Run: Day 13

Word Count: 78,056

Summary of Events:

After having their dine-in brunch without any incidents, Ty and DaNiel continued north and west on I-84; they were passed by a police car that DaNiel had initially feared meant to pull them over; before long another police car, as well as a fire truck and ambulance had passed while traffic had slowed to little more than a crawl, indicating an accident was ahead. Because their car was running low on fuel DaNiel elected to pull onto the shoulder and shut the car off, during which time he slept, while Ty, after having had a brief nap, chose to get out of the car and explore the land decently close by until finally the accident was cleaned up and they were able to continue on at normal speed . . .

Excerpt of the Day:

Cultivated land had started to flank the Interstate again — something they’d largely left behind not all that long before traffic had started to slow near the accident — when the car started to slow; Ty didn’t recall having heard the ding, but he looked over at DaNiel, whose expression was grim as he pulled over to the side of the Interstate again, right near an offramp.

“We’re empty?” Ty asked.

“Yes,” DaNiel replied. “We could maybe milk it a little farther, but not far enough.”

“What are we going to do?” Ty asked.

“I don’t know,” DaNiel replied.

Ty sat silent, feeling quite anxious. He didn’t really want to be stuck in Idaho, even if he had wanted to see more of the running water, and he especially didn’t want to be sitting on the side of the Interstate for hours with traffic hurrying by at the regular posted speed limit of 80 miles an hour.

They hadn’t been sitting at the side of the road for too long before Ty noticed a vehicle, a big pickup truck that looked like it was used for hard work, pull up behind them.

Silently he waited, noticing that the driver had gotten out and was walking over to DaNiel’s door. Ty put his hood over his head to disguise himself as the driver stopped at DaNiel’s window, which DaNiel rolled down.

“You need something?” the driver — a man who looked strong and hardworking — asked.

“Yeah, with waiting to get through that accident back there we ended up using up our gas,” DaNiel replied. “So we’re pretty much out.”

“Aw man, and Palisades Corner isn’t even that far away,” the driver said. “I don’t have a can in the back, but there’s a farm up there, I’ll go see if he can spot you a gallon or so, you guys are so close.”

“Thank you,” DaNiel said.

“No problem,” the driver replied.

He walked back to his truck, got in, and took off past them.

“You really think he’s going to get gas for us?” Ty asked.

“We can only hope,” DaNiel replied. “We have no jerry cans to carry any gas that might be found at that Palisades Corner place here.”

“Unless they have a store that sells them,” Ty said.

“Yeah,” DaNiel agreed.

According to the clock on the console nearly a half an hour passed before a small, off-road vehicle — one of those newer ones that could fit two people abreast and had a roll cage on it —  came kicking up a cloud of dust down the ditch until it reached their car.

A different man got out from behind the wheel than had been in the truck, DaNiel got out and went over to him; Ty saw a jerry can in the back and before long the man had hauled it over to the fuel tank and started emptying it inside.

He and DaNiel then shook hands before the man put the jerry can back, got behind the wheel, pulled a tight U-turn, and burned back the way he’d come.