Diana Hartwell's Arc

Chapter 5 of 5

Diana sat with her hands on the wheel and worked the problem forward. She needed rough material under the rear tread. Sand. Gravel. Branches. Anything the tire could bite. The snow around the car was powder, useless. The gravel shoulder was buried somewhere under three feet of drift, and she did not know exactly where. She thought through what she had. The floor mats were gone, left behind on the last stretch of road. The spare sat in the open trunk, still out of reach. That left the cabin. She turned in the seat and looked. The dealer's pamphlet lay in the glove box. Paper. Not enough. The owner's manual, thicker. The rubber liner under the front mat on the driver's side. She pulled it up. Ribbed rubber, stiff in the cold. It would grip better than nothing. She needed more. She popped the seat cushion release and lifted the rear bench. Underneath sat the toolkit in a cardboard sleeve, a jack handle, and a folded canvas. She took the canvas. She took the jack handle for the ice shelf. She was reaching for the toolkit when the car jolted. Not a push. A yank. The whole frame shuddered sideways and dropped an inch. Her shoulder hit the door. The jack handle rang against the floorboard. She froze on her knees behind the front seat. Through the rear window she saw it. The antlered thing stood at the corner of the trunk, one long arm hooked over the open lid. Its skull tipped down toward her. The rack of antlers scraped the trunk edge as it leaned. It pulled again. The Lincoln lurched. Metal groaned where the frame met the drift. The rear end slid deeper. She heard the ice shelf under the tire crack and reset lower. She scrambled forward over the bench and threw herself into the driver's seat. She turned the key. The engine caught. She jammed the shifter into drive and fed the gas. The rear tire spun. She heard it whine against fresh ice. No bite. The car did not move. The creature pulled a third time. The Lincoln swung a foot to the right and dropped. The passenger side tipped up. Her shoulder pressed against the door. The headlights swept across white and lit nothing. She let off the gas. Fighting it with the engine was making it worse. Every spin polished the shelf. Every lurch buried her deeper. She killed the motor. The cabin went quiet except for wind and her own breath. The car sat at a harder angle now. The rear tire hung. She could feel it in the seat, the way the weight had shifted off the drive wheel entirely. Even with rough material, even with the spare, the tire would not touch ground. The canvas lay on the floor by her boot. The jack handle beside it. Both useless until she solved a new problem. The car was no longer stuck. It was hanging.