Flat Tire Read online

  Chapter Two

  He watched his sister go inside while he climbed into his car, buckled up, and started his car. He pulled on to the “driveway” of hard, packed sand and started his journey south to the main highway twenty-five miles ahead. This was the first leg of his hour and forty-five minute drive back to Barstow. The car’s high beams poked the clear, empty, steadily darkening, horizon of empty desert with nothing but road ahead and a quickly ending day.

  A quick adjustment to the climate control was needed for a little more heat to the interior as he drove down her driveway. The temperature had quickly dropped fifteen degrees and the invading night completely devoured the remaining shards of the light from the day. The uneven road gently bobbed David up and down in his driver’s seat.

  He jabbed the start button on his CD player and his favorite CD, which was perpetually resided in his CD player, started playing. He boisterously sang the lyrics by memory as he drove down the desolate road into the new darkness. The sun was just below the horizon with only red and gold glowing radiance visible above the horizon.

  He loved seeing the desert night sky on his trips out, and he has always been awed by the whole of the night sky being filled with stars, planets, and all kinds of other cosmic and celestial displays, but tonight was especially clear. Away from city lights few people get to experience this thrilling display unhampered by light pollution of the crowded cities. It reminded him of the movie “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” for the night sky was spectacularly twinkling with all of the stars.

  Just as his favorite song came up on the CD, and at that moment he felt a jolt to his car, and the handling degraded to mush. He stabbed the off button on the CD player with a thumb jab to the steering wheel radio controls and heard the sickening sound of whap, whap, whap; the sound of a mangled tire hitting the inside of the wheel well.

  Great, a blowout. I should have taken the walkie-talkie like Barbara asked. This is so typical. If I would have taken it, I wouldn’t have had this blow-out. Thanks Murphy.

  At 50 miles per hour, almost the fastest anyone could drive on this packed sand road, David easily maintained control of his car. He tapped the car brakes gently to slow down and pulled his car to the right side of the road to a safe stop. He looked down at his resettable odometer and figured he was about 10 miles from his sister’s house, and 15 miles from the highway. Either way he’s a long way from help. Nothing but empty desert stretched out for miles in all directions.

  He flung open the driver’s door, and mumbled to himself, then stepped out all knowing of what to expect. David left the door open with the alarm softly dinging; his car warning him that he had left his keys in the ignition. With a push on the trunk unlock button on the fob while climbing out of his car into the interior light illuminated area around the driver’s door, he heard the trunk open with a soft whomp. He walked around the rear of his car to confront the dilemma at hand.

  “Shit.” he muttered screwing his face into a grimace as he surveyed the useless tire on the passenger side. He walked the few steps to the back of the car, lifted the trunk lid, and peered into the courtesy light lit trunk and spotted the spare tire cover askew from the spare tire well, and no spare tire.

  “Damn.” he shouted and glowered at the missing tire and slammed the trunk shut.

  David's temper cooled and then he remembered the flat he had the two weeks ago and why there was no spare; he failed to pick up the repaired tire from Tires R Us after a nail punctured it at the construction site around the hospital.

  Marilyn used to keep track of all this stuff.

  This was the one time that he had no time to spend in the middle of the desert with a flat tire. One of his patients was in labor and he had no way to contact the hospital or his sister, and no way to repair the tattered tire.

  “Well,” he resolved to himself, “I guess I’ll hike to my sister’s house. There’s no other choice. Crap, ten miles, this will be my gym time for this week,” he said out loud and kidded to himself.

  In the back seat was his coat and he reached for it, and also pulled a 32 ounce bottle of water from a stash of ten behind the driver’s seat of his car. Water was always in his car now when in the desert; something his sister taught him. “Just in case,” she always said.

  Her driveway and the highway were not well traveled and he may be stuck for hours in the hot burning desert. She said to always carry water when out here. And he did; it became a habit

  It got very chilly. The temperature fell quickly and the darkness of the desert was only illuminated by the beautiful canopy of stars overhead.

  Wow, it’s like thousands of little night-lights shining in the night sky.

  He slowly turned 360 degrees while standing in one spot to see the whole magnificent sky.

  His brow furrowed into a worried scowl as he n thought about Mrs. Caldwell.

  This was her first child, and she would probably be in labor for eight to twelve hours. The first childbirth was usually notoriously slow. But this would give me time to hike back to Barbara’s, and arrange for Dr. Michelle to tend to Mrs. Caldwell.

  Shit. Mrs. Caldwell will be pissed, but once I explained to her my circumstances, she’ll be forgiving, at least I hope.

  In his practice, he would listen closely to each mother’s worries, and would be reassuring to them. Most doctors would just utter the obligatory “Uh huh.” and that would be that. But David cared and that is what endeared him to his patients, and also what grew his practice. He noted the personal worries of each of his patients so his staff would know how to handle each and every one of his young mothers.

  He knew that Mrs. Caldwell was in good hands. He would take Michelle and her husband Kenny to the new Cajun restaurant “Aw, Sher” for some seafood gumbo and boiled crabs as a peace offering. They would all love that.

  His resolve at its highest; he put the bottle of water on the on the car roof and pulled on his coat and prepared for the long hike to his sisters. The temperature has dropped into the mid forties, according to his dashboard thermometer.

  He picked up his water, slipped the bottle into oversized left pocket of his coat, and closed the car door. With a stab to the key fob and a “tweet” from under the hood he armed the alarm and then slipped the keys into right his coat pocket.

  Well that was dumb. Who's gonna steal my car out here.

  David again looked to the sky and admired the heavens . He turned and started his long return trek back to his sister’s house.

  After no more than four steps and was by the trunk of his car when he stopped and spotted a bright object streaking west across the black horizon.

  “Wow.” He muttered to himself, “A shooting star. This must be some kind of good luck omen,” he said excitedly, closed his eyes, and made a wish like he used to when he was a child.

  He watched as the small, bright, pin-point of light, began to get bigger indicating that it was coming towards him.

  “It’s going to go right over my head.” he said excitedly out loud.

  “Damn, I wish I had my camera. My phone camera would never get a good pic.”

  Transfixed on the object he watched as the point of light continued to expand and also began to slow. Incredulity froze him in his tracks in the chilly desert air. The growing object was steadily getting closer and slowing down ever more. Details about the object were becoming apparent and he was taken aback by what he saw.

  The object was now about one hundred feet from his car and hovering fifty feet above the desert floor. As the object descended from the sky he saw that it was saucer shaped. It was smooth with no visible seams or rivets or anything to show that it was made up of individual parts.

  “No way,” he said barely audible as he watched incredulously the saucer drop from the sky in a controlled decent. He crouched behind the rear of his car and watched in uneasy excitement. His eyes were like saucers and his body temperature began to rise. A low
hum filled the air and he could see the saucer was spinning and its spin was slowing.

  “This is not happening. I am hallucinating in desert,” he said out loud to himself his eyes transfixed on the saucer and his body trembling but not from the cold.

  The saucer, he estimated, was about one hundred feet in diameter and about thirty feet high at its highest point in the center. It was like two dinner plates put together but with half spheres protruding below and above the saucer‘s center.

  Damn., He thought, this thing looks like one of the saucers from a 1950’s Sci-Fi movie. It looks like it’s straight out of ‘Forbidden Planet.’ he mused nervously.

  He pulled out his iPhone and attempted to take a picture but his phone was dead.

  What the ….. I just charged the battery last night.

  Annoyed and confused, he shoved his phone back in his jeans pocket.

  The saucer stopped spinning and hung in the air as three landing legs extended like a tripod from the outer rim of the lower half sphere. The saucer, now hovering ten feet above the desert floor, wobbled slightly like a toy top, and it continued its descent and landed on the desert floor with a decided “thump”. The landing gear flexed slightly and cushioned the less than perfect touchdown. It was almost like the pilot, or whatever was piloting the craft, had a small problem landing the craft.