The Runaway

She appeared from the gloom like a new star in the darkening sky. The pale flash of bare legs caught on the periphery of my old truck's headlights. For just a moment… I thought some spirit of the plains and swamps and ancient creeks had stepped forth to call an ageing trucker out from this world. So unfathomable was it that such a creature might be walking down the same dreary, back-end roads that I so often followed. Trudging through all the mud and rain and filth that we other mere mortals stir about.

But then, she turned towards my approach. A bedraggled face lined with signs of sudden hope. A thumb stuck immediately out in a gesture so human and . It took me a second just to remember all the laws of the road as I swerved to answer that siren's call. Churning gears crunched as the lumbering machine tried to turn its mind to stopping on that wet and slimy road. I tried to avoid splashing her… yet there was little space that wasn't puddled water, on this forlorn and uneven highway. A glance within my wing-mirror gave an unfortunate play-by-play of the inevitable wave rising up to douse her slender form.

I feared that she would imagine I had done so on purpose. See me as some cruel and chuckling tyrant of the night, glorying in her misery. However, the creature who braced herself against that sheet of spray seemed to do so with little flinching. I would guess she considered herself already about as drenched as one could be. Through the misting curtains of monsoon, she stepped lightly toward the cab. Young, alone and soaked to the bone… there was yet still some strong-backed pride to the way she moved. As if this storm and night were just another trial that she would clamber through as steadily as all the ones before. Admiration came easily and immediately to me, watching her navigate her way to the door I held open. She was wearing nothing but a soggy, white tank-top, denim shorts and broken-laced boots. The true colours of a homebred, country beauty… sadly far from the blazing sunshine that was supposed to accompany them.

There was a smile waiting as I reached across to open the door for her. … but no less radiant for the effort it took. Somehow it bathed me in sunlight, despite all the present weather between and above the pair of us. Her presence on the roadside was a gift to me, rather than a duty or an askance… of that much I was immediately sure. It took a moment more of letting the poor thing get further drenched… before I could find any words of invitation.

"Umm… Where are you heading… Little Miss?" Was about as much as I could offer, stunned still by the way her laden clothing clung tight to every curve.

"Anywhere drier than here…" Was the simplicity of her reply.

I nodded once, and she hopped on up. Closing out the storm behind her. The smell of rain and wet hair instantly suffused all the small confines of my small and cosy cab. Parts of her dripped at irregular intervals onto the various surfaces of my world. Adding a whole new rhythm against the racket from outside. I set the truck back in motion and turned the heater up a notch. Measuring movements in the corner of my eye as the girl tried to vaguely ring out her hair. It wouldn't do to stare… and the road was hard enough to follow already.

But some visions are too blessed to be ignored.