re… here?” I asked.

“Yep. Pulled up a minute ago. No rush.”

No rush. At 2:50 in the morning. In rural Burgundy. I hung up and headed outside.

The yard was dark except for a single headlamp cutting through it like a lighthouse beam. Parked at the edge of the drive was a white van pulling a narrow box trailer that looked less like a car hauler and more like something your lawn guy used for his riding mower and yard equipment.

My phone rang at 2:50 a.m.

Not buzzed. Not vibrating politely on the nightstand. Rang. Loud enough to snap me out of sleep and straight into that split second where your brain runs through every possible catastrophe before you even sit up.

Hospital. Fire. Jail. Or worse, the gendarmes.

I answered it with a sound that wasn’t a word.

“Oi mate,” the voice said. Cheerful. Alert. Entirely unconcerned with the hour. “I’m out front.”

Out front of what, exactly, was not immediately clear.

Then it hit me. Mike.

The Englishman. The solution. The problem. The guy I’d hired off a website that looked like it hadn’t been updated since George W. Bush’s first term. The man who, according to his messages earlier that day, was somewhere between England and Burgundy with a van, a trailer, and my fate.

I swung my legs out of bed and shuffled toward the stairs, still holding the phone away from my face like it might explode.

“You’re… here?” I asked.

“Yep. Pulled up a minute ago. No rush.”

No rush. At 2:50 in the morning. In rural Burgundy. I hung up and headed outside.

The yard was dark except for a single headlamp cutting through it like a lighthouse beam. Parked at the edge of the drive was a white van pulling a narrow box trailer that looked less like a car hauler and more like something your lawn guy used for his rider mower and yard equipment.

And standing beside it was Mike. White athletic socks pulled halfway up his calves. Pale knees glowing faintly in the dark. Wearing a t-shirt that had seen better decades and loose athletic shorts. My brain was still foggy, but hold on a minute. Are those coach’s shorts? You know the ones every football coach and gym teacher in the 70s wore. The ones with the three-inch-wide elastic waistband? I think they are. He looked rested. Energized. Like a man who had just finished a good nap and was excited to get on with his day.

“You ready?” he asked. That’s when I noticed something important. There was no tow truck.

This was not the beginning of the problem.

At this point, the car had been dead for days.

Not moody-dead. Not intermittently sulking. Properly dead. Wouldn’t start. Wouldn’t click. It sat in the driveway doing absolutely nothing but costing me money.

The local garage couldn't fix it. The dealership in Dijon couldn't look at it for another month. By then we'd be long gone from Burgundy, headed back to Charente-Maritime.

Maday, the relocation specialist who had helped us move to France and had become part of our survival infrastructure, had miraculously secured an appointment at a Mercedes dealership in her town, Carcassonne. Carcassonne was 600 kilometers away. But the problem was now in her hands, and if anyone could make something happen, it was Maday.

Which left one question. How on Earth do you move a dead SUV from Burgundy to the South of France?

Enter Clicktrans. A shipping marketplace that connects you with independent transporters across Europe. Think eBay, but instead of bidding on vintage lamps, you’re bidding on strangers to move your problems.

Mike’s bid came in at £795. He was driving from England down toward Carcassonne the next day. He said he could pick it up on the way. Not exactly a straight line, but I don’t understand the world of European transportation.  Mike spoke in pounds. France thought in euros. My brain heard dollars. Somewhere in there, I stopped converting and started agreeing. I said yes.

Was this legit? I had no idea. But I had to do something. Between the two rental cars and the dead Mercedes, I was bleeding euros like a punctured wine bladder. So I booked him.

The next day, nothing. Radio silence. That is until around five in the afternoon, when Mike messaged to say he’d be there in a couple of hours to pick up the car.

Okay. Not ideal. But I’ll take it. A couple of hours turned into three. Then four.

Meanwhile, my friends were on glass number eleven, well past casual enjoyment and deep into the part of the evening where time stops mattering. I was pretending to be present while quietly running through everything that could go wrong and checking my WhatsApp every sixty seconds.

By midnight, we were still alert, still talking, and enjoying that wonderful confidence that only comes after enough wine convinces you everything will probably work itself out.

More importantly, I was completely confident that Morning Paul could handle whatever happened next.

Then Mike called.

“Oy mate, I'm on the road but gettin’ tired. Might pull over and kip a bit. I’ll let you know in the mornin’ what time I’ll be there.”

That was fine. I went to bed.

Apparently, Mike’s definition of “the morning” began at 2:50 a.m.

“Let’s pull the Merc up the ramp,” he said, casually pulling two narrow metal rails from the trailer like this was a routine Tuesday. “Drive it up nice and slow.”

“Drive it?” I asked. “Mike, the car doesn’t even start.” He looked at me for a moment, processing this information like it was mildly inconvenient but not disqualifying.

“Well then, we’ll push it, won’t we?” Push it. A 2.5-ton German panic machine. At three in the morning. Push it. It was parked on gravel. It was the middle of the night. And the ramps he was holding were about a foot wide each.

Oh no, I just can’t… I told Mike “I’ll be right back”.

I did what any self-respecting man would do in that moment: I went inside and woke up my friend Eric. Eric, mind you, is an aeronautical engineer. Designed helicopters for the US Navy. Calm. Precise. Not a man who appreciates late-night improvisation involving massive vehicles and gravity.

I rousted him from his wine-soaked slumber. Thankfully, he got up.  I gave him a ten-second briefing. “Guy from England. Dead Mercedes. Trailer. Ramps. Three a.m.”

He blinked. Paused. Then said, “Okay.” Which is how I knew I hadn’t explained it well enough.

We walked outside together. Eric took in the scene — the van, the ramps, Mike in his socks — and looked at me. “You’re serious?” he said.

I told him he was going to have to help me push it up those ramps somehow. He just stared at me. He is a good man. I told him I would put it in neutral and see what happens.

I opened the driver’s door and reached under the push-start button and pulled it off to insert the emergency key. If I could get the car into neutral, we could roll it.

As I fumbled around the button, pressing where I’d pressed a dozen times before, something happened. The dashboard lit up. The engine turned. The car started. Just… started.

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It got worse.
White Socks continues in Savoring the Chaos. →‍ ‍