The blast of an air horn caused him to jerk upright and slam the back of his head against the hood. He twisted out from beneath it in time to see two large headlights settling behind the Monte Carlo on the shoulder of the road. The stink of diesel exhaust filled the air.
Ellie had gotten out of the car and was standing on the shoulder again, her small shape silhouetted against the approaching headlights. David winced at her, as if it hurt to see her. “I told you to stay in the car.”
“Daddy?” she said, fear in her voice.
He reached out, touched her shoulder. She felt very much real. “Get back in the car, honey,” he told her. Then he continued toward the truck, one arm up to shield his watery eyes from the glare of the headlamps.
He heard the hiss of air brakes and, a moment later, the sound of someone’s boots crunching along the gravelly blacktop. A man’s hard voice said, “Shitty place for car trouble.”
“Yeah,” said David.
The man was nothing more than a barrel-shaped silhouette until he stepped around the side of the Monte Carlo. He was a big guy in a nylon vest and a flannel shirt, a John Deere hat pushed back on his head. He pressed his large fists on his hips as he approached David, sizing up the Monte Carlo with evident disappointment.
“Hate to say it,” said the trucker, “but American-made cars ain’t what they used to be.” The man turned toward David, his frown brightening into a grin. In the glow of the truck’s headlights, the man’s teeth looked as large and as gray as tombstones. “I’m Heck. Hector.” He held out one thick hand.
“Tim,” David said—the first name on his mind. He shook the man’s hand. “You wouldn’t know how to fix it, would you?”
“That depends. What’s wrong with her?”
“I don’t . . . I don’t know.” He rubbed his eyes. “Everything was fine until we blew a tire. I changed it with no problem, but when I went to start it up again—nothing. Not a sound.”
“Who’s ‘we’?” Heck asked while simultaneously leaning in through the open driver’s window. He reached for the keys in the ignition, then saw Ellie in the passenger seat. “Well, hello, sugar.”
“Hi,” said Ellie.
Heck cranked the ignition a few times with nothing to show for it. “Bummer, ain’t it?” he said to Ellie.
“Sucks,” said Ellie.
Heck chuckled. “You said it, darling.” He withdrew from the window, then went around to the open hood. David trailed behind him. Those large meathooks parked back on his hips, Heck surveyed the engine in silence. After a full minute had passed, he stared at David and said, “Can I make an admission?”
“Sure.”
“At the risk of having to turn over my Man Card, and despite the fact I make a living driving that big rig back there, I really don’t know piss-all about cars.” He grinned, exposing those tombstone teeth again. “You and your kid live around here?”
“No. We were heading for a campground about a hundred miles northwest of here.”
“Well, I’m heading in that direction myself, so I’ll offer you and your girl a ride. Or if this puts a damper on your camping weekend, I can drop you someplace else. Just hate to see you folks stranded out here with night closing in.”
“That’s very kind. I’d appreciate it. The campground will be just fine.” It wasn’t lost on him that Hector was observant enough to see through Ellie’s disguise and recognize her as female. It made him slightly uncomfortable, and he would have preferred to part ways with Hector right away, but they needed this man to get them to the campground.
“Wonderful,” Heck said, removing his cap and sliding a thick-fingered hand through the buzzed gray bristles of his hair. “I’ll give you a hand loading your stuff into the truck.”
“Uh, we don’t have any stuff,” David said. “It’s just us.”
“Guess you ain’t a Boy Scout. Camping with nothing more than whatever’s in your wallet.” Heck jerked a chin at David’s bandaged arm and the blood on his shirt. “What happened there?”
David hugged the injured arm to his ribs. “Sliced my arm changing the tire.”
Another whiskied chuckle rattled up out of Heck’s throat. “Yeah, yeah,” he said, shaking his head and moseying around the side of the car again. “No Boy Scout, all right.”
44