Off the Beaten Path Read online

  Chapter Four

  Twenty minutes ago she had been driving west on highway 90 toward Seattle. Her plan was to spend the night in one of the small towns along the way and get up early the next morning and make it back to Seattle before Saturday night. She had told her staff that she would not be back to work until Wednesday, but she figured she could rest up for most of Sunday and be back in the agency by Monday morning. She had some work that she could get caught up on she didn’t need to wait until Wednesday. Work would help her get through the next few months, or years, or the rest of her life.

  Kristin had no idea what had made her abruptly turn off the four lane highway and head north up highway 200 along the Blackfoot River. It was probably the same sensation that had made her take I-15 out of Los Angeles instead of heading straight up I-5 toward Seattle; she was in no hurry to get back to her empty apartment.

  She made the trek to L.A. two times during the year for business. This was the first time since that she had decided to drive herself instead of the usual airport, rental car chaos that surrounded one of these trips. She needed some windshield time to get her bearings and feel like she was in charge of something, anything.

  At the last possible second Kristin had jerked the steering wheel hard to the right and angled the Mercedes off the interstate and onto the highway 200 exit ramp. She felt the car fish tail and the tires squeal as she maneuvered around the sharp turn of the exit ramp. As she rolled to a stop at the bottom of the ramp she remembered a movie she had seen a couple of years ago about two brothers fly fishing on the Blackfoot River. The movie had painted a tranquil, almost spiritual portrait of life and fly-fishing in Western Montana. She wondered if it really could be that beautiful and serene. There was only one way to find out.

  Kristin turned right and drove north through a quaint little lumber town where all the houses were lined up in a neat row right across the street from the massive Weyerhaeuser lumber mill. The buildings of the lumber mill seemed to run the entire length of the town, and she could imagine every adult above the age of eighteen working at the lumber mill.

  As Kristin left the small lumber town in her rear view mirror she drove past a massive rock formation that was the entrance to the narrow canyon along the Blackfoot River. The closeness of the narrow canyons gave her a feeling of security she needed. The gently flowing river that ran along beside the road provided the calm that she had not felt for years. And the giant evergreens clinging to the rocks on the sides of the mountains gave her the strength she had been looking to discover for this entire trip. She found herself wishing that the twisting turning road would go on forever. There was something revitalizing about taking a sharp corner faster than the roadside signs suggested. She caught herself leaning into the corners as she turned the wheel as if the tilt of her body was attached to the skeleton of the car. She could sense the road slightly raising in elevation just enough to make her keep a constant pressure on the gas pedal but not enough that she needed to down shift except when she was coming out of a particularly tight corner. The echo of the roaring engine off the canyon walls sounded like a scream coming from way down deep in her gut.

  At the end of the long straight stretch of road the car burst out from the narrow canyon and onto a slight rise that felt like the sudden drop of a roller coaster in her stomach. What she was gaping at now literally took her breath away. Extending out in front of her in every direction was a pristine valley that appeared to be almost imaginary, like she had stepped into a canvas painting by one of the masters.

  The valley spread out in front of her seemed to be a mirage of light and color. She eased her car over to the side of the road and got out to take in every detail that had unfolded in front of her. There was something extraordinary about how the valley appeared to be both vast and secluded all at the same time. The mountains that surrounded the valley looked like their sole purpose was to hold the valley in place, to hide it from the outside world. The sky was bluer than anything she had ever seen and the valley itself had the character of the old painting that jumps off of the canvas at you. The pastures were so green they looked like they had a fresh coat of wet green paint on them. There were houses and barns scattered around the valley, none of the buildings were new but they all looked well kept. From her vantage point slightly above the valley it seemed as if she looking across the billowing clouds instead of up at them. And for a moment everything froze. Her vision didn't just expand it unfolded in front of her like she was being pulled into the valley, sucked into the painting.

  Chapter Five

  The deafening blast from the air-horn coming up the road behind her collapsed her vision and forced her back to reality. It was not a malicious get out of the road honk or a the sexy, hey sweetie want a ride honk, it was more of a,

  “Hey, lady don't step out in front of my truck and get run over,” type of warning honk. Although, two-hundred yards down the highway the trucker did give Kristin the “Hey sweetie,” honk. At least she hadn't put him in the river; she laughed and waved at the disappearing truck. He shot back a long blast from the air-horn until he was out of sight.

  Kristin climbed back behind the wheel and eased the car back onto the highway. She had gone from launch speed coming out of the canyon to a slow roll taking in every detail of the valley. There was an old schoolhouse with what looked like a national monument marker in front of it. There were a handful of roadside billboards that advertised a local diner and bait shop. The road was neither straight nor windy; it appeared to be part of the land rather than an intruder on it.

  The canyon road that she had just emerged out of had been carved out of the mountain with men and wagons pulled by mule teams as well as a lot of sweat and dynamite, and it showed it. This stretch of highway she was on now was unlike any other road that she had ever driven on. It seemed to caress the valley floor like the men that had built it went to painful ends not to disturb the valley itself. It was the first time in her life that she realized that every road that she had ever traveled was only a visitor on the earth and that the earth would eventually reclaim that narrow piece of ground that lay under it given enough time and inattention by men.

  As she rounded one of the long slow curves in the road her eyes became fixed on an old barn sitting in the middle of a pasture surrounded by a fence that looked damn near as old, both of them refusing to give up and fall down. The old structure looked as natural standing in the middle of the valley as a rocking chair sitting on a front porch. The barn was built near the intersection of the main road and a long straight gravel road that appeared to spring right out of the mountains off in the distance.

  Without thinking she slipped her foot off the gas pedal and the car slowed. When she reached the intersection she cranked the wheel hard to the right off of the asphalt and onto the gravel road. She skidded to a stop in the middle of the dirt road and stared at the barn like it was as old friend that she hadn't seen in years.

  Kristin climbed out of the car reached into the back seat and grabbed her camera out of her camera bag. Although her camera had been sitting in her backseat for the entire trip this was the first time she had felt the urge to take it out and shoot any pictures since she had left Seattle over a week ago. Kristin walked up the road with her camera held out in front of her like a hunter holding his rifle ready never taking her eyes of the barn. She would stop every few feet and stare at the old barn, but not just at the barn but everything around and beyond the teetering old structure. Despite her years in front of a camera she still loved being on the viewing end of the shutter.

  She found the perfect angle to photograph the old barn. She took twenty or thirty shots of the barn at slightly different angles while she played with the exposure and the zoom. When she thought she had enough good shots she started walking back to her car, she suddenly realized how far she had walked from her car and how great it felt just walking down that gravel road. She remembered the old James Taylor song “Walking down a country road” and found herself singi
ng it as she headed back toward her car. When she reached where the car was parked she threw the camera into the back seat and stood there thinking about what she should do next.

  Kristin starred off down the long straight dirt road in the direction the car was already pointed and wondered what was at the end of that road. Before she knew what she was doing she had jumped over the closed door and into the driver’s seat like she was propelled forward by an unknown force. She stomped down hard on the accelerator and the shiny red convertible threw gravel and fishtailed as it tried to find some kind of traction on the gravel surface. The cloud of dust that the car kicked up could have been the cloud that had been following her for the last the last year. She had no idea how fast she was going and did not care. It appeared to her that she would drive straight down the dirt road and into the mountains that lay in front of her, and no one would ever see Kristin Palmer again.

  She did not even realize that she had picked up her wedding ring off the console and that it was clinched in her hand so tight that is was about to pierce her skin, again. She was on the verge of tears, partially from the pain of clutching the ring in her right hand and partially from the pain of the last few months. She did not realize how out of control she was until she heard the pop of the tire and felt the shudder of the car as it turned sideways in the road and headed broadsided for the grass covered ditch. As she watched the scene unfold in slow motion she closed her eyes and thought contritely, I've been heading into the ditch for years.

  Chapter Six

  Kristin gasp and coughed through the cloud of dust that surrounded her. She was still behind the wheel but the car was stopped and she couldn't tell what direction she was pointing. Kristin opened the car door and stepped out onto the gravel road. She walked slowly around the car and discovered that her left rear tire was blown out. She stood looking down at the flat tire with just the slightest bit of amusement. She thought to herself that this was probably the first time the shiny red Mercedes had ever been off the smooth confines of a paved highway. Kristin lightly ran her fingers over the line of the body as she walked completely around the car to make sure nothing else had happened to the Bright Red SL600. Talking directly to her car she asked, “What’s the matter Red, mad at me for taking you off the Interstate?”

  After she finished her walk around inspection of Red she took a couple moments to gaze at the valley surrounding her and the mountains rising in the distance. Although she was at least forty miles from civilization with a flat tire, sideways in the middle of a dirt road she was still amazed at how captivating the valley was. She didn’t even try her cell phone to call for help. She knew that she would not get a cell signal this far out in the country and besides who the hell was she going to call? And to be perfectly honest she was looking forward to changing the tire herself. A little elbow grease and dirt might just be what the doctor ordered. She looked down at the flat and said calmly.

  “Well, that tire isn’t going to change itself, better get to it.”

  Kristin pulled the jack, the lug wrench and the spare tire out of the trunk. She found a level piece of ground to place the jack on and gave the handle of the lug wrench a couple good pumps to make sure the car would be okay when she jacked it all of the way up to take the tire off. One problem, the lug nuts wouldn’t budge. She tried everything. She even stood on the jack handle but her one hundred and fifteen pound frame just wasn’t enough to break the lug nuts loose. Kristin thought to herself, they must have put these damn lug nuts on with the air wrench equivalent of a jack hammer.

  She was just about to have another go at the lug nuts when her attention was caught by a cloud of dust off in the distance. The cloud was coming from the direction that she had been headed in before her little blowout. Apparently the contour of the road had changed quite a bit not far from where she was parked; it seemed to become hillier with dips and turn that hid the owner of the dust cloud. She couldn't quite make out the vehicle headed in her direction but she was pretty sure that it would probably turn out to be an old pickup.

  The source of all the dust cloud was not moving exceptionally fast but it would slide in and out of her sight hidden by the small hills and ravines. Kristin grabbed her camera and focused the zoom lens in the direction of the cloud. Yep, she was spot on. An old pickup, probably an early 80's Chevy. She watched the old truck for a little while then grabbed her water bottle off the backseat and pulled up a seat on the hood of her Mercedes to wait for the calvary to show up, at least she hoped it was the calvary.

  Chapter Seven

  Kristin was still sitting on the hood of her car when the old blue Chevy pickup rolled to a stop about thirty feet in front of her. She could see a man behind the wheel and gold colored dog in the back of the pickup. She slid down off the hood as the truck came to a stop; the dog immediately leaped out of the back of the truck and headed straight in her direction. The dog came to an abrupt stop when the man in the truck whistled and yelled out loud,

  “Sam, don’t you dare jump up on that nice lady.”

  The Yellow Lab pulled up just shy of where Kristin was leaning against the fender and promptly sat down, tail wagging and obediently waited for some attention. Kristin obliged, she squatted down and started scratching Sam behind the ears. She started talking to Sam.

  “You’re a good boy, aren’t you Sam?”

  “Girl,” said the man emerging from the pickup.

  Kristin looked up at the man leaning against the old truck with a one word question,

  “Sam?”

  “Short for Samantha, my wife’s idea.”

  The man leaning against the hood of the pickup in faded jeans, cowboy boots, and an old blue work shirt was wearing a Rockies baseball cap and a warm smile that immediately put her at ease. He was in his early forties and about and a half a head taller than her. He had a farmer’s tan and a rugged face that looked like it belonged in one of those old Camel cigarette commercials. She could see a hint of gray dusting the sides of his temples and peeking out from underneath his baseball cap. When he took off his sunglasses and threw them back through the open window of the pickup she noticed that his eyes were the same deep blue as the sky above her.

  “Lug nuts giving you a problem?” He asked with genuine concern.

  Kristin smiled and said,

  “Yes, as a matter of fact they are, I think those guys in the tire shop see just how tight they can make them before they break off.”

  “Let me see if I can loosen them up for you.”

  When he got to where Kristin was kneeling down and petting Sam he stuck out his hand and introduced himself, “Jack’s Evan’s.”

  Kristin stood up reached out and shook his hand, “Kristin,” was all she offered. Jack heard the hesitation in her voice at not wanting to volunteer her last name. He noticed that she didn’t have a wedding band on despite the fact that there was a wear line on her finger where a ring had been not so long ago.

  Kristin was impressed when Jack shook her hand. It was a real handshake, like he was shaking hands with another man. Not like one of those wimpy, week handshakes she got from some of the men she did business with in L.A. or Seattle.

  She had always wondered why some men think that you are supposed to shake a woman’s hand like it might break, didn’t they understand that women deserved a respectable handshake as well. Jack's hand was tough but not hard with a warm familiar embrace to it, like they were old friends.

  “Nice to meet you Kristin; let’s see if we can break those lug nuts loose.”

  He took the lug wrench from her and knelt down in the dirt next to the flat tire. She noticed that his hands looked like they could have loosened the nuts without using a wrench at all. His hands were strong and steady but they were not callused or hard. She could tell that he was busting the lug nuts loose without any effort, although he tried to make out like it was more difficult than it really was.

  Kristin laughed. “I loosed them up for you.”

  Jack looked up and smiled a
tepid smile; he knew that he had been caught.

  They both smiled a knowing smile.

  Kristin reached into the backseat of her car and grabbed her camera. She squatted down in the dirt and took a couple close-up shots of Jack’s face as he changed the tire. Jack blushed a little and told her that there were a lot more interesting and beautiful subjects around to photograph.

  “Don’t sell yourself short Jack; there are people in the big city that spend thousands of dollars to look the way you look at this very moment.” he blushed again.

  “Long way from home?” Jack asked, trying to change the subject.

  “The closer I get the longer it seems,” Kristin replied, as she stood up and looked out over the valley and took a long drink from her water bottle.

  Jack had the tire changed and was putting everything back in the trunk in less time than it took Kristin to get a Latte at her local Starbucks. As he closed the trunk lid he patted her car lightly on the trunk and said, “There you go Red, good as new.”