Thanksgiving Vacation
Delaney Callahan tossed her suitcase into the trunk of her 2012 Toyota Camry and slammed the hood closed. She went to the driver's door, opened it and, before sitting down, she looked around at the empty campus and smiled. She could not believe her luck, and her family would be super surprised when she showed up later tonight to celebrate Thanksgiving with them tomorrow.
Delaney was a19-year-old, college junior currently attended Clemson University in South Carolina. She was a member of the cheerleading squad, and she had never had the opportunity to get off campus during the long Thanksgiving weekend until this year. The Saturday after Thanksgiving was always Rivalry Weekend in NCAA football, and the Clemson Tigers always played their rivals, the South Carolina Gamecocks. As a member of the cheerleading squad, Delaney and the other girls, and a couple guys, were told not to leave campus because of the game Saturday. This year, the restriction had been lifted, as long as everyone was back on campus by Friday evening. Delaney's family was from Philadelphia, and she decided to surprise everyone by showing up late Wednesday evening.
She tossed her brown suede, faux fur lined jacket into the passenger seat along with her orange scarf and purse, sat in the Camry, started the engine and checked her iPhone. The Waze traffic app told her to avoid the route she would normally take when driving home. The Wednesday before Thanksgiving was considered the busiest travel day of the year, and I-85 to I-95 was a parking lot. Waze told her to take I-77 north into the Blue Ridge Mountains, then northeast on I-81. The route was typically longer than her traditional route, but today it would save her hours on the road. She figured she would get to her family's house before 10 pm.
She checked her makeup in the mirror out of habit and was happy with what she saw. Delaney was not conceited but she knew she was very pretty. At five-foot, three-inches tall and an athletic 110 pounds, with wavy auburn hair and blue eyes, she was able to catch the boys' eye while walking around campus. Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail and her makeup was perfect. She plugged her phone into the charging cord plugged into the adaptor in the center console, backed out of the parking space and started toward home.
The roads were congested but moved along at a decent pace, until she was on I-81 and the traffic ground to a halt. A check of her Waze app showed there was a crash approximately ten miles ahead that had several lanes blocked. The app did not suggest taking an alternate route, but she saw a state road, SR-11, less than a mile away, and it would help her bypass the crash and enable her to get back onto I-81 in Christainsburg.
Delaney pulled the Camry onto the shoulder and raced past the stand still traffic to the exit for SR-11. She turned north and found the two-lane road devoid of most traffic. The road, according to the app, was empty except for small towns that were at least fifteen miles apart. In between the towns, there was nothing but open country and gorgeous mountain views in the dwindling sunlight.
She was making great time when, in an area between the towns of Pulaski and Dublin, Delaney noticed a knocking sound emanating from her engine. At first, she ignored it, but soon it got louder and she began to worry. The check engine light illuminated on her dashboard as the knocking got louder. She looked at the dashboard and saw the engine temperature gauge was starting to redline. Delaney was not a motorhead, but her father had taught her basic automotive knowledge. She knew the car was seriously overheating. She pulled the car to the shoulder on the empty road just as the engine stalled.
She attempted to restart the engine but that endeavor was unsuccessful. The sound coming from the motor was unlike anything she had ever heard from her car before.
"Shit," she muttered, as she popped the hood and exited the car.
She opened the hood, propped it on the yardarm and looked at the cooling engine. There was nothing glaring or out of the ordinary - no steam geysering from the radiator or some type of engine fluid erupting from another well - but the car was apparently not going anywhere anytime soon.
Walking to the passenger door, she opened it and retrieved a few napkins from the glovebox. She went to the engine and pulled the dipstick out of the oil reservoir. She wiped it with the napkin, reinserted it and removed it. To her horror, there was no oil on the stick.
"Fuck," she said out loud.
Delaney knew exactly what was wrong with the car. For one reason or another, the car had developed an oil leak, dripped out all the engine oil and the motor had seized up due to the lack of lubrication and extreme hot temperature.
Knowing this would ruin her surprise visit, she decided she had to call her father and tell him what had happened. Delaney was not worried because she had Triple A and could get a wrecker out to her location to tow the car. Unfortunately, she would probably miss Thanksgiving. Her mind was running though ideas to either get to Philadelphia or back to Clemson, when he retrieved her iPhone from the car and dialed her father's number.
Nothing happened. She tried again but the call did not go through. She looked at the phone as saw the "NO SERVICE" indicated in the upper right corner of the screen and noticeable lack of signal bars ensured no calls were going out from this location.
"Fuck me!" Delaney snapped as she noticed she was getting cold. The sun was starting to disappear behind the mountains, and the cool November air was rapidly getting chillier.
She looked at her outfit - white long sleeve Clemson University t-shirt, True Religion Brand Halle mid-rise super skinny jeans and brown mid-calf boots with a three-inch heel - and figured it was not enough for the impending cold weather. She grabbed the suede jacket and scarf from the passenger seat. After wrapping the scarf around her neck several times, she pulled the jacket tightly around her and assessed her situation.
The phone had plenty of juice, so she just needed to get to a place that there was a signal. She had plenty of extra clothing in her overnight bag, so she could layer up to help against the cold. She had not seen another car since she stopped - had actually seen only one or two cars since she got on SR-11 - but she ascertained that she could flag down the next passing vehicle and ask them to call the police for her. Dad always told her, when in doubt just call the cops.
It took almost thirty minutes before she saw the first car, a Chevy Silverado, but the driver ignored her as she frantically tried to wave him down. It was not until an additional ten minutes had passed when an old Honda Odyssey minivan came by in the dwindling light. Unlike the pickup truck's driver, the minivan pulled to a stop in the roadway next to Delaney.
The passenger door window went down and the driver asked, "Miss, you need some help?"
In the gloom of the minivan, Delaney could make out the driver. It was a man, boy actually, and he appeared to be very young. She walked to the open window on the passenger door, leaned in and she realized he was probably younger than she had originally thought. The kid behind the wheel looked no older than 14, maybe 15. He was tall and lanky, with a head of unkempt red hair and a face full of acne.
"Thanks for stopping," Delaney said. "My car has an oil leak and my engine seized up."
"Man, that sucks," the kid said. "Anything I can do to help? I ain't got no oil in my van."
"My phone doesn't have a signal," she said. "Any chance you can call someone, maybe the police, to come help me?"
The kid sighed. "The cellphone reception sucks out here. Always has and probably always will. I'm heading home. It's a couple miles up the road. If you want, you can come with me and use my phone there. It's a landline so it works all the time."
Delaney knew from a young age to never get into a vehicle with a stranger, but this was a kid. She glanced at the interior of the Odyssey and saw he was most certainly alone in the vehicle.
