Goines On: P-M-U-R-T

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Goines jerked awake, cold and shivering, drenched in sweaty T‑shirt, from as horrific a nightmare as had ever afflicted him. Goines had been driving, and he shuddered now remembering looking in the rear-view mirror and seeing the nose of a pickup truck with five legible red letters, as though he were seeing them through the windshield of his vehicle and about to collide head-on with them. The letters must have been affixed in reverse on the hood behind, like E-C-N-A-L-U-B-M-A on an emergency rescue vehicle.

    And every time in the dream Goines had looked in the rear-view mirror, the letters were there, on pickup truck after pickup truck, of whatever make, and he understood, in the silent, knowing fashion of dream, that some wealthy toady must have lined the pockets of pickup truck manufacturers, likely hoping to win a Cabinet appointment, maybe seeking executive authority to regulate non-gas-guzzling automobiles.
    Goines tried to remember that electric-car entrepreneur’s name.
    Mole Sunk?
    Keno Slum?
    Slue Monk?
    Noel Musk?
    Lone Musk?
    Goines felt that the name was right there, if he could just think of it.
    God, Goines almost prayed, may I never have another P-M-U-R-T dream.

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