The sound of country music came from the radio, and there was occasionally scratchy conversation on the CB. Mike's arms swung the steering wheel around, and the big rig turned and began to crawl down the on-ramp to the interstate. His attention was attracted by a figure standing on the shoulder, pale in the glare of the truck's headlights in the late dusky dimness. Mike grinned. It was a young man with his thumb out.
The big rig slowed and hissed and eased to a stop on the side of the exit, just past where the hitchhiker was standing. In the right side mirror, Mike could see the young man in the red glow of the truck's side lights, hurrying up along the side of the rig. The young man clambered up to the cab and opened the door.
"You headed east?" asked Mike over the rumble of the idling diesel engine.
"Yeah, I'm headed for the coast," said the hitchhiker.
"Well, you're in luck, kid," said Mike. "I'm headed all the way to the coast. I ought to get there about one in the afternoon tomorrow."
"Great!" said the boy, climbing into the cab and slamming the door.
"I just ask one thing," said Mike, shifting gears and pulling the truck back into the exit lane. "When I stop to sleep later tonight, I want you to give me dinner, okay?"
The boy paused, mentally calculating how far the small amount of money he had with him would go. "Deal," he said. "It'll still cost me a lot less than a bus ticket."
The driver grinned, making no response to that. He extended his powerful, coarse hand. "My name's Mike," he said.
The hitchhiker shook the driver's hand. "I'm Tim," he said.
The driver merged into traffic on the interstate, and then looked over his passenger as well as he could in the dusky light and the glow from the dashboard. The kid was wearing jeans, a light-colored t-shirt with a printed picture of a rock band, and the kind of big sneakers which were popular among kids but which the driver just found goofy-looking. "How old are ya, kid?"
"Eighteen," said Tim. Mike wasn't sure he believed him, but it didn't matter to him.
"How come you're headed for the coast?"
"To get away from where I was," said Tim. "Life in that little town is the pits. And my girlfriend just broke up with me. There's nothing for me there."
The driver smiled grimly. He could fill in the parts the boy wasn't telling: the high school he hadn't finished, the parents who he couldn't get along with. He could see that the boy had no specific plans, but was just vaguely headed "for the coast".
"Well, I understand," said Mike. "That's why I started driving, 'cause I don't like to stay in just one place. I've been driving for seventeen years this last April." He scratched his chest. "'Course, it gets kinda lonely on the road. That's why I like to give a ride, for the company."
The truck eased around a bend to the left, and the lights from an oncoming car let Tim get a good look at the driver. He was a large, burly man with broad shoulders, and a moderate gut that filled out his white t-shirt and just barely drooped over his belt. His powerful arms were covered with curly dark hair. He wore a cap, but his grey-flecked brown hair could be seen at the sides. He had a thick moustache, and his eyes were brown and sober.
"You pick up a lot of hitchhikers?" asked Tim.
"Pretty often," said the driver.
"Well, I really appreciate the ride." said Tim. He looked behind him at what looked like a little bed in a dark room. "Is that a sleeper?"
"Yup, the motels and all are just too expensive, and the front seat ain't too comfortable," said the driver. "This kind of cab costs more, but it's worth it if you're on the road a lot."
The two made conversation into the night, with the CB and the country-western radio filling the occasional pauses. The driver took a liking for the kid; he might be a runaway, but he wasn't a wise-ass. The driver liked that.
After many hours, the driver pulled off at a rest stop and guided the deep-breathing rig into a space in a long line of trucks. "Well, here's where we bed down for the night," said the driver, shifting the gears to let the diesel engine idle. "You're welcome to join me in the back; there's plenty of room for both of us. You get in the back first, so I can keep an eye on the cab."
Tim crawled through the gap between the shoulder-rests into the sleeper, followed by the driver. Tim had never slept in such close quarters with anybody, and felt a little awkward, but said nothing. Mike removed his cap and unselfconsciously stripped off his t-shirt, revealing what looked in the dim light like a very hairy and well-muscled chest. Then he reached down to unlace his boots, paying no attention to Tim.
Tim was not sure what to do; he would have really rather slept in his clothes, but maybe truckers always undressed to sleep. If Tim had been a little more experienced, he might have taken the driver's move as a possible indication that the driver wanted sex from him, but this thought didn't occur to him. He decided that the best thing to do was to follow the driver's example. Tim slid his t-shirt off, and then slipped off his shoes and socks and jeans. Soon the hitchhiker and the much larger driver were lying back in their dimly-white underwear, a respectful space of unoccupied bed between them.
"You think you're gonna be able to sleep okay?" asked the driver.
"I don't know," said the boy. "I know it's late, but I'm wide awake."
The driver chuckled. "You're just excited from being on the road," he said. "I got something that'll help calm you down." He fished under the corner of the mattress, pulled something out, and put it in Tim's hands. Tim recognized it as a little curved liquor flask.
Tim felt very grown-up being offered this adult drink by the driver. He unscrewed the shot-glass-sized cap and poured himself a capful. Taking a breath, he downed the capful and managed not to cough or splutter.
The driver spoke again, and Tim heard a grin in his voice. "You better have you another one," Mike said.
Tim poured himself a second capful and drank it. If Tim had been a little older, he might have realized that the liquor had a very odd taste; but he had only experimentally drunk a little from his parents' liquor cabinet with his friends and wasn't able to tell one drink from another.
"You want some?" asked Tim, proffering the open flask back to the driver.
"Naw," said the driver. "I don't think I'll have any problem getting to sleep tonight."
Tim screwed the lid back on the flask and set it aside. He already felt the pleasantly burning warmth from the drink. Then he suddenly remembered something. "Oh, shit!" he said. "I was supposed to get you dinner!" There was no restaurant at this rest stop.
The driver scratched his hairy belly, and Tim thought he heard the driver's belly rumble. "Don't worry about it," Mike said. "We'll take care of that in a little."
Tim took this to mean that he would buy the trucker a meal tomorrow. "Okay," he said.
"How you feeling?" asked the driver.
"Okay," said Mike. He was glad he was lying down, because the drink was making him feel strangely dizzy but comfortable. In fact, the sleeper was already seeming less cramped. "You give this drink to a lot of hitchhikers?"
The driver chuckled. "Only the ones I ask for dinner."
Tim considered that. "So some of your hitchhikers pay you back other ways?"
The driver scratched at the rise in his underwear. "Yeah, I have some of 'em give me head," he said.
"The girls, you mean?" asked Tim, again feeling grown-up to be having such a conversation with a grown man.
"Girls and boys both," rumbled Mike. "A blow-job feels as good from a boy as from a girl."
"Yuck," said Tim. "I wouldn't let a guy blow me." Then he suddenly fell silent; it just now occurred to him for the first time that driver might be looking for a blow-job. He looked at the situation as if he were seeing it for the first time: he was lying here in the dark in his underwear, and the driver was much stronger than him and was in the way of the only exit.
As if reading Tim's thoughts, the driver chuckled again and mussed Tim's hair with his hand. "Don't worry about it, kid," said the driver. "I said I wanted you for dinner."
Tim tried to think of a response to that, but he noticed something else. "Man, this drink is weird!" he said. "I feel like I'm getting smaller."
"It can make you feel like that," said the driver. "So, anyway, whatcha gonna do when you get to the coast, kid?"
"I dunno," said Tim. "I guess I'll hang out for a while and then look for some kind of job."
"You graduated from high school?"
"No," said Tim.
"I don't know too many places that'll hire ya without a high school diploma," said Mike. "Lotta kids like you end up in a bad way. A lot end up hustlin'-- you know, having sex with men for money. A lot just end up out in the cold."
Tim said nothing. He really didn't want to hear this.
Mike continued. "But I ain't gonna let than happen to ya, kid. I got a nice warm place you can stay."
Tim turned toward Mike, interested. "Where's that?"
The driver looked straight at Tim and slapped his soft, hair-covered belly. "Right here, kiddo. Inside of me."
"Huh?" said Tim. This completely failed to register on him.
"I'm gonna swallow you up, like Jonah and the whale." The driver licked his lips hungrily.
"That's ridiculous," scoffed Tim. "How can you do that?"
"Ain't you noticed that drink's making you smaller?"
Tim gasped. It was true. He had thought it was just an aspect of the alcohol, but now he realized that both the sleeper and the driver loomed much larger than they had a few minutes ago. Tim looked and realized that was already less than half the height of the hulking driver.
"Now, don't worry, kid." said the driver. "It ain't gonna hurt at all. And it's for the best for everybody." His stomach rumbled ominously.
"For the best?" cried Tim. "Maybe for you. What about for me?" He shrank away from the driver against the sleeper wall.
The driver chuckled and drew the shrinking boy's smooth body against his larger, hairy body. "I know you ain't gonna thank me, kid, but this is a lot more humane than letting you go starve on the beach. No sense letting you go to waste." The trucker rubbed his stomach. "I think you'll find it's nice and warm and comfortable inside of me, and there's a lot worse ways you could go. If I let you loose, you'll just go and cause trouble for the folk that live by the beach, breakin' into houses to eat and whatnot, so I'm saving everyone a bunch of grief. And it's good for me-- I'm damned hungry, and you're lookin' pretty tasty, boy." He licked his lips again.
"But-- the cops," spluttered Tim. "They'll find out."
Tim could see Mike's big moustached mouth grin in the darkness. "Nobody knows where you are, kid," rumbled the driver. "And they ain't never found out about none of the other boys I ate, either."
"Please, don't," begged Tim, squirming against the driver's warm, hairy body but unable to escape from the driver's strong arms. "I said I'd buy you dinner."
"No," drawled the driver. "You _are_ my dinner, kid. Why do you think I picked you up? Now, no more talking. Down the hatch you go."
The driver sat upright and lifted Tim's diminished but struggling body in both hands toward his face. Even in the near-darkness, Tim could see the driver's mouth gaping wide open, like a cave into perfect blackness. Mike's big tongue came out and tasted Tim on the forehead. "Mmm," rumbled the driver. Tim felt the driver's warm breath on his face.
Then the driver pushed Tim's head completely inside his mouth. Even with Tim's reduced size, the driver had to stretch his mouth admirably large to take the boy's head in. Tim felt the warm wetness of Mike's tongue covering his face, and heard slick noises against his ears as Mike took him slowly further in. Mike's moustache tickled on Tim's neck.
Mike looked down at the back of the young man's body he held in his hands and mouth. The boy was still proportioned like the young adult that he was, but overall he was now much smaller. Mike hungrily admired the smooth curves of the boy's butt, now naked as the oversized underwear fell off of the shrunken boy. Mike watched the little arms and legs frantically but uselessly flailing. Mike's mouth was crammed too full to smile, but he would have smiled if he could at his prey's strugglings. Partly pushing with his strong hands, and partly gulping with his powerful mouth and throat muscles, the driver took more of the hitchhiker into his mouth. He took in the boy's shoulders, and then the chest and upper back. The flailing of the boy's arms stopped as Mike's lips gradually pinned them.
Tim felt the warmth of the driver's mouth and throat around his head and torso, and told himself this couldn't be happening. Tim had never heard of one person swallowing another, but it seemed it was possible after all. He wished desperately that he had not left home. Here he was, halfway swallowed by a hungry truck driver; rather than a future of freedom on a beach, it looked as though the only future Tim had to look forward to was a burly truck driver's stomach.
Mike drew his tongue back and forth across the delicious boy's chest, tasting him. Ah, this boy was good. Mike felt his cock stiffening in his shorts and wished he had gotten a blow-job from the boy. Well, too late for that now.
Mike gulped again, taking the hitchhiker in so that his greatly stretched lips surrounded the boy's waist. The boy's legs still kicked, hanging out of the truck driver's moustached mouth; but that did not slow the driver down at all as he gulped more. Mike felt the boy's smooth ass sliding against his upper lip as he sucked it inside him. Mike's belly rumbled again, eager to be filled.
Tim was getting exhausted in his helpless struggle. His whole upper body was nearly immobile in the truck driver's mouth and throat; he could only wiggle slightly. He still kicked his legs, but he was getting tired, and felt the mobility of his legs decreasing as the mouth and throat muscles squeezed around him and drew more of him inside. There was nothing he could do to stop the trucker.
Mike swallowed and swallowed, taking the boy to his thighs, then to his knees, then to his calves, and then the driver's soft lips were around the hitchhiker's ankles. The feet still twitched, but this was all the struggling Tim could make now. The truck driver sucked at Tim's body again, drawing the feet into his mouth. The hitchhiker was now completely inside of the truck driver.
Tim felt the throat muscles contract again, and he felt himself being drawn down the truck driver's throat into his stomach. The stomach expanded to accept him, and Tim felt himself curled up in the tight space. It was very warm and perfectly dark.
The driver sighed and stretched out on his back. He patted his hairy belly, which was now bulging with its struggling cargo. "You were delicious, boy," he said, rubbing his stomach and tasting the lingering flavor of the hitchhiker in his mouth. The driver was feeling pretty horny by now, so he slid off his underwear, scratched his wiry black pubic hair, and gripped his stiff shaft in his strong hand. "I shoulda fucked your sweet little mouth before I ate ya," he murmured to the bulge in his middle, stroking himself.
Inside Mike's stomach, Tim continued to squirm. It was indeed very comfortable and warm here, as Mike had promised, but Tim wasn't too happy about this comfort. Tim sucked at what little air there was in the truck driver's stomach, knowing it would not last long.
It did not take the driver very long to come. Sticky flecks landed in the dense hair on the truck driver's bulging belly, and the hitchhiker felt the stomach contracting around him as the truck driver came. After his orgasmic convulsions died down and he lay panting for a few minutes, Mike stretched back and relaxed, wiping his belly with Tim's rock band t-shirt. He belched, stroked his moustache, and patted his belly again. "Thanks for dinner, kid," he said. With his hunger and his horniness both satisfied, the truck driver drifted off to sleep, a smile on his face, feeling his victim still moving feebly inside of him. The diesel engine of the truck rumbled as it idled.
As the hours passed, the sleeping truck driver's powerful stomach digested the hitchhiker. All of Tim's matter was effeciently absorbed by the trucker. Mike's arms, legs, and chest were all fueled by Tim, readying for the next day's work unloading the truck. Some of Tim's matter was made into fat around the trucker's middle, making the hairy gut imperceptibly larger.
In the morning, the truck driver woke early. He grinned and rubbed his belly again, but the hitchhiker he had eaten was no longer in his stomach; Tim was now completely a part of him. Mike dressed and put him cap back on, and left the truck long enough to toss Tim's clothes in a dumpster. He returned to the cab of his idling rig and put the truck into gear. As he guided the truck back into the interstate traffic, he turned on the country-western station again and smiled, keeping a close eye out for any hitchhikers in need of a ride.