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Towing. A young
girl answered and told her that it would be one hour until they
could get to her. All of the trucks were already out. Delaney had
politely declined through clenched teeth and moved on to the next
business on the list, Joe’s Towing. No answer. Just as she finished
dialing the number for the third location, her phone beeped twice.
She looked at the red flashing battery icon on the top of her
phone. Low battery. She waited for someone to answer at
Phil’s Towing. Maybe Joe and Phil are brothers. She grumbled
at the less than innovative names that plagued the towing services
in the middle of nowhere.
    “Yeah,” a voice answered on the other
end.
    “Is this Phil’s Towing?” The phone beeped
again.
    “Yeah.”
    “Great, can you send a tow truck? I’m in the
ditch on Highway forty-one heading south. Not sure where exactly,
one hour north of Milwaukee?”
    “More details, little lady,” he said.
    “I don’t have any, but my phone is almost
dead and it’s freezing,” she urged. Come on.
    “Well, probably about two hours out. That is
if I can find you,” he replied.
    “A white Honda Civic headed south on the
east side of the”—beep, beep, beep—“road,” Delaney finished,
looking down at the blank screen on her phone. She slammed her
phone on the steering wheel then looked at out the passenger side
window at the freeway above. She knew that even if a car happened
to drive past, the odds were slim that someone would notice her
white car buried in the ditch below amid the flurry of white. She
resolved that she had two choices, although neither option was
favorable in the conditions of blinding snow and sub-zero
temperatures . Without any notion of how long the blizzard
would last, she opened the door in dire hope of flagging someone
down.
    She exhaled as she pulled out her hat from
the console, adjusting it over her head full of waves to fit snug
over her ears, and then reached to pick up her overnight bag from
the passenger side floor. Just as she moved to place her mittens on
her hands, she glimpsed a pair of headlights flashing on and off up
on the side of the road to her right. Through the white-filled
haze, she spotted the glare of red blinking lights on the tail of
the truck; the driver had turned on his hazards.
    A tow truck.
    Her eyes followed a man in a full
snowsuit and ski mask, carrying a shovel as he made his way down
the embankment toward her car buried in the snow. Jesus, a ski
mask? I’m bait. A headline from her Uncle Walt, editor of the Journal Sentinel, sprawled through her head , Missing
Woman, 28, Abandoned Car Amid Worst Blizzard of the Decade.
    She looked around her car for a sharp object
but found nothing to alleviate her paranoia. He made his way around
the car to her driver side where he stood, almost knee-deep in
snow, motioning her to roll down her window. She hesitated instead,
and reached for the key in the ignition. The distrust evident in
her eyes, he took off his ski mask, unveiling a middle aged man
with gentle eyes and a goatee. A friendly wave with his gloved hand
followed. She smiled back, rolling down the window to a whistling
wind of arctic breeze and flakes.
    “Looks like you are in a bit of trouble,
miss,” he said, pointing his finger toward her car. His goatee
moved back and forth with his mouth. The hair reminded her of her
bristle brush. “I’m Joe.”
    “Sorry about that, Joe. You just scared me a
bit with your full suit and ski mask. I’m Delaney, by the way,” she
replied as she reached out her hand to shake his because that’s
what you did in the Midwest. Even in the midst of a snow storm, you
were polite.
    “Nice to meet you, Delaney. Not, of course,
under these circumstances, but I’m glad I saw you down here. I
won’t be able to get your car out now; the snow is too thick and
it’s too dangerous, but I can give you a ride if you’d like. Back
to my shop,” he said, pointing to his truck up on the side of the
road. Back to the