Linda looked out over the hood of her car and watch the steam rise up from it.
"Well that's not good." she said out loud even though she was alone in the car. In fact she hadn't seen anyone, not even another car, for the last hour as she drove through the vast expanse of the prairies.
She was on her way out to the west coast for a big job interview on Tuesday and had headed out early seeing as it was Thanksgiving and she didn't have any family to spend it with.
That was probably one of the reasons no one was on the road today as well, everyone would be just about ready to sit down to Thanksgiving dinner right about now.
She pulled over to the side of the road and shut off the car. She found the owner's manual in the glove compartment and read through it for a few minutes until she found the "Solutions to common problems" section which seemed to indicate she had a cooling system problem from her description.
"Well duh." She muttered under her breath as she popped the hood and went to take a closer look.
Not that she really expected to be able to do anything, she wasn't a mechanic and while she'd always been proud of being able to take care of herself and fix pretty much anything that might have gone wrong, even she knew this wasn't something that was likely going to be an easy fix.
She leaned over the engine and took a closer look, after a few minutes she saw the problem, a split hose coming from the radiator. She shook her head in resignation, that was going to require a visit to a mechanic all right.
She turned around and looked down the road, brushing a few errant strands of her brown hair from in front of her face. There was nothing but telephone poles and the road for as far as she could see.
She pulled her cell phone from her pocket and found no signal.
Just as she was closing the hood of her car, she heard a faint noise, it sounded like an engine of some kind. The hood clicked shut as the sound grew louder and she finally was able to determine it was coming from the field beside her.
She squinted to try and get a better look and after a couple of quick scans of the field saw movement, it looked like an ATV or something in the distance.
She got back in to her car and leaned on the horn, keeping an eye on where she had seen the vehicle. When she was sure it was coming her way, she stopped honking and got back out of the car.
It took a few minutes for the ATV to make it all the way over to the road but once it was close enough she could make out the details. It was a four wheeler, decked out all in camo, with a young man riding it. He wasn't wearing a helmet and like the ATV, was dressed in a camo shirt and jeans. His scruffy beard looking out of place on such a young man.
He pulled up and turned off the ATV, looked at the remaining wisps of steam rising from the car hood and then back at her.
"Looks like you've got a problem there ma'am, do you need some help?"
She smiled, "Yea, it's a radiator hose that's split and I couldn't get any signal on my phone.", she said as she pulled her phone from her pocket.
"Yea, we're too far out of civilization for cell phones. I can give you a ride back to my house and you can use the phone there if you like."
"Thanks, that would be great."
He motioned for her to get on the back of the ATV and fortunately she'd chosen to dress down for the trip, her pants let her straddle the seat and her sweatshirt and jacket would keep her warm as they rode to his house.
She threw her leg over the seat and held on around his waist as he started the ATV and drove. She was surprised at how muscular he was under the t-shirt, he'd seemed almost skinny when he drove up but now as she held on to him she could tell he was all muscle and no fat.
* * *
"Hey Paw, I found someone stranded by the road." He called out as they walked up to the house. It looked like a house from a painting of the prairies. Two stories, with a porch and faded and starting to chip paint, peaks and a steep roof to cap it off.
The door opened and an older, heavier and greyer man walked out, though there was no mistaking him for anything but the father. He wore a simple white t-shirt along with a pair of overalls.
"Dit'cha boy? Well, what's that, third one this month?"
"Yea Paw, just that time of year I guess."